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A whole economy runs on your data, AI makes scams cheap and fast, and the people with the least power get watched the most. One person's weak spot becomes their whole group's.
You don't need a bunker. You need a few good habits that fit your real risks, learned alongside the people you protect. We teach them, set them up with you, and share the tools.
Everything you do online stacks up like this. Most trouble starts at layer 5 or 7, and most of it is fixable in an afternoon.
Pick yours. See what you're up against and where we can help.
Ask a local nonprofit to sponsor a session with our ready-made email. They fund it, we show up, your neighbors pay what they can.
An "attack surface" is every door someone could use to get to you: accounts, devices, people, habits, and now the AI assistants you've handed your inbox to. Let's count yours. (It's fine. It's not fine. It's fixable.)
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Lesson for the rest of us: {{ rogue.cur.lesson }}
Source: {{ rogue.cur.src }} ↗Several of these happened in tests or on developer tools. That's the point: if it happens to the people who build them, plan for it happening to you.
"Agentic" AI means software that doesn't just answer — it acts: reads your mail, clicks links, runs code, moves money. That makes it useful. It also makes it the most gullible intern in history.
Funny you should ask.
We exist to protect human dignity in a world built to watch. We do that by teaching right-sized privacy habits, setting them up alongside the groups that need them most, and building shared tools the solidarity economy can own together.
Plain-language education, free resources, no gatekeeping.
Workshops and accompaniment that turn knowledge into routines.
Shared, open, community-governed tools so no group stands alone.
Collective deletion requests, evidence, and advocacy that make surveillance costly.
Privacy is normal. You wouldn't send all your mail on a postcard.
Match protection to real risk. Panic helps attackers, not you.
The best habit is the one people will actually keep.
Your gap is your group's gap. We protect each other.
Zen Privacy Collective is a worker-self-directed project: the people doing the work make the decisions. We exist to protect human dignity through informed, intentional privacy practice — and to build that practice across the solidarity economy, one group chat at a time.
We're educators, security practitioners, systems thinkers, and organizers. Our practice draws on digital-rights advocacy, secure-infrastructure work, open-source intelligence research, and hacker-community traditions. We're independent and not affiliated with any company whose tools we recommend.
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ZPC is a worker-self-directed project hosted by Limicelia, a fiscally sponsored project of ISI, a 501(c)(3). ISI holds legal and fiduciary responsibility; the people doing the work make day-to-day decisions under a written agreement with our sponsor. Our finances are open to anyone who asks, and we'll publish who funds us.
Contributions pay for free seats, open research, and tools anyone can use. They go through our fiscal sponsor.
Hands-on workshops that turn privacy knowledge into practice. Each stands alone; together they take your group from personal hygiene to shared governance. Everyone leaves with a take-home playbook.
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{{ w.date }} · 6:30–8 PM ET · In person + virtual
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90 minutes: a short talk, hands-on practice, and small-group discussion. We cap the room at 20 so it stays human. Online folks join live. Recordings stay with registered participants for 90 days.
Pay what you can — no one turned away for lack of funds. Childcare and ASL interpretation on request. Tell us what else you need when you book.
Co-facilitate a session. We pair new trainers with experienced ones and share our curriculum openly.
For worker co-ops, mutual aid networks, co-op developers and incubators, platform co-ops, and anyone else doing sensitive work together. We fit the practice to how your group already makes decisions.
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Well-resourced orgs pay more so grassroots groups can pay less. Nobody is turned away for lack of funds.
Open source where possible, self-hostable where it matters, judged on privacy-preserving design and real maintenance. Every tool is tagged the same way so you can compare at a glance.
Tools change constantly. What lasts is knowing why you picked them.
Ask: Who benefits from collecting your data? Who has access if they're hacked? Can you audit the code? Is the organization transparent about funding? Are there recent security audits? Our job is to teach you to think critically, not to tell you which app to download.
Breaches usually aren't clever. They're the same 18 everyday mistakes, repeated — now at machine speed. Here's what each looks like in real life, and the fix that actually works.
Use this to pick your first three fixes.
Ratings are our field judgement for small groups and individuals, not statistics. Your threat model changes the order.
