#TBOT: Take Back Our Tech

Building a private alternative to big tech hasn't been a straight line. There has been pressure, obstacles, and moments where we wondered if the whole thing would survive.

This Saturday at VIP Summit 5, I am sitting down with Richard Grove to talk about the crashes we hit while building Above Phone and how we turned those moments into fuel for a bigger mission.

📅 Saturday, March 7th, 2026 at 12 PM ET 👉 Register now!

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🫶 @takebackourtech
📩 WEBSITE & NEWSLETTER | 🎥 VIDEOS| XMPP | SUBSTACK

Securing Your Digital Identity

In this webinar, we dive into the importance of sovereign security. Learn from real-life stories about the dangers of insecure password storage and discover how to protect your digital life.

👉 Watch the full webinar
🔒 Learn more about digital sovereignty here

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🫶 @takebackourtech
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New Pipe: Stream Without Being Watched

Curious about a YouTube experience without the trackers? In our Mindful Media webinar, we get into NewPipe on Above Phone, an open-source wrapper that lets you stream, download, and even play in the background without feeding the data beast.

👉 Watch the full webinar here
📱 Get your privacy gear

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🫶 @takebackourtech
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Building for digital sovereignty isn't just about code—it's about grit. I’m joining Richard Grove for VIP Summit 5 to share the "untold stories" of the crashes and obstacles we faced while building Above Phone, and how we turned those setbacks into a mission for freedom.

📅 Saturday, March 7th @ 12 PM ET 👉 Register now!

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🫶 @takebackourtech
📩 WEBSITE & NEWSLETTER | 🎥 VIDEOS| XMPP | SUBSTACK

Exploring Open-Source Navigation

From ancient maps on mammoth tusks to modern-day digital globes, maps have shaped civilizations. Today, open-source navigation empowers us to reclaim control over our location data. Dive into the history and the future of mapping with us!

👉 Watch the full webinar here
🌍 Explore Above

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🫶 @takebackourtech
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Cell Service Problems: More Than You Think

From lack of privacy to centralized control, traditional cell networks are filled with issues. And SIM swapping is a rising threat. If you’re using your phone number for second-factor authentication, your bank account could be at risk. We’re breaking down what you need to know.

👉 Watch the full webinar here
📲 Take back control of your digital life with Above

NATO will have combat cyborg cockroaches

SWARM Biotactics control live insects via bioelectronic neural interfaces, equipping them with sensors and AI — allowing coordinated swarm movement

Footage: SWARM Biotactics

Hidden Signs Your Phone Is Compromised

When your phone is compromised, your private data is quietly sent to someone not authorized. Sure, big tech already collects data, but here we’re talking about a third party siphoning your info without your consent. If you’ve had concerns about your phone, in this webinar I share how you can check.

🪧 Watch the full webinar
📲 Protect yourself, check out Above’s ecosystem

📂 Want alternative news? Check out these channels 📢

#TBOT is now part of GeopoliticsLive, a collection of channels covering geopolitics, politics, global news, economy, and more. All English speaking! Stay informed.

Whether you're seeking in-depth analysis, breaking news, or expert insights, our catalog has got you covered.

👉 ADD CHANNELS

Today is an important day to pray for peace in your heart. Let it fill up, overflow, and bathe the planet.

May the conflict in Iran end as quickly as it began. Please protect us, our loved ones, and the innocent in this turbulent time.

Aaron Day joins us today to discuss "The Hijacking of Bitcoin," his detailed and well-documented breakdown of how and why Epstein hijacked bitcoin.

via The Corbett Report https://ift.tt/qX1Rxda

Fungal Computing with Mushrooms

What if electronics did not have to be toxic and permanent. Researchers are testing common store bought mushrooms as bioelectronics, exploring fungal computing and memristor like behavior.

Why it matters: the world generates a staggering amount of e waste, and recycling is still difficult because of toxic materials like lead and cadmium. If bio based components prove viable, we could see electronics that are more biodegradable and less harmful from the start.

It is early research, but the direction is exciting. Less waste, less toxicity, and a new path for computing that does not rely on mining and endless disposability.

🪧 Read the full article on Substack
📲 Get privacy gear

Flock × Ring Pull the Plug After Super Bowl Backlash

Ring and Flock Safety just cancelled their planned integration after public backlash tied to Ring’s Super Bowl messaging and the fear of total neighborhood surveillance.

Ring’s statement is classic doublespeak. They say the integration would have taken more time and resources than expected, and they stress it never launched, so no Ring customer videos were sent to Flock. Notice the wording. They say customer videos, not footage or data.

The bigger point is this. Ring already has law enforcement request pipelines, and Ring already works with other police tech companies. The plan was to bridge massive surveillance networks together and sell it as “community safety.”

The backlash matters because it shows public pressure still works. These companies will keep testing the limits, and the only real boundary is what people refuse to accept.

