Privacy Guides
In the digital age, protecting your personal information might seem like an impossible task. We’re here to help.
This is a community for sharing news about privacy, posting information about cool privacy tools and services, and getting advice about your privacy journey.
You can subscribe to this community from any Kbin or Lemmy instance:
Check out our website at privacyguides.org before asking your questions here. We've tried answering the common questions and recommendations there!
Want to get involved? The website is open-source on GitHub, and your help would be appreciated!
This community is the "official" Privacy Guides community on Lemmy, which can be verified here. Other "Privacy Guides" communities on other Lemmy servers are not moderated by this team or associated with the website.
Moderation Rules:
- We prefer posting about open-source software whenever possible.
- This is not the place for self-promotion if you are not listed on privacyguides.org. If you want to be listed, make a suggestion on our forum first.
- No soliciting engagement: Don't ask for upvotes, follows, etc.
- Surveys, Fundraising, and Petitions must be pre-approved by the mod team.
- Be civil, no violence, hate speech. Assume people here are posting in good faith.
- Don't repost topics which have already been covered here.
- News posts must be related to privacy and security, and your post title must match the article headline exactly. Do not editorialize titles, you can post your opinions in the post body or a comment.
- Memes/images/video posts that could be summarized as text explanations should not be posted. Infographics and conference talks from reputable sources are acceptable.
- No help vampires: This is not a tech support subreddit, don't abuse our community's willingness to help. Questions related to privacy, security or privacy/security related software and their configurations are acceptable.
- No misinformation: Extraordinary claims must be matched with evidence.
- Do not post about VPNs or cryptocurrencies which are not listed on privacyguides.org. See Rule 2 for info on adding new recommendations to the website.
- General guides or software lists are not permitted. Original sources and research about specific topics are allowed as long as they are high quality and factual. We are not providing a platform for poorly-vetted, out-of-date or conflicting recommendations.
Additional Resources:
- EFF: Surveillance Self-Defense
- Consumer Reports Security Planner
- Jonah Aragon (YouTube)
- r/Privacy
- Big Ass Data Broker Opt-Out List
view the rest of the comments
This is the first I've heard of a dummy load. What exactly would be the purpose of replacing the antenna with a dummy load?
RF analog electronics can often be damaged if powered without the antenna load, and of those that won't be damaged, many will be able to detect and fault for lack of antenna load.
So replacing the antenna with a dummy load will keep the system operating "normally" without risk of damage, but also without actually sending data.
So you're saying that other electronics used within the car (ones that aren't damaged by the lack of antenna) may be able to detect the lack of antenna as a "fault" and thus hinder their own functionality? Also, by "antenna", are you referring to the one used for the radio? Like an Aerial? So my understanding is that giving the antenna connection a "dummy load" is a way of removing the antenna, and stopping the sending of data, without damaging or hindering any other electronics/components of the car.
Sort of.
The electronics that do the communicating could sense the lack of antenna as a fault, then indicate to other devices in the vehicle that fault. This could potentially cause the vehicle to light it's fault indicator, among any number of other things.
And by antenna, yes it could be what you think of as an Aerial, but it likely won't be the same one as for the radio (some antennas are multi purpose, but most are tuned to specific bands)