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Almost every fail comes down to four things: weak login protection, nobody owning access, rushed decisions under pressure, and no rehearsal for when it goes wrong. That's why our workshops start with threat modeling and end with governance — not an app list.
A shared toolkit: kits we put together, plus the hardware and services we actually recommend. Start small — two security keys and a password manager do more than any gadget.
Prices are rough ranges. Kits come with a setup session, because a security key in a drawer protects no one.
Get security keys, phones, and encrypted drives from the maker or an authorized reseller — not marketplace third-party sellers. Counterfeit and tampered security devices do show up on big marketplaces.
No commissions, no paid listings. Know a worker-owned or cooperative vendor we should list? Tell us.
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A grandparent and a platform co-op don't face the same attacks. Pick who you are to see what you're protecting, where people usually get stuck, and where we can help.
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For {{ needs.p.label }}: {{ needs.help.forYou }}
Best for: {{ needs.help.kit.who }}
MITRE ATT&CK maps how attackers break into companies. We made one for people and small groups: six things attackers try to do, and the everyday ways they do it. Pink doors matter most for {{ needs.p.label }}. Tap any door.
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OWASP ranks the riskiest flaws in web apps. This is our version for humans: the ten weaknesses we see most often in people and small groups, ranked by how often they lead to real harm. Each one comes with a question to ask at your next meeting.
Both frameworks are open. Use them, remix them, and tell us what's missing. Not affiliated with MITRE or OWASP.
Everything you do online passes through the same stack: your stuff, how it connects, the software running it, your accounts, your data, and what the world can see. Attackers pick the weakest layer. Tap one to see what can go wrong and what protects it.
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Loosely inspired by the OSI model network engineers use (). Turn on nerd mode for the jargon. We added two layers OSI leaves out: the operating system, and what the world can see. You're the eighth.
Watch how one small crack in one layer becomes a problem for a whole co-op. Step through it; the stack above lights up as it goes.
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No genius exploit. Just public info, a phone call, and settings nobody changed.
Layer 5 turned one leak into everything. A $25 security key breaks the chain.
Dani's email became the co-op's breach. Security is collective, or it isn't security.
Security keys on email. Carrier PIN. Opt out of people-search sites. Then a two-person rule for money.
Data-removal services send opt-out requests to people-search sites for you, over and over, because brokers re-list you. You're paying for convenience, not magic. Better still: prevent new leaks with an email alias per service, then clean up what's already out there. In Consumer Reports' 2024 test, careful manual opt-outs removed more listings than any paid service.
Small study: four people per option, 13 sites. DIY takes roughly 20+ hours per full pass.
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DIY works best, but it's lonely and boring. So we do it together: snacks, a shared checklist, and three hours of clicking “remove my info” as a group. Pay what you can.
Every device is a door. Some let in grandma, some let in the whole internet, and some let in companies that profit from your kid's attention. You get to choose which doors, for which places, and when.
Open the full device guide → Printable PDFOne smartphone for everything is the most convenient choice, and it opens the most doors. Matching a simple device to each place keeps kids reachable without handing them the whole internet.
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Social media isn't all harm: it can be a lifeline for isolated kids, including LGBTQ+ youth finding community. The risk rises with hours, content, and a kid's own vulnerabilities, which is why the setup and the conversation matter more than any single rule.
Our take on family tools, sorted by need and how ready we think they are. Filter by age or need; tap a dot for why.
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Adopt: we recommend it. Trial: good with setup. Assess: depends on your family. Hold: we'd avoid it. Our judgment, reviewed each season; no paid placements.
Secretly monitoring a teen's messages is the same technology as stalkerware, and it teaches kids to hide. Use visible, agreed limits that loosen as they grow, and talk about why they exist.
Bullying, harassment, and heavy social media use often show up offline first: in sleep, mood, and friendships. Tick what you've noticed. None of these prove anything alone; together they're a reason to talk.
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Addictive design isn't an accident. It's a business model. Here's what we hand over, often without noticing.
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A workshop for parents, caregivers, and kids together: build your family agreement, set up devices, and practice what to do when something goes wrong. Pay what you can.
