Tech platforms can’t be trusted. Oligarchs and billionaires want you to keep giving your data to their Big Tech companies for free so they can sell it and manipulate you into believing nonsense. In this talk, the Lockdown Systems collective will introduce Cyd, their open source desktop app that makes it easy for people to reclaim control over their data from Big Tech. Giving users actual control over their data is challenging when dealing with hostile, enshittified tech platforms like X and Facebook. Cyd bypasses all of that though by putting the user in the driver’s seat: it runs on the user’s own computer, from their own IP address, and it works by automating a web browser on their behalf - and sometimes relying on APIs, when they’re available, free, and don’t suck. It doesn’t share any access to your accounts or your data with the Lockdown Systems collective. Attendees will learn how Cyd works under the hood, how you can use it, and how you can contribute to building tools that challenge the dominance of Big Tech.

The Lockdown Systems Collective will be holding a hands-on workshop about Cyd, the open source app that helps you claw back your data from big tech companies. This workshop will walk you through the following: installing Cyd, saving your data from X and/or Facebook, deleting what you want from those platforms, and migrating your data to Bluesky/Mastodon. If there’s interest, this workshop will also cover getting started with Cyd development environment, discussion about how Cyd’s black magic works, and discussion about the worker-owned Lockdown Systems Collective.