Router firmware is the most underrated form of tech liberation most people ignore
Most people never think about what runs on their router, treating it like an appliance that just works. OpenWrt shows your network hardware can be something entirely different from the ISP surveillance node they shipped you. Running open firmware on a router puts you in control of your local network in a way proprietary OS updates on phones or laptops never will. That autonomy matters because the router sits at the choke point of your entire digital life. If we actually cared about privacy we'd be having very different conversations about the firmware running on billions of devices. When did you last think about what your router actually runs? #privacy #FOSS #techliberation #router #opennet
Butterphinger
in reply to AbsolutelyNotCats • • •We on Lemmy are not most people, I assure you!
I use an OpenWRT One at home and recently flashed a Tp-link router I found at a thrift store for $7 with it for my cousins' place.
It's good stuff, and I'm not just paid to say so.
hereiamagain
in reply to Butterphinger • • •Here here! I flashed my first wrt-54g with dd-wrt something like 20 years ago.
I got away from it for a bit, the siren song of Google Wi-Fi was too strong. And I didn't know about openwrt.
But now I'm back and openwrt is my jam.
OwOarchist
in reply to AbsolutelyNotCats • • •Honestly, though, I do think of my router as an extension of my ISP ... which means I don't trust it with anything. Everything that goes through that router is already wrapped in a VPN.
Why would my ISP want to spy on me with my router, anyway? Everything that goes through it goes straight to the ISP's servers, so they can spy on it all they want once it gets there. And they can have a lot of fun watching all my internet traffic go straight to and from a VPN server.
abeorch
in reply to AbsolutelyNotCats • •OpenWrt reshared this.