If the data is encrypted, it can go on the cloud, though.

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I recently migrated off of my legacy "Google Apps for Your Domain" (now Workspace) account to a mix of self hosting and a regular old vanilla gmail account.

It was a real eye opener to experience how challenging it was to move my data from one Google account to another. Takeout is nice in theory, but there is no equivalent "Takein" service that accepts the data form import to another Google account in the format produced by Takeout! I naively assumed "Export Google calendar from here, import same files to there" but nope, that did not work at all. Maps data was even worse.

I don't think fastmail is going to help you. They are subject to legal requirements too and probably American jurisdiction also despite what their particular position is. https://www.fastmail.com/blog/fastmails-servers-are-in-the-u.... People love to hate Google but they're just doing what any corporation subject to law is going to do.

Anticipation of stories like this are why I didn't rely much on Google 20 years ago.

Never used Gmail other than as a throwaway account.

Went many years before I had a Youtube account. Finally made one to upload some videos. I am normally not logged in.

(OK, OK - I was more concerned with them suddenly charging for a "free" service, as well as selling data to commercial enterprises than with them giving to the government).

(OK, OK - I do use Android).

I've migrated everything from Google except for Google Voice. I have yet to find an alternative that can match the feature set and ease of use, regardless of the cost.

Protonmail iirc. You can even get documents and photos synced. Not sure how well it works for photos.

I migrated away from my main email, it wasn't a Google mail but it was on the providers domain.

First I signed up with Proton Mail and added my own domain, they fit the bill for me, YMMV.

Then I did a search in my password manager and went through those accounts.

Then I just let the old account sit there for a year. Each time I got an email from something I cared about I'd log in and change mail.

It's been a year now, and I'm about to terminate the old account. All I get there now is occasional spam.

I really dreaded this, but all in all quite painless. And next time it should be easier since I now own the email domain.

edit: Forgot to mention I use Thunderbird, so old email I archived to local folders. That's part if why I ended with Proton, their IMAP bridge allows me to keep using Thunderbird.

Nothing. To the contrary things work BETTER outside the google eco system. The way to do it is incrementally. You don't just yolo delete you Gmail day 1. I still have mine, it's just getting almost no traffic today. Start by moving to an alternative email provider. I use proton. Buy a domain so that you can move providers easily in the future and use catch all email. Do a Google takeout and store the backup somewhere safe (I just use two hard drives sitting and home, replicated). Move the thing that you need day to day somewhere else. You can pay for someone to host it for you or self host. I'm self hosting immich for my Google photos replacement. I'm using proton calendar and email for Gmail service replacements. I was already using signal for most communications, but do that. I moved to graphene to get off of android and there are some sharp edges there if you want off Google play. I had to give up Android auto and gps tends to work worse (graphene does support android auto but I didnt like the tradeoffs). Nothing dealbreaking but can be annoying.

For general security, I also use a yubikey for all services that support it, froze credit with all agencies, and added phone support passwords to all my financial institutions.

I've run into one government website that required email addresses to come from gmail.com, outlook.com, or another common domain, and several websites that won't let you change your email address once registered. It also makes it really confusing if someone needs to share Google Docs with you. So I've moved as much as I can off of Google, but some stuff will linger forever.

I use Fastmail and the main difference I notice is less effective spam filtering — it’s good but not as great as Gmail was.

Overall it’s been an acceptable trade off and I’m glad years ago I switched to a custom domain for email so I can have portability.

Personally, I deleted everything I could but kept the Gmail account for a couple of years with a forward to my new account, and after that, I also deleted it. Google Takeout is a very useful way to quickly create a backup of everything Google.

Google leak ALL the time without warrant, Apple as well.

Note that there was a major press cycle about this in October / November of last year - a quick Google showed stories in the Guardian, The Intercept, and the Cornell Sun, as well as commentary on Reddit. Not inconceivable that they found about it last October and had six months to leave and de-Googlify.

As other comments say, it was a major story months ago. I started moving off around December. It's a long process to switch over all email accounts. I only recently got self hosted kubernetes set up for immich as a Google photos replacement and some other hosting needs but for the most part I am off google. I get probably 1-2 emails a week still going to Gmail but when I do I just switch those accounts to my new email. It will be a while before the old Gmail is deleted entirely unfortunately.

I didn't mention it in op but I also moved to graphene os which tbh feels much better than android has recently.

Setting aside the fact that this is a new account and it's their only post, what about the timeline is difficult to understand?

The request came in April 2025, and the user was notified the following month. That's next to a year for them to hear about it internally and then quit and setup self-hosting prior to today.

Maybe they read one of the articles written about this incident months ago.

It's this account's only comment and was only created right before posting. It has no credibility.

Administrative warrants do not carry the weight of law. It's merely a term of art for a request for information.

That statement is true at face value. But if you look at how Eric Schmidt travels with government representatives, how rich and powerful BigTech is, and how much they individually and collectively spend on lobbying, then they could be a massive obstacle if they only cared.