We've all been there. We try to convince our family and friends that advertising companies selling our personal data is a bad thing but they usually don't listen. They'll either roll their eyes or say something along the lines of "muh I have nothing to hide". Well my friends, I have decided to compile what I'd say in these specific situations and place them here. You're free to use these in any capacity you deem necessary because I know nearly everyone who isn't privacy centred will respond in one or more of these ways, and its about time they learn the truth.
If you truly had nothing to hide, you wouldn't close the bathroom door when you use it. You also wouldn't wear clothes as per your words you have "nothing to hide". You may then argue that both of them are for public decency; So if you have nothing to hide that means I can freely ask for your email, phone number, credit card details, who you voted for in the last election, and so much more personal information in which you'd be able to tell me and the entire world right? Chances are you'll say no to those questions, so why give all of those out to random strangers on the internet because they work for a major company? And don't say that they are outstanding ones as nearly every single one of them has issues with how they handle customer data and data breaches that happen all the time.
Now this is one that I partially agree with. Unless you are a major figure in the world, say a politician or a celebrity, then I don't believe there is an entity out there that is actively seeking you out and trying to gain access to your personal data. But that doesn't mean that they are not employing methods to track you with ease. Mass surveillance, also called passive or dragnet surveillance, is something that has evolved to the point where the other party just has to start an automated program in order to track customer data. They are exerting the absolute minimum in terms of tracking us, i.e. your ISP using a program to look at your DNS logs rather than monitoring all your web traffic. Remember advertising companies pay well for customer data and knowing most companies they'd take the chance for a couple extra bucks if it means just opening a program and letting it do all the work.
You've probably been gaslighted into thinking that, as the Panopticon effect proves that people do indeed care about their privacy. The companies that do snoop on you have made very sure that you don't know you're being watched in order to give you the false sense of privacy, if they didn't then I'd bet my left nutsack you'd behave a lot different. Privacy is a human right, something every single one of us is entitled to without discrimination. Don't let any government entities or pricks on the internet tell you otherwise.
I'd like to refute that statement with every single ounce of my being. Unless you're being actively targeted I believe you don't need to go to extreme measures in order to protect your online privacy. Privacy is a journey, meaning you take steps into an eventual compromise where you have enough privacy while not sacrificing too much convenience. Even something as simple as switching browsers or using a private DNS resolver is a big step in taking back your online privacy. You don't need to abandon everything if you want to take some of it back. Remember the companies snooping on you are doing the absolute minimum to track you, so fight fire with fire.
This is a pretty tricky one but I'll try my best to explain the consequences. See most services like these require a lot of money in order for them to run, and the companies running them know their customers will probably not pay cash up front for them. So they decide to collect your data and sell them to advertisers in order to keep the boat floating. I believe that your personal information, something that can be akin to your entire identity both online and offline, is worth a lot more than just convenient internet searches and AI prompts. As such, paying with your personal data is something that should not be the case in this time and age where identity theft and impersonation scams run rampant. And before you say that they will keep it protected at all costs from malicious actors just keep in mind that even the biggest companies get data breaches, meaning no company is safe from the dedicated Mr. Robots out there.
Don't be too overwhelmed when starting you privacy journey. Rome wasn't built in a day so take it one step at a time.