PRIVATE Alternatives to Google Docs!
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- čas přidán 2. 08. 2024
- Billions of people use Google products for their personal and professional needs -- their products are high quality after all! For example, Google Docs Editors Suite allows you to collaborate in real time with anyone in the world in a seamless experience!
Unfortunately, it's not at all private -- Google gets access to ALL your personal information.
In this video we look at two alternatives to Google docs that are private: Skiff and Cryptpad.
00:00 Intro
01:28 Why look for alternatives?
03:04 Cryptpad Deep Dive
06:34 Cryptpad TLDR
07:15 Skiff Deep Dive
10:50 Skiff TLDR
11:03 Summary
Both platforms are free, and are secured with end-to-end encryption, so not even Skiff or Cryptpad can see what you're writing. Try them out, and let us know if you have other e2ee google-docs-alternatives that you recommend!
cryptpad.fr/
skiff.com/pages
Huge thank you to Andrew Milich for his time!
Brought to you by NBTV members: Lee Rennie, Will Sandoval, and Naomi Brockwell
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Our eBook "Beginner's Introduction To Privacy:
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Watch this video on Odysee!
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Here are a bunch of products I like and use. Using these links helps support the channel and future videos!
Recommended Books:
Beginner's Introduction To Privacy - Naomi Brockwell
amzn.to/3WDSfku
Permanent Record - Edward Snowden
amzn.to/305negc
What has the government done to our money - Rothbard
amzn.to/2KMzmcu
Extreme Privacy - Michael Bazzel (The best privacy book I've ever read)
amzn.to/3BLZ1gq
Digital version: inteltechniques.com/book7.html (non affiliate link)
No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA, and the U.S. Surveillance State - Glenn Greenwald
amzn.to/2UQmJ4m
Some of my favorite products to help protect your privacy!
Brave browser: brave.com/nao076
Faraday bag (signal stopping, to protect your fob, credit card, computer, and phone)
amzn.to/3z02UiF
Data Blocker (if you're charging your phone in an unknown port, use this so that no data is transferred)
amzn.to/2SVh0J2
Camera tape (electrical tape is the best tape for covering phone and computer cameras)
amzn.to/3Xn8xBn
USB-C to ethernet adapter:
amzn.to/2lOVBoy
Privacy Screens (use your phone and computer in public? Keep your information safe!)
Computer: (Search for the size right for your computer)
MacBook Air 13" amzn.to/3VQvpZ7
HP/Dell/Acer/Asus/Lenovo 15.6" amzn.to/3KK1Oda
Lenovo Thinkpad/HP Elitebook/Dell 14" amzn.to/4enT2zq
Phone: (Search for the size for your phone, decide whether you want glass or plastic!)
Galaxy s24 - amzn.to/3VGgb8H
iPhone 15 - amzn.to/45vCd1h
Pixel 8 - amzn.to/3KFDuJF - Věda a technologie
The days of trusting big tech companies are over. Trusting any commercial operating system today is like going to bed at home with your doors unlocked.
Probably more like living in a glass house, they want you to think you can lock the doors
Ive been using skiff for some time now, and will say its both Impressive, AND improving. The phone apps work well, particularly the email app, but for sure the webmail/desktop is the most functional. They bring updates regularly and DO seem to listen to users with regards to feature suggestions. Honestly, if they keep improving at this pace the suite will render a lot of my other apps/softwares obsolete. I run small installer team over it and its a godsend.
Didnt find this video till after Skiff sold out to Notion. Standard Notes looks to be the next best alternative but 90/year for a document editor seems steep for anything more than 100mb of storage
This is really well made! These sort of things need to be way more popular, it's disturbing how little people care about companies having access to their private information. Like, it's not just data, that's your LIFE. How are ya'll good with google literally know where you live?
Your channel is such a valuable service! Very important content combined with excellent digital communication skills.
These videos are such a godsend, Naomi. Thanks for your hard work and interviewing these incredible folks
Good to see some companies jump on this bandwagon, the future is looking safer thanks to them.
completely agree!
