One of my favorite things about the internet over the years, and one of the main reasons I keep going back to it even though it doesn't bring me joys in the ways it used to, is the community responsible for bringing tools to people like me, who, in the face of gestures broadly desires alternatives. Usually these are passion projects that never ask for a cent in return (other than maybe asking for a donation if you'd like). It's people like this that show me that there isn't some inherent selfish core of humanity. People just love doing what they're passionate about and they'll sacrifice their time and labor to make it happen.

The scope of this page is a bit smaller than #FOSS (Free and Open Source) as a whole though, and further than that, this page even has elements that aren't FOSS, but are useful towards digital sovereignty nonetheless. I've organized the tools by situation, so feel free to scroll to whatever situation you're curious about.

In...like... the Real World

Meshtastic

https://meshtastic.org
The first tool I want to spotlight is Meshtastic through the LoRa network. Essentially, it's a cheap device that you can buy or build yourself that creates a mesh network with other devices. Depending on the terrain, range can reach miles. This creates a "mesh" network so you could use the wifi of devices between you and a friend 50+ miles away to reach them, completely encrypted. This does require a certain adoption rate of Meshtastic devices in regular intervals.

I've had a couple of these devices for a couple years, one of which is constantly plugged in and connected to the greater network. My phone uses bluetooth to interface with the device and has an app that functions as a messaging app. It's fun to see everyone in the public channel testing out the range on their devices as well as random local-specific topics like weather or traffic.

But the main reason I started looking into this in the first place was reports of police using location data from your cell phone to surveil protests. Using a device like this means you can get an urgent message across an area of protest to friends that you need assistance without having your cell phone there, leaving breadcrumbs that can be picked up by police later.

Rayhunter

https://github.com/EFForg/rayhunter
Rayhunter is really interesting- if I'm understanding things correctly, here's some basic info and what rayhunter does about it:
Stingrays (or CSS) are devices the police use to spoof cell towers. Your phone thinks it is connecting to a legitimate cell tower, but the identifying information, and sometimes even communication interceptions can happen on these Stingray devices. Rayhunter is essentially just a canary. It doesn't stop any of these interceptions from happening (meaning, you should still leave your phone at home during protests). But what Rayhunter is is alternative software for a Verizon Orbic Hotspot (around $20 used) which connects to cell towers and monitors if anything weird happens. The screen, which usually shows a green line, if showing a red line after participating in a protest, can give valuable information to people studying surveillance at EFF.