Degoogling

Basic description

The DeGoogle movement (also called the de-Google movement) is a grassroots campaign that has spawned as privacy activists urge users to stop using Google products entirely due to growing privacy concerns regarding the company. The term refers to the act of removing Google from one's life. As the growing market share of the internet giant creates monopolistic power for the company in digital spaces, increasing numbers of journalists have noted the difficulty to find alternatives to the company's products.

History

In 2013, John Koetsier of Venturebeat said Amazon's Kindle Fire Android-based tablet was "a de-Google-ized version of Android." In 2014 John Simpson of US News wrote about the “right to be forgotten” by Google and other search engines. In 2015, Derek Scally of Irish Times wrote an article on how to "De-Google your life." In 2016 Kris Carlon of Android Authority suggested that users of CyanogenMod 14 could “de-Google” their phones, because CyanogenMod works fine without Google apps too. In 2018 Nick Lucchesi of Inverse wrote about how ProtonMail was promoting how to "be able to completely de-Google-fy your life.” Lifehacker's Brendan Hesse wrote a detailed tutorial on "quitting Google." Gizmodo journalist Kashmir Hill claims that she missed meetings and had difficulties organizing meet ups without the use of Google Calendar. In 2019, Huawei gave a refund to phone owners in the Philippines who were inhibited from using services provided by Google because so few alternatives exist that the absence of the company's products made normal internet use unfeasible.