Brilliant information Naomi, please keep them coming. Thanks for sharing 💚🌍
Thank you 🙏🙏
After trying them both I prefer Skiff because it has auto-correct and that is something I desperately need in life
Before I watch this. Know this. The company I work for used Google docs for some of our tech databases to record repaired units, what they were and what repairs and the costs for them. It got hacked and we lost all that info. That was a valuable and costly mistake we had to recover from. Had to formulate our own database system company wide and it's an International company.
DO NOT USE google docs.
This is great we have been actively looking for a private alternative to google docs ... would love for it to also support drawings in vector graphic also
I'm just getting into testing these out and it looks like Skiff has native apps! I use Google Drive mostly on my phone so this is a HUGE win for Skiff over CryptPad. Need to do more testing though. Thanks again for this excellent review of the products. Very excited to be moving a bunch of my information off of Google.
Cryptpad is indeed difficult on phone! Would be great to see them work on that
Great video, also including a chapter or test criteria on whether apps are compatible with calyxos & graphene os would be wonderful
Been doing a bit of research on Internet Computer this week. I was surprised to learn that by comparison, Google is actually the lesser of the two evils. crazy how that works... Thanks for the great tips as usual Naomi!
Good video, and possibly one of the best I have seen so far on this channel. IPFS seems to be a stand-alone service, which might be worth investigating in a future video. I love the mid-century modern styling on this channel, as well. It is similar to The Vintage Space.
I really appreciate that!!!
Excellent info Naomi! Love this kinda stuff....
Was looking for a mail and collaboration platform to add to my pCloud, thanks!
Such a helpful review. Thank you!
Very interesting and certainly worth a look at! thanks.
Could you comment on my practice of using Libre Office then encrypting the document before uploading it to Google Drive? I have the encryption and uploading to Google stages fully automated so that it is trivial to accomplish.
way to go. don't hesitate to let the world know your method, assuming you use FOSS like rclone
Oooo, this sounds awesome! How did you get the encryption key imported into LibreOffice?
When using these tools, be aware who is in your distribution list as many forms of encryption are subject to export controls. Stay legal, stay safe. Most documents i produce are produced offline for local use, using an offline open source office suite. Sometimes it pays to have a 2nd offline computer.
where would one find this distribution list? is it specific to the tool? or the network we use? mb if dumb question
I have a google sheet linked with a form web. Google allows me to automatize this. When a person press "send" on the form, immediately save the data in my sheet. I made it by code on a function that google have.
Any of these alternatives can do that?
Ty ♡
*And also thinking of those "free" services like: Grammarly, .doc to .pdf converters where you have to upload your document, who knows where the original ends?*
My need is to move also the personal domain based email, so would that work with any of the proposed solutions?
No need for identity secrecy, but yes for documents and emails being protected
Privacy is the reason I self-host on my own server. I already have Nextcloud self-hosted, and hope to get my email server set up asap when I get my static IP block.
I've just an article about Mega saying they couldn't read your files and researchers proved they could!
Very good to know that skiff, at the time of this video is making, does not support highlighting and strike through in documents, and does not have a spreadsheet editor.
The biggest problem with both of these for me are no reliable apps. its the same thing with proto. Cryptpad doesn't have any mobile apps, and Skiff app is very new and rough. Proton itself has recently come under fire in the ios store for decreasing quality. It is unfortunate, but many people such as myself need the option to easily access these files on mobile devices.
Same
My docs and financials stay on my non internet connected laptop. Its 10 years old but works fine for such purpose with the original Word. It's inconvenient at times but there's no way I'm putting certain personal info into Googles cloud. There's already too much out there I have no control over.
i gave up google docs in favor of onlyoffice just to stay away from google but these alternatives offer an added layer of security. I'm really intrigued to give them a try. especially cryptpad. skiff doesn't quite seem like a full office suite yet but it looks more like a privacy-oriented alternative to Notion, Coda, or Evernote.
Skiff has apparently been acquired by Notion and is shutting down and this is causing a huge uproar.