🪧 Read the full article on Substack
📲 If you’re ready to cut off the data supply, check out Above

ICE’s Clearview AI Contract

CBP just awarded a fresh contract to Clearview AI, a company notorious for scraping massive amounts of images from social media and racking up privacy violations worldwide.

This new deal would let border officers identify travelers simply by taking their picture, and it is slated to go live in September 2026. It also builds on a previous $3.75M ICE contract that was marketed as a way to identify “ICE protestors.”

The message is clear. Opposing surveillance can make you a target. In practice, a single selfie can be enough to match your face to public profiles and flag you as a person of interest.

What you can do: treat photos as sacred, avoid auto cloud uploads, shrink your public footprint, and consider de googled phones like Above Phone.

🪧 Read the full article on Substack
📲 Take back your privacy with Above

Google Glass wasn’t a failure, it was a test balloon. They just waited a decade until society was distracted, addicted, and desensitized enough to roll out the real version.

Support my work: https://linktr.ee/Jebassler

⚡️How Is AI Deployed?

In the webinar, I get into exactly how AI is actually deployed. There’s a training phase where models learn on huge datasets, and then there’s the inference phase—that’s where you and I actually use the AI. One big misconception is that you can’t run AI without massive environmental costs. While the way big tech does it is often pretty reckless, there are ways to do it more responsibly.

If you’re interested in how we can deploy AI locally and ethically, tune into our recent webinar: Empowerment with Ethical, Local, and Private AI.

📱Explore tools built with autonomy in mind at Above

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🫶 @takebackourtech
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• dude drops $2000 on a DJI robot vacuum like a lunatic
• refuses to use the normal app like a peasant
• Sammy Azdoufal fires up Claude to crack the API so he can drive it with an xbox controller
• Claude delivers the goods
• pulls an auth token from their servers, connects successfully
• except the system thinks he controls 7000 vacuums
• checks again
• yep, seven thousand
• DJI built authentication with zero device ownership verification
• any valid token works for any unit on the planet
• Sammy now has eyes inside homes across 24 countries
• live vacuum camera feeds everywhere
• full floor plans from the mapping data
• some guy in germany eating cereal at 3am, unaware his roomba is snitching
• one API call away from being the most informed burglar in history
• all he wanted was to steer his vacuum with a joystick
• does the right thing and reports it
• DJI fixes it in two days
• back to normal life with his stupidly expensive floor cleaner
• IoT companies stay undefeated at shipping garbage security

What Epstein's Emails Reveal About Privacy and Power

After missing the deadline for the Epstein Transparency Act, the DOJ released an additional 3M pages of Epstein emails and documents, many heavily redacted. Another 2.5M documents will remain unreleased, supposedly to protect victims.

The full dataset is on the Justice Department website, and researchers are already repackaging it with AI tools to make it searchable. I used some of those tools to dig into what these files reveal about how elites behave behind closed doors, and how arrogance shows up in the details.

Epstein and associates operated brazenly through Gmail and Yahoo, using attachments and file transfers while also maintaining serious infrastructure across multiple properties.

Do not let this drain your power. Expect little from the system. Focus on personal accountability and building a life that does not feed the abusive systems that make crimes like this possible.

🪧 Read the full article on Substack
📲 Discover real privacy at Above

#TBOT 21: Epstein Files Update, ICE Expands Clearview AI, Ring + Flock Cancel After Backlash, Fungal Computing with Mushrooms

Here are this week’s stories:

What We Can Learn from Epstein’s Privacy:
The DOJ has released millions of pages tied to the Epstein case, with more still held back. We look at how the emails were obtained, where to find the datasets, and what the records reveal about how Epstein operated.

ICE’s Clearview AI Contract:
CBP just purchased a new contract with Clearview AI, expanding face search at the border using what you post online.

Flock + Ring Cancel Partnership After Super Bowl Backlash:
Amazon pushed a feel good surveillance ad and people hated it. Now the planned Ring and Flock integration has been cancelled.

Fungal Computing with Mushrooms:
Researchers are testing common store bought mushrooms as bioelectronics, exploring “fungal computing”. Could this be the future??

Share this post with your crew!

👀 Watch full show on Substack
📲 Get your privacy gear

Update: Google has not “backed down” from developer verification

Contrary to a vague mention ↗️ of a possible “advanced flow” that may eventually allow “experienced users to accept the risks of installing software that isn’t verified”, Google’s description of the program ↗️ continues to state plainly that:

Starting in September 2026, Android will require all apps to be registered by verified developers in order to be installed on certified Android devices

Until such time that they have shown evidence that it will be possible to bypass the verification process without undue friction, we must believe what is stated on their official page: that all apps from non-registered developers will be blocked once their lock-down goes into effect.

Get involved:
https://keepandroidopen.org/