AI is a powerful tool, and right now it's also a race. We teach people to defend against it, we use it carefully in our own work, and we decide together, by consent, where it belongs.
Moloch is an old name for a god that demanded sacrifice. Writers now use it for a trap: everyone races to keep up, each giving up a little of what they value, until nobody wanted the result but nobody could stop.
The attention economy is Moloch. The AI arms race can be too. The way out is the solidarity economy's oldest trick: coordinate. Decide together, set limits together, and refuse together.
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Anyone can suggest a tool. They write down what problem it solves and what data it touches.
We run the eight questions above, out loud, as a circle.
It moves forward only if nobody has a reasoned objection.
Every tool gets a review date. If we can't say why we still need it, it goes.
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Adopt: we recommend it. Trial: good with setup. Assess: depends on you. Hold: we'd avoid it. Our judgment; no paid placements.
Tick anything that's true right now.
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Privacy feels impossible because the internet was built to collect, and now AI is built to act. Here's the problem from four angles, why it matters to you, and what to do about it without losing sleep.
What's happening: Apps, ad networks, and data brokers collect where you go, what you buy, and who you know, then sell it to anyone who pays.
Why care: It's how scammers, stalkers, and bosses find you, and it's legal in most places.
Calm move: Opt out of people-search sites; turn off ad tracking.
What's happening: AI writes perfect phishing, clones voices from seconds of audio, and runs attacks with little human help. Even the labs' own agents have gone rogue.
Why care: Being a small target no longer protects you. Attacks are cheap enough to try on everyone.
Calm move: Security keys on email; a family code word.
What's happening: Organizers, workers, immigrants, survivors, and journalists get watched most, by employers, agencies, abusers, and bad actors.
Why care: Privacy is how people with less power stay safe enough to speak, organize, and seek help.
Calm move: Separate your organizing identity from the rest of your life.
What's happening: Convenience and attention-grabbing design push us into habits we didn't choose: one login for everything, giant group chats, AI with the keys.
Why care: One person's weak spot becomes a whole group's breach. Security is collective.
Calm move: Name an owner for every group chat and shared drive.
Every problem above lands somewhere in your everyday tech: your devices, connection, software, apps, accounts, data, and what the world can see. Attackers pick the weakest layer.
Privacy isn't anonymity. You're still you; you just don't hand your return address to everyone.
Tools people don't use protect no one. We pick the easiest habit that works.
Stop new leaks first (aliases, keys), then shrink what's already out there.
Perfect privacy doesn't exist. Good-enough privacy, done consistently, beats a perfect plan you abandon.
Password manager, security key on email, carrier PIN. Those three stop most of what goes wrong.
A grandparent and an organizer need different things. Take the quiz to find your right amount of paranoia.
Habits stick when your people do them too. That's the solidarity-economy way.
Today we teach, accompany, and equip. Tomorrow we want privacy to be invisible infrastructure, like HTTPS: owned in common, governed by the people who use it, and strong enough to push back. These are ideas we're researching, not products you can buy.
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Fake identities, CAPTCHA bypass, fingerprint spoofing, or anything that breaks the law or other people's trust. Envelopes, not masks.
Our thinking starts from tinted-windows, an open-source experiment that pairs an email alias and virtual card with every service. Developers welcome.
Developers, lawyers, co-op members, funders: if you want privacy owned in common, we want to hear from you.
Twelve questions. You get a privacy score, and the level of protection that fits your situation. Not everyone needs a bunker. Everyone needs an envelope.
You're not hiding anything. You just wouldn't send all your mail on a postcard.
After Phil Zimmermann's argument in “Why I Wrote PGP.” Privacy is normal, not suspicious.
This sets your goal level. Pick the one closest to your biggest risk.
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Your goal: {{ quiz.rec.t }}. {{ quiz.rec.d }}
Nothing you answered left this page. The score is a conversation starter, not a certification.
Your phone is the most sensitive thing you own. These settings come straight from Apple's, Google's, and EFF's public guides. Do the "Everyone" ones today; the "Higher risk" ones if your quiz goal is Registered mail or above.
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Your face is a password now. So is your voice.