Not used a Google phone for 2 years and moved most of my things off Google, using Synology docs instead of Google docs works OK.
which phone you use?
@@striker1258 Huawei P40 Pro, best phone hardware I ever had
@@JoelBergmark How do you get around the playstore
@@striker1258 Aurora store most works only 3 apps does not and then I can use Gapps that somehow makes them work. Abit dodgy but I'm happy to be out of Google sphere and live the Emui it's best interface i hadx will try to buy a P40 Pro plus later or hope Huawei release some p60 with 5g next year
great, web 3 porting has arrived!
Have you done any videos on Only Office?
What about Arweave instead of ipfs?
In their privacy policy, Skiff state;
(We share your information with) "Business Partners. We may share your information with business partners to provide you with a product or service you have requested. We may also share your personal information to business partners with whom we jointly offer products or services."
... which basically says "We sell your information to the highest bidder".
???
The content you upload to Skiff is stored in end-to-end encrypted form in a secure cloud database hosted by a cloud provider or on IPFS. We do not share user content with any other third party.We may share other information we collect with other third parties, as follows:• Service Providers. Currently, Skiff does not share any of your personal information with service providers. However, we may share your information with our third-party service providers who use that information to help us provide our Services. This includes service providers that provide us with IT support, hosting, payment processing, customer service, and related services.• Other Users. As described above in “Personal Information We Collect,” our Services allow you to share your profile and/or User Content with other Users.
???
Libre Office is free, open source and their organization earns money via donations.
Idk if you have already. But as a follow up to this video you should know Google is close to launching their AI which can scrub your Google docs to answer questions.
Why aren't either cryptpad or skiff available in the fdroid repo? Who owns them? Have they been audited?
Arriving email from outside Skiff is not encrypted. Skiff is based in the US. What's their countermeasure to national security letters and the associated gag orders? Will they shut down like lavabit, well the cave to the feds, or have they already?
But are cryptpad and skiff going to be there in 5 years? The concerns about privacy are meaningful. However, my concern is that if I make a commitment to to one of these platforms and build a complex labyrinth of documents and then these companies go belly up... All my stuff is lost... No?
Is there a way to transfer documents over from docs to skiff?
I just realized Google docs are nfts Google created nfts before they were a thing, a link to a document stored on a server somewhere and you didn't have a complete document in your email but just a link and you could buy and sell documents but really it was buying and selling links
6:54 Cryptpad Cons: Zero mobile apps
Not to mention third party pdf readers such as Lumin PDF which counts as sharing data with a third party.
would you do "share" or recommend "what's on ur toolbox? (email, VPN, excel, word, antivirus, etc, etc)
Actually I did that in my privacy 101 video a few months ago! I’ll try to do an update sometime tho!
I'm a little curious. On one of your other videos you said (not exact wording), if a company doesn't run ads or sell your data, how do they make their money.
how do these make their money? Donationware or? :)
is it fine to use epic browser for privacy Naomi
I’m very interested in having a private set of alternatives to Google drive etc. The problem is convincing the people I work with to change. Either they don’t want to learn something new, they’ve just barely grassed Google drive and all of its tools, or they work in an environment which requires Google Drive or some other insecure system.
Cell
If I have all of my things on a secure system, but I have to use Google drive because clients, fellow employees, bosses, etc., require Google Drive, what’s the best way to use that?
That’s a great question. In an isolated browser that blocks tracking for collaborative work. You can also password protect things before putting them into drive.
@@NaomiBrockwellTV Decoding that, it sounds like you are saying to have a disconnected account that one would use for such purposes, so that any tracking that can't be avoided (because the data is stored on Google's servers) is only that of the exact work one is doing, and nothing else, done within a browser that is "isolated." However, I'm not sure what isolated specifically means. A separate computer that is not on my network? My computer, but with some kind of "airlock" that isolates that browser through software? Or do you refer to a specific browser brand that has this isolating feature? All of those?
