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Cake day: June 29th, 2025

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  • from what i understand about how this works, you fund a certain type of life insurance policy that has a cash value component to it. once you’ve accumulated a certain amount of cash value in the policy, you are allowed to take out loans against the policy. however, you are still paying premiums on the insurance, and it is a loan that accrues interest. if you borrow too heavily, the policy can lapse. unpaid balances also reduce the death benefit from the policy. over funding too aggressively can also expose you to something called modified endowment contract status, which may cause the income from the loans to be taxable. none of this is financial advice, if you don’t feel comfortable with your parents involving you in this, i would tell them that.





  • privacy on a local network is an excellent use case for a virtual private network (vpn). your network traffic between your computer and the provider will be encrypted. i’d also look into dns-over-https, which will also encrypt your dns record requests. if everything is set up properly, the only things visible from the home network will be encrypted dns record requests out to your dns provider, and encrypted traffic to your vpn provider and back. however, with the virus on your mothers computer, i would consider the whole network compromised. you can try and harden against local intrusion, but using a vpn will not protect you from a virus, only prevent it from knowing about your traffic if its sniffing from another computer.






  • some of those things, disconnecting cameras and turning off location are generally okay things that reduce digital footprint and make it so data collection is harder on you. keep in mind, using gmail, google scans all your emails so you will be included in their data. however, it is unlikely that you in particular are being singled out among the millions of people various governments may classify as dissidents. it can be normal to have those kinds of thoughts sometimes, but people you personally know are likely not out to get you. if this is causing significant disruption to your life and relationships, it may be good to check in with a professional.