Hey guys, Over the last several weeks/months, I've been doing a ton of data cleanup in my personal life, this includes deleting old accounts, removing personal information from e-commerce sites, and replacing apps that don't respect privacy with ones that do. The whole process got me thinking about how I could improve the privacy of this website for users like you. That's not to say that it was lacking before - in fact, I've always prided myself on not playing fast and loose with user data. Selling email lists or tracking users so they can be targeted with ads, is pretty much the norm these days when it comes to data. For most companies, selling user data can generate the same or MORE revenue than selling products and services. To be clear, I never have and never will sell private user data. If you live in Europe, you've got some protection, but even those won't allow you to escape the privacy abuse from companies like Facebook (or it is "Meta"?) and Google. If you want to be shocked, request your personal data from Facebook, Google. Fitbit, Samsung, Apple, or Amazon. It's easy to do but be warned that it will likely send you off on a digital privacy adventure. :-D But now I'm going off on a tangent. Here are some changes I've made to the back-end (no pun intended!), which you likely won't notice, but if some issues come up, please let me know. Some of this may be a little techie, especially if you aren't familiar with website development, but I figure I'd explain what's going on. I'll be testing these changes over the next few weeks, and I plan to implement more to improve privacy on the site. Once everything is said and done, I'll update the site's Privacy Policy. Just your friendly neighborhood ostomate. Thank you, Eric. It is greatly appreciated! I do my best to fight off the powers that be on my personal accounts etc. It is an up-hill battle. 54 years Type 1 Diabetes, insulin pump, CGM, neurological complications, retinopathy, and autoimmune CIDP. Nerve damage led to ileostomy in 1/2015. Cheers Eric, I don’t think any of us really realise how our data is gathered and used. You do go about and beyond 🙏 ileostomy 31st August 1994 for Crohns Thank you, Eric. It is greatly appreciated! I do my best to fight off the powers that be on my personal accounts etc. It is an up-hill battle. If you think it would be helpful, I'm completely open to starting a topic in the lounge to discuss ways we can improve our privacy online. 👍 Just your friendly neighborhood ostomate. Thanks for that! I'm the same way about anything that might connect to google. I self host all my fonts, and tell my site users they should use ad blockers and other privacy plugins on my site just to make sure! That said, I almost couldn't get to this site tonight. for the first time ever, I was greeted by Amazon's Cloud Front warning that I must be a bot and I'm not allowed to proceed! It sat there for quite some time before passing me through to the site. I know Cloud Front has some advantages, but I won't use it on my many sites because it's also used to collect user data. I use fail2ban on my servers, that will auto block and report anyone providing a bad password more that twice. Seems to take care of it for me. Retired engineer, now goatherd I self host all my fonts, and tell my site users they should use ad blockers and other privacy plugins on my site just to make sure! Good advice for sure! Amazon's Cloud Front Are you certain it was Cloud Front? I use Cloudflare for my CDN and some security, but also cleantalk for antispam/bots. Either of those might throw up a warning, but I don't have any adequate alternatives for either at this time. This overhaul is a work in progress and I'm stripping down everything that isn't completely necessary while replacing some services with more privacy-focused alternatives. Rather unfortunately, because the site gets hammered with bots trying to register and post their garbage, there are extra layers that I'd rather not have but need to have. These layers obviously impact performance, user experience, and are also paid services. Stupid bots. I will post more updates as the site evolves as I'd like to be transparent with the changes. If you encounter long delays with trying to get back on the site, please let me know. I know some of the settings I'm changing may temporarily create some undesirable outcomes, but only in the short term. 🤞 Just your friendly neighborhood ostomate. Thanks for putting in the effort. Appreciate it. Why? Backed up that appreciation with a donation. I was encouraged to do so by your effort to secure your site. Why? Backed up that appreciation with a donation. I was encouraged to do so by your effort to secure your site. I really appreciate that! Thanks! Just your friendly neighborhood ostomate. Eric, I am blown away by everything you do for this site. I appreciate it very much. Thank you!! Happy New Year! Laurie Just a semicolon @veganostomy Yes, sorry it was Cloudrlare that was blocking my access. Has only happened the one time though. Retired engineer, now goatherd @veganostomy Yes, sorry it was Cloudrlare that was blocking my access. Has only happened the one time though. Thanks for confirming. I'm not sure if I'll be dropping cloudflare as it offers performance and security advantages, but it's another service that can break the user experience, as you've unfortunately experienced. I will investigate this further. Just your friendly neighborhood ostomate. Was surprised to get this pop up today when I clicked the bookmark for this site. " Warning: Potential Security Risk Ahead Firefox detected a potential security threat and did not continue to www.veganostomy.ca. If you visit this site, attackers could try to steal information like your passwords, emails, or credit card details." Maybe some of the changes you have made triggered this? Why? Was surprised to get this pop up today when I clicked the bookmark for this site. " Warning: Potential Security Risk Ahead Firefox detected a potential security threat and did not continue to www.veganostomy.ca. If you visit this site, attackers could try to steal information like your passwords, emails, or credit card details." Maybe some of the changes you have made triggered this? Yup, I'm aware. Nothing to worry about as the site is in transition to a different DNS host and the error will come up until that's done. It's a longish process but it should be resolved in the next half day or so. Just your friendly neighborhood ostomate. @veganostomy Good to know! I got it too then was pushed through here very quickly. Thank you for all your work Eric! Linda
~ Crohn's Disease ¦ Ileostomy ~
~ Crohn's Disease ¦ Ileostomy ~
Ostomate since 2015: Mid transverse after cancer
Our goats always live at GoatsLive.com
~ Crohn's Disease ¦ Ileostomy ~
~ Crohn's Disease ¦ Ileostomy ~
Ostomate since 2015: Mid transverse after cancer
Our goats always live at GoatsLive.com
~ Crohn's Disease ¦ Ileostomy ~
~ Crohn's Disease ¦ Ileostomy ~
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