Tech gifts you shouldn’t buy your family and friends for the holidays

This piece advises against gifting certain connected technologies due to lasting privacy and security risks, citing examples and recent mishaps. It warns about genetic testing kits (irreversible data exposure and 23andMe scraping), cloud-reliant video doorbells (law-enforcement access and weak E2EE assurances), commercial VPNs (traffic selling and poor encryption), kids’ location-tracking apps (leaks and data broker sales), cheap Android tablets (preloaded malware and outdated software), and internet-connected sex toys (vulnerabilities and exposed user/location data). It recommends privacy-preserving alternatives such as E2EE cameras, Tor Browser, built-in family controls, self-hosted VPNs, and Bluetooth-only devices.