It seems to me that this only partially solves the social engineering problem, since using passwords on all documents will certainly cause backlash from the apparent inconvenience from some folks. Heck, even I'm whining every time I have to use 2FA just to visit a site I last visited a few hours, or even a few days, ago
BTW, I'm reading a book, Surveillance Capitalism, and wondering if you've read it or covered it yet, and how big data privacy and behavioral shaping fits in with your data privacy advice.
Please do a review of SpiderOak One Backup. Its supposed to be zero knowledge end to end encryption. There is also a version for teams. I'm a user for a while now but I can only trust what they say they are and what they say about their zero knowledge encryption that they don't and can't have access to your data. Its stored in the US which makes me even more surprised something like this is allowed. Subbed and Liked.
I think they were hacked not too long ago.
@@techlake2252 Probably. Saw a notice they had to secure some parts. But if its truly zero knowledge, all that data should be encrypted. The hackers wouldn't get at client data.... if what Spideroak says is true.
what do you think of onlyoffice or should we stay away from that as well?
Yes, except that it is not possible to create a skiff account, the captcha will not be displayed. Lots of people on reddit and the same problem. Nothing works.
If it cannot run my VBA macros, then I don't need it or want it.
besides the government being able to potentially access your info on request, most google android apps or in the web browser are also going to be cloud storage compared to local storage . don't forget the keyboard u type on also..💻🇦🇺😎
If we have been writing stories or poetry on our google docs, is there a possibility it could be stolen and show up somewhere? This is horrifying! 😱😱😱
I’m here for u only😂☝🏽
Yayay! Thanks for watching!
their apps still did not mature to replace Microsoft and Gsuit.
How do i share my documents
Nice recommendations. For me, the lack of collaborative document editing rules these out though.
I'd like to point out that you can also self-host a document server, for example Collabora Online. Depending on your skill level, this may well be the most secure option out there. Setting this up securely is non-trivial and not recommended for the average user.
Skiff has full collaborative document editing
@@volcomterd Oh good to know. I must have missed that - unless it's the segment about sharing the encryption key, which would not be cool.
@@wombatdk This is also the case of CryptPad, which is fully realtime top to bottom. Maybe you want to give it a more in-deep test.
Both of these are real-time collaborative documents and e2ee, that's the point of the video :) I will try to do better if that point was missed!
@@NaomiBrockwellTV Thanks! I did see the sharing, and your warning about the key, and assumed that collaborating therefore isn't secure. (ie. that the collaborator only needs the key, not a valid login)
Thanks for sharing good tools..
world have to move towards more privacy first approach..
what about simple text app in our computers?
They’re great, but if you want to collaborate real time you’ll need a service (and best to use an e2ee one!)
Thanks, Naomi, I am looking for privacy solutions that you can pay with crypto. Paying with FIAT is making KYC. Keep it coming, I am also degoogling my phone thanks to you.
The best alternative is a piece of paper and handwriting
does this allow people to collaborate online?
Nextcloud is another alternative.
Thanks
This is great. Now Google can't spy on me when writing fanfics.
this alternative should be decentralized. Preferably inside a web30 ecosystem.
I love this channel, but the opening tenet that data going between end user and Google is unencrypted is demonstrably false- you can literally open a browser, connect to Google suit, and see that the connection is HTTPS mode... please go ahead and see for yourself.
There are many kinds of encryption. You’re talking about transport later encryption. That doesn’t stop google seeing what you wrote, only e2ee does, and google is not e2ee. The tenet of the video is your contents on google are all visible to google.
@Dean woah woah woah, iCloud is NOT end to end encryption Dean.
@Dean No iCloud is not secure if it's not e2ee. Neither is Google docs. Perhaps I should do a video just explaining e2ee as this is probably a topic that a lot of people might want to understand better?
