Why a VPN is the simplest way to stay secure online?

[JeffDunhill]

"  The internet can be a tricky place to navigate for even the most ardent of user, with data sniffers or hackers lurking looking for a weakness to exploit, advertising cookies and tracking services putting your privacy in jeopardy daily.
So it makes sense to secure yourself with a virtual private network (VPN), giving you the confidence of being anonymous on the web and keeping the chances of your online use being hacked down. "

http://www.techradar.com/news/why-a-vpn-is-the-simplest-way-to-stay-secure-online

[Sylence]

you can't be anonymous on the web, Nsa finds you eventually. but if your aim is to only hide yourself from ordinary websites you visit every day then it might work for you, might.

[Togijak]

1 hour ago, saeed_dc said:

you can't be anonymous on the web

sounds like you never used Tails

[Sylence]

1 hour ago, Togijak said:

sounds like you never used Tails

 

since when Tails has become a VPN? lolz epic fail

[SPECTRUM]

VPN secure ? lol xD

 

well, it can be secure depending of the country where is located, but if the VPN is located in USA, then is controlled by NSA.

[steven36]

43 minutes ago, SPECTRUM said:

VPN secure ? lol xD

 

well, it can be secure depending of the country where is located, but if the VPN is located in USA, then is controlled by NSA.

Vpn is not secure or tor or anything regardless  of were youre from if you sign into prism ran services  they know who you are regardless, if you made a accounts with you're real info and use it  shop online etc VPN or TOR is not worth nothing  . In fact the only  filter  the NSA has on Prism  is not to use it on people from the USA.

 

Quote

 

PRISM is still around, and it’s not alone

Remember PRISM? The clandestine internet-spying program where the NSA bulk collected internet communications from companies like Google, Apple, and Facebook? The one even a Republican Congressman who championed the Patriot Act called “more than the Patriot Act allows?”

PRISM gives the NSA access to a vast amount of data, from records of Skype calls and Gchat logs to unflattering unposted selfies. The only filter the agency uses to make sure it isn’t illegally spying on people within the US is asking an analyst if they’re 51 percent confident that the surveilled person is outside the US.

 

PRISM was never shut down. Somewhere in America a bunch of NSA analysts are PRISMing like Edward Snowden was a fever-dream twinkle in their spyin’ eyes.

 

http://gizmodo.com/surprise-the-nsa-is-still-spying-on-you-1745256761

There's a  big loop hole in the law  that says its fine for them to spy on you as long as you're not from the USA .

Quote

 

Most obviously, there’s Section 702,” Electronic Frontier Foundation staff attorney Andrew Crocker told me. That’s Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, and it gives the NSA authority to collect internet communications on (you guessed it) foreigners. The NSA uses it to justify stuff like Stellarwind. It was introduced in 2008, and it’s not up for renewal until 2017.

Another justification is even older. Reagan signed Executive Order 12333 to authorize foreign intelligence investigations back in 1981, and it has been a boon to upstream surveillance cheerleaders. The beauty of 12333 is in its empty, flexible language: Any information “incidentally” collected during an intelligence gathering mission focused outside the US—even if it’s the entire email history of a Minnesota teen or every iCloud photo from a Chicagoan’s iPhone—is fair game.

 

These loopholes and broad interpretations of orders are not totally unnoticed in Congress. “I will continue to push for reforms to section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act – like closing the backdoor searches loophole,”Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) told Gizmodo in a statement. “And I believe Congress needs to take a hard look at collection conducted under Executive Order 12333 as well to ensure it is not abused to circumvent laws or violate Americans’ civil liberties. As long as Americans keep demanding policies that protect both their security and their liberty, you can expect to see more reforms in the future.”

 

 

As far as inside  the USA that's the FBI  , and State and Local law enforcement's  job so thinking the  NSA is not spying on you because you use a VPN and live outside the USA you could not be more wrong in order for them not too be tracking you you must never have posted you're real info out there all a VPN or TOR can do is hide you're ip it dont make you anonymous.

