How much privacy can I really have when I'm being ratted out by my friends?

useduser:

I’m coming to the belief that interacting with people who are not privacy conscious has become a privacy risk

Yes. You can limit this to a certain degree. One of the main ways is not to pose for any pictures in groups. It causes some issues with people who are happy to give this sort of data away (“ stop being boring ” sort of thing, but they’ll appreciate why in the future).

Also, if you wanted to go a step further, use alias names IRL instead of your official government-owned name (yes, government-owned…!). Some people do this with middle names, which is limited, but if you’re a “Bob” or a “Robert” be a “Jim” or a “James”? This is particularly useful if you have a less common surname.

I haven’t used my real name for many years. In fact, some of my closest friends don’t actually know my real name . If you call your dog, Rex, by the name “Fido” so many times, it’ll come running to you when you call it “Fido”.

I have a phone number for friends and family and a phone number for anything else official or business related.

useduser:

going to public places where there are cameras, which is most urban public places, is also a privacy risk

This is difficult. Largely unavoidable but yes some tech does exist. Special glasses etc. you could also wear a disguise. This isn’t within my threat model so I can’t say the extreme lengths interest me - but there are options!

Essentially, depending on your threat model, there’s lots of things you can do. The most immediate one for me is the images and names. You can’t control what third parties do with your personal information. They’ll feed AI with your personal information and your images. So change that practice…!

Good luck!