Does anyone here use VPNs?

[leavesoftrees]

Hello,

does anyone here use VPNs.? are they to be trusted or are they just another means of surveillance

[kaon]

I prefer TOR over the VPN's.
https://www.torproject.org/

Here is one of many articles that rank the VPN's
http://www.vpntopten.com/

I recently used Cyber Ghost and it seemed to work fairly well, but on one instance I did an IP address check while using their service and it showed my real IP address, defeating the purpose in using it in the first place. I had checked dozens of other times throughout the month and it showed the other server's IP address aside from that one instance.

hidemyass VPN works very well for me. It had passed all of my IP checks and seems to have decent speed.

You can experiment with most of them as they have free trial periods, but limit the amount of data that you can receive.

One other note about using VPN's. If you use gmail or hotmail over your VPN they will detect the different IP address and in some instances they will make you go through security questions or ask for identifying information or a phone # for text verification. Intrusive indeed!

[panopticon]

Posted by leavesoftrees (here)
Hello,

does anyone here use VPNs.? are they to be trusted or are they just another means of surveillance

I always use either a VPN or Tor when accessing the internet.

I modulate which VPN I access with. I never use the same one in a month and keep sessions to less than an hour before changing.

For me it's about privacy not anonymity.

I'm not actually worried about anything I write online and could easily use my direct connection without any problem. I simply don't like the fact that the State (not necessarily "my" State either) can monitor my activity easily. I just want to make it more complicated for the bastards.

If you want to try a free VPN service there's VPNgate from the National University of Tsukuba (Japan). It's run by academics & volunteers (servers vary in speed/access/uptime) with many of the server admins keeping logs for at least 2 weeks and relay servers logs for 3 months:

VPNGate
http://www.vpngate.net/en/

Here are a few links from a quick Guggle and a few articles I always use for those interested to peruse.

Which VPN Services Take Your Anonymity Seriously? 2015 Edition.
https://torrentfreak.com/anonymous-v...w-2015-150228/

I am Anonymous When I Use a VPN: 7 Myths Debunked
https://www.goldenfrog.com/take-back...-and-anonymity

In September 2013 a few articles appeared and The New Yorker wrote about it:

How the N.S.A. Cracked the Web
http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elemen...racked-the-web

In December 2014 Der Spiegel had an excellent article:

Prying Eyes: Inside the NSA's War on Internet Security
http://www.spiegel.de/international/...a-1010361.html

Jacob Appelbaum & Laura Poitras chatting @31c3:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=0SgGMj3Mf88

I hope this was useful.

-- Pan

[leavesoftrees]

Thanks for your replies Pan and Kaon

I think I remember seeing somewhere on Avalon that Tor was run by the CIA, but I may be remembering wrong

If using a VPN when visiting a site such as Avalon I assume it won't recognise your IP address and so you will have to manually log in?

It had never occurred to me to regularly change VPNs. I had seen the Torrentfreak review. The 7 myths debunked has some interesting things to say, essentially you can close your curtains, but your street address is there for all to see

[panopticon]

Posted by leavesoftrees (here)
Thanks for your replies Pan and Kaon

I think I remember seeing somewhere on Avalon that Tor was run by the CIA, but I may be remembering wrong

No wucken furries. Glad to help.

Originally developed by US Navy.

Pentagon assisted in later development and ongoing running costs.
So, US Navy, NSA, FBI, CIA & others.

Interesting article on that here:
Almost everyone involved in developing Tor was (or is) funded by the US government

In the article it mentions a forensic analysis run by Harvard University to identify a person who sent a bomb threat via their network:

All that Tor did was make the cops jump a few extra steps. But it wasn’t hard, nothing that a bit of manpower with full legal authority to access network records couldn’t solve. It helped that Harvard’s network logging all metadata access on the network — sorta like the NSA

Tor vulnerability is all about exist node routing or exploiting vulnerability of a users system (eg never install flash, be aware of DNS leak). If the node is run by an alphabet then much easier for them to store traffic. As Tor traffic is directed via fastest connections then those who own those exit nodes get the majority of traffic. Then, if encrypted, decrypt to view contents.

So, if all of the fastest exit nodes are run by the 5 Eyes (eg CIA, FBI, NSA, GCSB, GCHQ, ASIS, CSIS), or an agency from another country (eg China, Russia, Iran, France, Germany), then most Tor traffic can be stored and analyzed (decrypted if needed).

Might not be happening but I view it's naive to think otherwise.

Again, make it harder. Create more steps. More people using everyday assists in system usage.

Privacy not anonymity.

Couple of articles:

Schneier in 2013:
How the NSA Attacks Tor/Firefox Users With QUANTUM and FOXACID

A Wired article from Dec 2014
The FBI Used the Web’s Favorite Hacking Tool to Unmask Tor Users

Posted by leavesoftrees (here)
If using a VPN when visiting a site such as Avalon I assume it won't recognise your IP address and so you will have to manually log in

If you store passwords in your browser then your login will still be stored. The IP address of the website remains the same only your address changes.

I never store passwords (use an external encrypted drive) so this isn't an issue for me.

Posted by leavesoftrees (here)
It had never occurred to me to regularly change VPNs. I had seen the Torrentfreak review. The 7 myths debunked has some interesting things to say, essentially you can close your curtains, but your street address is there for all to see

Glad to have helped.
Very good analogy.

BTW, let's put this all in some perspective.

The internet was started as a US military project...

-- Pan

[yuhui]

I use goagent which needs a gmail account (used uk phone number when registered) if I remembered correct. It's getting slower these days and reallly can be frustrating.....

[e.Man]

the privacy freak that i am, i currently do not use a VPN or TOR (i do take some other precautions)

TorrentFreak puts out one the best guides on VPN providers - just wanted to mention that for others that my find this thread...

edit: i see the TF guide was already linked to, sorry
Which VPN Services Take Your Anonymity Seriously? 2015 Edition
https://torrentfreak.com/anonymous-v...w-2015-150228/

HMA (HideMyAss) is a popular one, but keep in mind that it was HMA who turned over data in at least one very publicized case - see What Everybody Ought to Know About HideMyAss:
https://invisibler.com/lulzsec-and-hidemyass/