Replying to Avatar Dr. Hax

You may have heard of the "slippery slope"

First, you discover #nostr, then #LoRa and #Meshtastic, then things built on top of these like #reticulum and #nomadnet

After that, you decide to stick it to the closed source software. You purge Windows and macOS, switch to #GrapheneOS and #Linux.

Then you start purging the simple closed source #hardware starting with all those IoT devices. #Nest ain't hoovering up your data anymore. You tell #Ring to GFY. #OpenSource everything.

Next thing you know, you're driving around with your #phone in airplane mode. Good luck tracking your every move now, overlords.

Then you're biking & walking with your phone in airplane mode instead of driving. High gas prices, drivers licenses, car insurance, #ALPR systems... they ain't gonna stop you.

Then you start your own #garden and learning how to preserve food. 50% inflation on food? Not a huge deal. You got this.

Later your leaving all #electronics at home and paying for everything in cash. You know the routes that minimize exposure to security cameras. You're nearly a ghost.

I'm not sure what comes after that, but I'll let you know when I get there.

These may happen in a slightly different order. Each person has their own path. But once you start going down the "STOP FUCKING EXPLOITING ME" path, and stop paying the people who are doing it, it's extremely hard to stop. It feels so good to be free from all that nonsense. You want to keep going and never look back. #cypherpunk

Take the plunge. Start with just some small things. You won't regret it. And if I'm wrong, you can always turn back anytime.

What's your take on VPNs? I'd rather my ISP not know my history and websites not know my IP. TOR can be a real PITA tho and doesn't work often. I don't know how to feel about the VPN provider trust issue. I'm really more concerned about privacy and being labeled "bad" for my browsing.

Reply to this note

Please Login to reply.

Discussion

Tunneling VPNs still sounds miserably slow. Lord the internet feels so broken.

Sounds like you already understand the tradeoff between trusting your ISP vs trusting a VPN provider. I'd say Tor is better, but sometimes you can't use Tor for one reason or another.

I'd suggest RiseUp when you want a VPN. You don't even need to give them an email address. Pay what you think the service is worth. Homor policy.

I know people who personally know and vouch for the crew that run it (and the other RiseUp services).

How about Proton and IVPN?

As I understand it there's also an anonymity set consideration when using a VPN. Which is why using something like a self hosted VPN thru a cloud provider doesn't do much for privacy at the network operator level.

I don't have an direct on second level contacts with any insider knowledge on Proton or IVPN, so all I know about them is what's public info.

Think about what info you are trying to protect from whom. If you want to prevent your ISP from knowing what sites you visit, and the sites to not know your IP address, a self-hosted VPN works great.

Also defending against the cloud provider hosting your VPN, or a global network observer is far more difficult. Best bet there would be to connect to a VPN over Tor. Here are the tradeoffs:

+ ISP can't see where you're going

+ VPN doesn't know your home IP address

+ websites don't see your home IP

+ you can use websites which block Tor as long as they do not also block VPNs

- VPN may slow down your connections

- Tor may slow down your connections

? VPN may know your name & address depending on how you pay

? VPN may require you to give them a working email address, but usually not a phone number

Tyvm! That was helpful