Buying a computer and disconnecting it from the internet to maintain your privacy is quietly becoming a national security risk. Big Tech and government regulators are actively engineering the truly sovereign, offline personal computer out of existence. Through invasive operating system updates like Windows 11's Recall, constant background screen-recording, and local file searches that ping corporate servers, your machine is being transformed into a surveillance tool. Driven by the threat of decentralized AI, tech giants are now lobbying to classify unrestricted local compute power as a hazardous weapon, ensuring that your private data is forced through their heavily monitored cloud terminals where even personal diary entries can be reported to law enforcement. Watch: This lockdown extends deep into the hardware itself, with embedded technologies like Microsoft Pluton and mandatory Secure Boot acting as remote tethers that prevent you from running unauthorized operating systems. Manufacturers are eliminating modularity and breaking offline setup flows, turning modern PCs into leased, authenticated terminals rather than property you actually own. As crackdowns on micro-manufacturing and local tech increase, the only defense against this corporate enclosure is to embrace true hardware ownership, run local-first software and AI models, and disconnect as many of your devices from the internet as possible before it is too late.
I love Braxman: I leave my music PC unplugged because it's super slow when I leave it plugged into the internet all the time. So, the feds are worried about my gym music collection.
I don't use any Microsoft products anymore. The last one got a bug and I needed to reset it. While I owned it, it didn't come with any software and I would have to go Microsoft store and give them the code information before they would download the information for resetting the system. I had the data backup so I just went totally to Linux. I have a raspberry pi 5 that I use on the net and use a plug in USB drive for storage and. I have a second raspberry pi that is not ever connected to the Internet and I use the USB to transfer data. I also backup my data to a CD that burns the data. Not able to reuse space, but it is EMP proof. The raspberry pi operating system and the pi do all of the things I need. With the price of storage chips, the raspberry pi is not the lowest cost system anymore, but it is with their operating system in my mind, the least technical and the most secure. I use Amazon to order a lot of stuff . I am 88 years old now and I'm not to healthy. I can get things delivered to my house in a day or so at about the same price as buying them in the area and cheaper than buying them locally. Their AI knows me now. If I need to get a part for metal lathe, it will tell me that my jet lathe can't use that's size tool or that won't work with my CNC router. While I find it very helpful, it is not a good idea for operational security. At my age it doesn't matter as I have too many things wrong to survive tshtf anyway . I just do it to minimize the hassle of spam and virus. A lot of the things that were cheap a Year or two ago are now expensive because of the AI craziness. A lot of things with memory have doubled or more in price..