 

[Jobe]

Cyberghost black friday deal 70% off premium 1 year

UK=£12-50

Euro-€15-00

Good deal.

[Cobaltius]

13 minutes ago, steven36 said:

Vpn is not secure or tor or anything regardless  of were youre from if you sign into prism ran services  they know who you are regardless, if you made a accounts with you're real info and use it  shop online etc VPN or TOR is not worth nothing  . In fact the only  filter  the NSA has on Prism  is not to use it on people from the USA.

 

http://gizmodo.com/surprise-the-nsa-is-still-spying-on-you-1745256761

There's a  big loop hole in the law  that says its fine for them to spy on you as long as you're not from the USA .

 

As far as inside  the USA that's the FBI  , and State and Local law enforcement's  job so thinking the  NSA is not spying on you because you use a VPN and live outside the USA you could not be more wrong in order for them not too be tracking you you must never have posted you're real info out there all a VPN or TOR can do is hide you're ip it dont make you anonymous.

 

 

 

So if there is a  51% less chance you are getting spied on by the NSA if you live in the US then going with a US based VPN will have better odds of keeping you secure then living in the US and using a non US based VPN right?

[steven36]

11 minutes ago, Cobaltius said:

 

 

So if there is a  51% less chance you are getting spied on by the NSA if you live in the US then going with a US based VPN will have better odds of keeping you secure then living in the US and using a non US based VPN right?

Not really  since a USA based VPN  is sold outside  the USA  too , it dont matter if you use a VPN or not  if you sign in to things the NSA keeps TABS  on  they already know who you are by you're personal info. If you talk to people the NSA is after outside  the USA  you will still get caught in the crossfire .

[Batu69]

Moved from security & privacy news forum.

[jamesDDI]

Use Airvpn, if you want use a Serious vpn service. NOT other like primary service vpn.

 

My conf for all the simple "uses" is Airvpn on host and Cryptostorm on guest. Tor browser on guest.  

 

More or less ...  If you need something more serious, leave your phone at home, take a car, drive, choose a wifi connection, Tails in live and go...

[polz]

you can see comparison vpn on here go

[Togijak]

for information about vpn you can trust read here https://www.privacytools.io/

 

Quote

Why is it not recommended to choose a US based service?

Services based in the United States are not recommended because of the country’s surveillance programs, use of National Security Letters (NSLs) and accompanying gag orders, which forbid the recipient from talking about the request. This combination allows the government to secretly force companies to grant complete access to customer data and transform the service into a tool of mass surveillance.

An example of this is Lavabit – a discontinued secure email service created by Ladar Levison. The FBI requested Snowden’s records after finding out that he used the service. Since Lavabit did not keep logs and email content was stored encrypted, the FBI served a subpoena (with a gag order) for the service’s SSL keys. Having the SSL keys would allow them to access communications (both metadata and unencrypted content) in real time for all of Lavabit’s customers, not just Snowden's.

Ultimately, Levison turned over the SSL keys and shut down the service at the same time. The US government then threatened Levison with arrest, saying that shutting down the service was a violation of the court order.

 

there is a list

VPN providers with extra layers of privacy

All providers listed here are outside the US, use encryption, accept Bitcoin, support OpenVPN and have a no logging policy.

[steven36]

 

Quote

 

How can I protect myself from government snoopers?

 

Now that the Investigatory Powers Act 2016 - or snooper’s charter – has become law, Charles wants to protect his privacy

 

Now that the snooper’s charter has been passed, how can I protect myself? Should I use a VPN? Charles

 

The UK has just passed the Investigatory Powers Act 2016, at the third attempt, and it will become law by the end of the year. The bill was instigated by the then home secretary, Theresa May, in 2012. It is better known as the snooper’s charter.

 

Jim Killock, the director of Open Rights Group, described it as the “most extreme surveillance law ever passed in a democracy”. It more or less removes your right to online privacy.

 

The law forces internet service providers to keep a record of all the websites – not the actual pages – you visit for up to a year. It also obliges companies to decrypt data on demand and gives government security services the power to hack your computers, tablets, mobile phones and other devices.