@Dean That is actually exactly what CryptPad and Skiff don't have. We do not have access to the key which is encrypting the data. In the case of CryptPad, all your keys are in your encrypted drive which itself is encrypted with a cryptographic key derived from your account password (which we don't have). This is a major difference with the security of most cloud service which promise you to encrypt the data on transport and on storage, but in both cases they have control of the encryption key, so ultimately Google can read the data. CryptPad and Skiff cannot. Concerning the sharing of the key with other users in order to collaborate with them, CryptPad has a system to transmit that key to other users, without having the key. This is done using "private boxes" encrypted using public/private key encryption.
@@ludovicdubost1528 Exactly Ludovic, that's my thoughts exactly. Well articulated.
People see "encryption" and think it is secure - always makes me smile.
You know when something is actually Encrypted - as you have literally done it yourself.
Ha, NBTV roxs
Dropbox said they couldn't read your files didn't they?
Dropbox is not private
Fucking love this channel 🤟
💛
Do you mean to infer that you only live this challel while you are fornicating? Weird!
Naomi is the greatest!
If you have an internet connection at home, you can have your own cloud storage too. All it takes is an old PC. The software is FREE. It just takes 3 elements:
1...Motivation
2...Commitment
3...Consistency
What cloud storage you would suggest for this case?
Check Infomaniak and Proton’s alternative
Sooooo.... Let's discuss how these private options are still free....
They have freemium business models. You can upgrade if you'd like.
nothing is private and nothing is safe on the net!
Considering neither of these has page formatting, they're both a squeak above worthless as word processors for novelists.
Yes they have page formatting, I’m unsure what you mean
@@NaomiBrockwellTV I spent ages trying to find layout settings as well as the typical divided page setting but got nowhere.
Prove to me that they are private and unable to read my docs
To bad Skiff is shutting down this August
Time to take back our privacy.
For videos just get a usb drive
Luv ya, gorgeous. Still need a usable privacy phone.
I just send junk email to google. I do not use them for private emails, I refused to do this after about 2009. So if I want to win a car, I send the email to google. I just delete the email daily.
And, how does this differ from Microsoft 360?
Not that I'm a huge Gates fan, but the reason that Docs is free is because of the data harvesting. You pay for it with your data. Microsoft 360 is a paid service.
@@digitalranger4259 aaaand you still pay with your data. It's free money lying around, and MS is happy to pick it up. This is E2EE, so no one except you should have access to it. Although one should maybe host this themselves to be sure...
With privacy being a huge concern, why on Earth would I even want to store or transfer my private data/info on someone else's server somewhere that I don't know?! There absolutely no need for anyone to do so. Buy an external drive, save all your personal files and docs, then encrypt/password protect your own files on that drive! Disconnect and store in your own safe place!
Stop saving and trusting all of this cloud storage! Use your own devices.
A secret is a secret if you're the only one who knows it.
this video is about collaboration software. No idea how you imagine that happening by passing around a hard drive.
The problem with your solution is "onsite storage" If you have a fire, water damage or a lightening strike let alone a home robbery of your electronics you could loose all of your data forever. That is why all institutions of any size use offsite storage as a part if their data integrity plan.
end to end encryption ensures that you are the only one that can view your data.
You have to be careful with taking privacy to the extreme, life starts to get very hard very fast it's impossible to do anything without having to trust someone.
Even if you decide to self host on premise you still have to trust someone, even if you're setting up the server yourself.
There are many reasons to have servers. The main one is for collaboration and making sure the data is backed-up and protected. You can definitively decide to host your own server (at least with CryptPad which is open source). However even if you self-host or host for a group of people, the end-to-end encryption is still useful as it protects ALL users from other users reading the data. Even if you host data for your company or friends, should you have access to all their data ? Also if the server is hacked, the data is not exposed. e2ee is much higher security which protects people's data. It should be the norm more and more.
A huge plus for CryptPad is that their data is stored in France so they fall under the European GDPR! Especially for me as a European, I like to store my data in Europe 🙂
And you think Apple and Microsoft do not do any of this? And haven't for years? XD They all live off these information details nowadays. People ARE the product, and have been for years by this point.
Right, neither of the solutions I recommended are Microsoft or apple for exactly that reason
@@NaomiBrockwellTV wow, an actual response. Nice. Long time Linux-user here.
