If it is the Android that comes with the phone, it comes with Google Play and Google Services libraries installed. It is tracking you already. If you use Duckduckgo at least they will not know what you search for (and you will get better search than AI-ridden Google search…).
If you want an Android that doesn’t track you all the time, listens to you and those around you, etc etc, you need to use a vanilla android like https://lineageos.org as it comes, and not install the Google Services packages. This means that you may not be able to use some bank apps or popular apps such as Uber, etc that heavily depend on Google Services. Some chat apps may also have a delay in receiving messages.
Yes it sucks. It’s doable though. Welcome to the future. If we do nothing it will get even worse.
Edit: some governments are pushing for apps to not depend on Google propietary libraries. For example in the EU transit apps (city, trains ticket planners etc) are being migrated away from using Google Maps and into OpenStreetmaps, and those apps run nicely with a vanilla LineageOS. We need to keep this momentum.
:/ There’s old and cheap phones that are still supported. Support varies between models. I have a Oneplus 6 running the latest Android, 15, perfectly fine. It has 6 years. The camera is ok, but could be better.
Manufacturers and Google end support for Android phones within 2-3 years of their release (not 2 years since you buy it). Afterwards they don’t get security updates which is quite dangerous given that we do everything on the phones nowadays, and we will do even more.
Note that those old official, unsecure phones are allowed still to do banking and other things. Even if they aren’t secure. The manufacturers don’t care, they want you to buy a new phone every 2 years from them.
And the actually secure phones running LineageOS, with up-to-date Kernel and security patches, with latest Android, sometimes are not allowed to run banking apps or other things in the name of security. Google and manufacturers don’t care about security at all. They just want control.
