Big Tech Is A Toxic Partner. It's Time To Break Up.

Me? In a toxic relationship? With Big Tech? That sounds ridiculous, right? This reaction is very common among people in unhealthy relationships. How can I be in a toxic relationship with someone when they do SO much for me in my day to day?

That’s exactly why it is so difficult to recognize the power they have over us. Even when we want to question it, it can feel terribly overwhelming. Breaking up with something we believe we need seems impossible...so, we cling to what’s familiar, even if it costs us our privacy and autonomy. Don’t think this applies to you? Let’s look at some classic warning signs of unhealthy relationships to see if any of them resonate with you.

1. Love Bombing

If you’ve spent 10 seconds on TikTok, you’ve probably heard the term “love bombing” at least once. It happens when someone overwhelms another person with over-the-top displays of attention and affection, typically at the beginning of the relationship. They make you feel special only to disappoint you down the line. Big Tech operates the same way - making tons of significant promises they never actually fulfill. Think about the first time you used Google search, versus the substantially worse results that you get when you use it today (before you even count AI summaries that are just plain wrong). Think of how Facebook used to be the perfect place to keep up with friends and family before they started pushing posts and media to your feed from people that you don’t follow. Think about how everything from Amazon products to Uber rides to food delivery used to be cheaper. This is Big Tech’s business model at work.

2. Obsessive Behavior

Obsessive behavior plays a major role in toxic relationship dynamics. An insecure partner might track your location, check your phone, or stalk you in an attempt to feel more secure in the relationship. Big Tech is also notorious for monitoring everything you do...collecting massive amounts of data right out from under users’ noses. They expect you to believe all data collection is necessary, even when it isn’t. In fact, Meta has been sued multiple times for gathering data it shouldn’t have. In 2023, Amazon owed over $30 million in fines for violating privacy laws by keeping recordings of children's conversations with its voice assistant Alexa. In 2024, Meta even agreed to another billion plus dollar settlement with Texas in a privacy lawsuit over claims that the tech giant used biometric data of users without their permission. Isn’t that disturbing?

3. Breaking Boundaries

It’s not uncommon for someone to gain control over their partner using manipulation tactics to blur the lines between acceptable and unacceptable behaviour. People who crave control hate being told “no”, and will do anything to keep you from setting boundaries. Similarly, Big Tech undermines users’ ability to set boundaries by sowing seeds of self-doubt and confusion in their minds. One way they do this is through dark patterns - manipulative digital design practices that trick users into making choices they wouldn’t otherwise make. This includes making the “accept” button more prominent than the “reject” button, using confusing language, or burying important choices within walls of text. Terms of service agreements are endless and overly complex on purpose. They often pre-tick boxes for you assuming you just won’t notice. In 2022, multiple states sued Google for using tricks to repeatedly pressure people to provide more and more location data, “inadvertently or out of frustration.” Big Tech takes advantage of users without their full understanding or clear consent. And even when users don’t give consent, Big Tech sometimes invades their privacy anyway, as we showed in the previous section.

4. Escaping Accountability

DARVO (Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender) is a manipulative technique used to shift blame and escape accountability. Controlling partners tend to be sensitive and cannot handle being criticized. Big Tech is just as sensitive and rarely owns up to the harm they cause. For example, in October 2021, former employee Frances Haugen publicly scrutinized Meta and accused the company’s platforms of harming teenage girls and contributing to mental health issues. Meta’s VP of Global Affairs tried to address these concerns during a CNN interview. He stated, “We can’t change human nature. You always see bad things online.” His response effectively flipped the script. Instead of accepting Meta’s responsibility for amplifying dangerous content, he positioned the company as an unfairly targeted victim with no control over the situation. By blaming human nature, he dismissed Haugen’s valid concerns and implied that the real problems people are facing were inevitable. Now, it seems as if the “bad guy” is human behavior, rather than Meta’s intentionally malicious business model. Even the interviewer called him out on this, pointing out that Meta could take action not to exploit human nature.

5. Isolation From Others

A controlling partner fears nothing more than their significant other meeting someone who sees the truth and offers a way out. Big Tech’s worst nightmare would be if you stopped using their platforms or used alternative ones. They don’t want you to be able to choose what’s best for you. Big Tech ropes users into their ecosystem so tightly by creating dependency. They want to make it so that their products only work best with other products that they make, and often have to be forced to make their products "interoperable". Think about how Big Tech relies on high switching costs to eliminate their competition so they remain your only life line. Breaking up with a tech company may mean sacrificing time and effort spent learning how a platform works, as well as the relationships and audience you’ve built. These risks can have serious financial and psychological impacts.

6. No Way Out

When you feel trapped in a relationship, you will invent any excuse to stay. This is exactly what your toxic partner wants. The most effective way Big Tech retains control over us is by restricting our free will. They eat up as much of our time and attention as possible so it feels too difficult and costly to walk away. As a result, we may want to believe that we chose to stay. They have all the right methods to keep you locked in, and have even been sued for creating illegal monopolies in their respective fields. They also try to create products for as many different markets as possible. For example, Meta owns Instagram, Threads, and Whatsapp. If you leave one platform, you’re essentially giving up all three. Don't even get us started on Amazon. Big Tech keeps switching costs high so services can be changed in ways that you dislike without losing your business. The higher the switching costs, the more a company can abuse you, because it knows that as bad as they’ve made things for you, you’d have to endure worse if you left.

What Do I Do???

Look, realizing you’re in an unhealthy relationship is never easy. You may experience shame after understanding you’ve been deceived or fear of what may happen if you leave. The truth is, we still need to engage with these tech monopolies to do virtually anything nowadays. So what do you do to avoid being taken advantage of? The first step in freeing yourself from emotional manipulation is awareness. Now that you know more about some of the ways you're being manipulated, you can become a lot better at noticing these tactics whenever they do occur...which already makes you much more difficult to fool.

The second and more challenging step is setting healthy boundaries, which is difficult when Big Tech companies are everywhere all at once. Thankfully, you don't have to do this alone. Switching to a secure email provider like StartMail can keep you safe from the intrusive tracking and data mining that is common with larger companies. We offer a host of features to keep your data private, and can provide you with unlimited aliases so that you can use services and make purchases without revealing your real email address. You can also prevent Big Tech’s mistreatment by staying informed about privacy policies, frequently reviewing your settings, and using tools that block unnecessary data collection. Our friends at the Electronic Frontier Foundation provide detailed guides on how to disable your mobile advertising ID, audit app permissions, and utilize other privacy tools.

This Valentine's Day, you deserve someone who treats you right, respects your boundaries, and isn’t trying to constantly toy with your emotions. So, it’s time to dump anyone who tries to trick you into settling for less.