These platforms are a great idea for journalists. However, I personally moved to the Gdocs suite because I liked that every edit was saved automatically to the cloud. Microsoft crashes and data loss were simply too frustrating; I had to make the move to Google... Also, Microsoft stopped offering their Office apps on Chromebooks, so Chromebook users have limited options when it comes to premium productivity suites. It's frustrating that Zion and US SigInt has a file on us all, but alas, it's the price we pay for free online software. The user becomes the product.
skiff is also automatically saved to cloud (just encrypted)
Well luckily you now have 2 alternatives that also save as you go to the cloud, but are private.
A pen and paper kept in a lockable suitcase.
Now if I can only remember were I put the key😉
All of the online storages can look and access your data. Hell, Google's fine print in the ToS states that they are free to use any materials you upload to their services as they please. The only way you're getting any privacy is if YOU own the server you're storing the data on, and YOU are encrypting that data on the server, and to and from the server.
"Privacy" is a funny joke and anyone who thinks they have even the slightest of privacy while using any of these services is in for a rude awakening. Ever read your ISP's service agreement? Good chance they've got a clause in there stating they may at anytime view your data traffic for advertising purposes.
No not all of them can look at what you store. Any Cathay are e2ee can’t. Like the ones I talk about in this video.
@@NaomiBrockwellTV Aikarion has a point. When a service talks about E2E Encryption - and then generates the keys themselves, that's a security concern. You should be using your own Encryption key, at minimum for online use, and veracrypt or similar to encrypt before upload, for storage.
Naomi you are the most beautiful and educated woman in youtube and your channel is great content thaaaanks
Thanks for watching!!
01:28 this is very misleading. Google workspace data is NOT unencrypted. All data on google servers is encrypted to a very high standard, in transit and at rest. Google is very transparent about their cloud security. Google does retain master keys to decrypt your data if they really wanted to, and I do think this is a concern worth discussing and addessing, but claiming the data is not encrypted is just false.
It's also worth noting that Google recently rolled up a client side encryption beta for enterprise workstation accounts. I don't think they are opposed to expanding this to non enterprise accounts, they would just need to modify the implementation to be more accessible to individuals because they are currently using external KMS providers in the beta. Nevertheless, I see them moving in the right direction here, and I hope it won't be long before we see a similar beta for non enterprise accounts.
Alternative to Google drive please 🙏
Both of these are alternatives to google drive :)
proton drive or mega
@@kaywee mega had some issue these days.. watch out
@@kaywee And Filen is a good option too.
Algorithm.
Grazie
Not to mention, Google has political directives they advance through their services with which you might not agree. They are extremely pro Israel, for example. If you don't approve of racial apartheid you might not want to support a company like Google that advances racial apartheid.
I like getting my privacy info from a women. Naomi is smart and I like to listen to her.
😥💔
Privacy is not just about technical specs about e.g. encryption.
Trust and track record are important also imho. Why should these services earn my trust?
@Dean at CryptPad we don't like this practice either, so we don't do it. I can confirm we did not pay for being featured, neither even knew it would happen.
At CryptPad, we agree it should also be the case. If you don't trust our hosting you can choose to self host. We are Open Source so you can look at what we do amd our wish is to benefit society. The company supporting the project has been around 17 years doing Open Source software. We have never "promised" crazy things to get money to do it. After that you decide.
@@ludovicdubost1528 My comment was more like: Privacy equals trust and/or depend on trust in my opinion. I expected some more in-depth motivation and facts about e.g. the past of the company/product about the historical privacy track record. Like what audits/pen tests have there been?
Open source for me is not the whole story because I am not able/skilled to audit the source files.
I also do want to understand the business model behind the product/service.
Even if it was "an add", that does not have to be relevant for my privacy.
I use paid privacy tools/services or donate once in a while.
NBTV > ROX
NAOMI > ROX
💚🥰💚
We basically use all google stuff for school, since everything is done on laptops. 🥲