Social accounts get hijacked to scam your friends. Face-search engines match strangers' photos to your profile. A few seconds of your voice can be cloned. Here's how to lock down the accounts, and how to make your likeness harder to steal.
Works for Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, X, LinkedIn, Bluesky, and the rest. Tap each one as you do it. Nothing leaves this page.
Researchers are building tools that add changes you can't see or hear, but AI can: face "cloaks" that make recognition models see someone else, and voice "jammers" that make cloning models produce garbage. Some are ready to use; most are still research.
No single tool makes you invisible. But a few layers together get you something better than magic: peace of mind. It's an arms race. Models retrain, cloaks get tested against old systems, and photos already online stay online. Use masking tools as a layer, never as the plan. The strongest protection is still the boring one: share less, blur more, and agree as a group on whose faces go where.
Bring your phone. We'll go through every account together, set up security keys, and blur a camera roll's worth of faces. Pay what you can.
Key concepts in plain language. Each entry says what it is, why it matters, one thing to try today, and where to go deeper. Follow the links between entries like a wiki.
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Free, trustworthy, and actually readable. We teach from these and you should bookmark them.
How we pick sources: we prefer nonprofits, public agencies, and academic labs that publish their methods and funding. When something is run by industry, or has a point of view, we say so. Look for “Why trust it” on each entry in the Who's who category.
Organizations we learn from, send people to, and want to back. Many are security-forward: they protect people doing risky, necessary work. Give them your money, time, and attention.
Local groups especially: a tenants' union with great security habits, a co-op tech shop, a digital-rights collective in your city. Tell us.
Community privacy education shouldn't depend on who can afford a consultant. So we fund it the solidarity-economy way: neighbors advocate, local nonprofits and funders sponsor, and everyone in the room pays what they can.
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Fill in the blanks, pick a tone, and send it to a food bank, a tenants' union, a library foundation, a community foundation, a credit union — anyone who cares about keeping people safe.
Not ready to email anyone? Tell us where you are. We share interest by city with our supporting nonprofits, so they know where to send us next.
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Every group we work with gets a tracking number. Like a pizza, you can see exactly where it is: what's happening, what's late, what it'll cost to fix, and who needs to act. No status meetings, no "just checking in" emails.
Example projects: the groups below are anonymized composites, not real clients. Leads are from our (sample) member directory.
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No projects match.
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Each project has one running log that everyone on it can see, so nobody digs through old group chats to find out what happened. We tell it things once. And because this is privacy work, the log holds only what the project needs, and we delete our copy of your details at hand-off.
ZPC is organized in local chapters. Members teach, run clinics, and walk alongside groups in their own city, in their own languages. We list each other by initials only: we practice what we teach.
Sample directory: these chapters and members are placeholders while the collective sets up. The people are notional.
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Nobody matches yet. , or start a chapter below.
Messages go to our shared inbox and get passed along; members' own contact details are never listed here.
It takes three people and a room. We bring the curriculum, the facilitator training, and the pay-what-you-can model.
Workshops, clinics, and community nights on {{ cal.topicCount }} topics, from scam-proofing your parents to privacy governance for co-ops. October is booked. After that, dates are proposed: tell us which ones you want and we'll confirm them.
{{ cal.sel.when }} · {{ cal.sel.where }} · Pay what you can
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Nothing on this topic this month. Try another month, or .
Any session on this calendar can come to your co-op, union hall, library, or group chat. You bring the people; we bring the curriculum.
Privacy and security headlines from {{ news.srcCount }} newsrooms and watchdogs, sorted by what they mean for you. Each story links to the ZPC page that helps. We collect the feeds on our side once a day, so your browser never talks to the news sites until you click.
Tap a day to see only its stories. Tap it again to clear.
Stories can count toward more than one topic. Tap one to filter.
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No stories match. Try clearing a filter or picking a longer range.
Headlines and summaries belong to each publisher; we link straight to them. Topics are tagged automatically by keyword, so the occasional story lands in an odd bucket. Sources: {{ news.srcList }}.
Book a workshop, bring us to your group, teach with us, or request a kit. We only ask for what we need to reply — and we'll never sell or share it.
Sensitive situation? Say so in the note and we'll switch to Signal.
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