The first thing to do is answer what's your threat vector? What are you trying to protect against? And the second thing is answer and what are you willing to g

The first thing to do is answer what's your threat vector? What are you trying to protect against? And the second thing is answer and what are you willing to give up? The best way is, of course, to not use technology. But that's not worth it to most folks. If your threat vector is general dragnet government surveillance over the entire populous, you're fighting against a shadows. Basically all we know of these techniques come from Snowden. Assume all internet data is logged, whether encrypted or not, and they have direct access to the ISP infrastructure. Room 641A shows the USA has been at this since 2006[0]. Even if your messages are encrypted, it's possible the agency has a 0day. For example, the NSA had decrypted all BBM traffic which was advertised as encrypted. The lesson here is avoid new and popular tools. Instead, just use PGP or other arcane yet reliable encryption methods. If everyone used PGP, I bet the NSA would exploit it too. Don't use a smart phone at all. Using bootable Linux USB of something like Tails on a public computer is probably the best bet, but unsustainable. Even Tails and TOR isn't perfect but it's miles better than Windows, Mac, ChromeOS. If your threat vector is a specific intelligence agency spying on you, (i.e. an APT), you have already lost. I don't think it even makes sense to try and protect against this level of threat. It's like worrying about a tank coming through your frontdoor. If your threat vector is private companies spying on you (be it Facebooks or even private intelligence companies), you have a lot more power here. Besides ISPs, private companies don't own the infrastructure and are not legally allowed to use 0days like the NSA is. In general, end to end encryption is sufficient here. It's all a sliding scale of compromise between security and convenience. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A