5 years! 5 years since that lunch in a Japanese restaurant with friends we weren’t expecting but who were a precious help in our thought process.
5 years since Exodus-Privacy came out of the shadow (we were working on the subject and the platform way before the association was constituted) with announcements in “Le Monde” and “The Intercept”, no less!
Remember February the 14th, 2018, only 6 months after the association was created, we were received at CNIL, by the LINC. Facing 3 members or friends, two dozens of CNIL staff members. Jurists, investigators, administrative staff came to meet that UFO straining against the reins of the small world of smartphone users tracking (I sometimes say spyphone).
Then came the first conferences invitations. We first asked ourselves if it was our part. Should we stay hidden behind the platform, or show ourselves and “spread the word”. We quickly opted for the second option.
Fantastic encounters, people paying attention to what we were saying and asking interesting questions, which allowed us to evolve and improve the platform.
The joy of seeing new members join us, see them get involved, give their time (a part, I hope) for the association, developing new functionalities, implementing a sturdy infrastructure, taking an active part in the conferences. Some of them left towards new horizons, farewell to them. Some others came and took over.
We also have the joy of working with the Ministry of National Education, which disposes of an internal instance of the εxodus platform. The Afnic Foundation for Digital Solidarity trusted us and funded us for the creation of an education kit, destined to digital mediators in the first place, but also everyone wishing to raise awareness in a public about the problem of the data leaking from our smartphones.
Same as everything we do, this Kit (actually a double Kit) is open source, everyone can use or modify it as they see fit.
What about the future? More and more trackers detected, more and more applications analysed (thanks to you since you are the ones feeding the platform). Now that restrictions are lifted, maybe we will be able to come and meet you again. We would love that.
A few figures:
I couldn’t finish this post without a few acknowledgments. First, our volunteers, be they members of the association or not. Without them, Exodus-Privacy would simply not exist. Secondly, our supporters, Gandi, providing us with the 3 servers for the platform free of charge, but also Octopus providing us with disk space for our backups, and all of the others I couldn’t cite without turning this into a shopping list, but you can find them on the support page on our website.
To conclude, I am only the current president but I am nothing more or less than the other volunteers of the association. To them I want to scream a huge THANK YOU FOR BEING HERE. In particular, Codimp, pnu, Esther, Imriel, MeTal_PoU, Jean-Baptiste, Porkepix, CapsLock, Jvoisin, DavidLibeau, Philémon, Lovis IX, Val-R, xakan, as well as the ones who came by and the ones who will join us.
Kisses if you want.