To some extent, the new law merely legalises the current “custom and practice” as revealed by Edward Snowden. The most obvious difference is that it makes your web history readily available to almost 50 assorted police forces and government departments. These include the British Transport Police, the Department of Health, the Food Standards Agency, the Gambling Commission, and the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust.

Web tracking and proxies

When you sign up with an ISP, the traffic from your PCs and other devices goes to your ISP’s servers, which feed most of it – except various blocked websites – on to the internet. You can track this process yourself using TraceRoute.

Your ISP therefore knows where you are going online. You can avoid this by using one or more anonymous “proxy servers” between your PC and your eventual destination. Your ISP will then know you visited the proxy server, but, if the anonymising is done properly, it won’t know where you went from there.

Most people aren’t interested in proxy servers, but often end up using them. For example, British people travelling or living aboard use UK-based proxy servers to watch TV programmes on BBC iPlayer, while people outside the US use American proxies to access Netflix and other services.

Enter the VPN

There are two big problems with using free proxies. First, you may not know who’s running them. They could be helpful hackers or criminals, or even CIA honeypots. Second, they may be unreliable and slow. It’s better to use a virtual private network or VPN.

 

Multinational corporations have long used VPNs as a way of extending their private networks across the public internet. If they encrypt all the traffic between computers in their British, American and other offices, they can send their traffic securely over the internet without paying for expensive leased lines. VPN service providers offer the same facilities to ordinary users for a small monthly fee.

The traffic from your PC is automatically encrypted and sent to the VPN supplier’s server, so your ISP can’t see the final destination. The ISP’s records should only contain the VPN company’s server addresses.

 

Not many people use VPNs. However, I recommend them to people who travel a lot or work from public Wi-Fi hotspots, because they protect your traffic from snoopers who steal passwords – or worse. I also recommend them to people who are potential targets for other reasons. They might be diplomats, film stars, bankers or anyone with commercially sensitive data

Choosing a VPN

Dozens of companies sell VPN services, and you can find plenty of reviews to help you choose. The things to look for include the number of servers and where they are located, their privacy policies, the applications they support (Tor, BitTorrent etc), speed and price. Some have applications for different devices. For example, NordVPN has them for Windows, MacOS, iPhone, iPad and Android.

If your motivation includes the snooper’s charter, choose a VPN that is not UK-based, and that does not keep any logs. If they don’t keep any logs, they can’t hand them over to government raiders. TorrentFreak keeps an updated list of “which VPN services take your anonymity seriously”: The Best Anonymous VPN Services of 2016.

For increased privacy, some VPN providers accept payments by dozens of different methods including Bitcoin and anonymous gift cards.

However, note that a VPN can’t guarantee access to any particular website. For example, Netflix has taken to blocking most VPN services (where hundreds of users are coming from one IP address), though some are making technical efforts to maintain access. You may also have problems with Google’s geolocation, PayPal’s fraud detection software, and so on.

Also, remember that a VPN doesn’t protect you from phishing emails, keyloggers, and websites that try to install “drive by” malware.

Web tracking

A VPN stops your ISP from logging your web visits, but they may still be logged. For starters, your own web browser is keeping a history. You’re also being tracked by dozens of advertising services, including Google’s. You can block trackers with a browser extension such as Ghostery or the EFF’s Privacy Badger, but note that Privacy Badger only blocks trackers from third-party sites.

GRC has a “forensics” page, which checks whether you are being tracked by cookies.

For increased privacy, you could access the internet from a “virtual computer” loaded in your operating system, and then throw it away after use. VirtualBox is a good free example. VMware Workstation Player is also free for non-commercial use.

This may be the only way to avoid being tracked by “browser fingerprinting”. This is when the tracking company (or government agency) gives your PC a unique identifier based on variables such as screen resolution, browser version, extensions, fonts, timezone and so on. If you use a virtual PC, every session starts with a more-or-less generic fingerprint. It may not be perfect, but it’s less identifiable than the alternative.

Mail, messaging and smartphones

The snooper’s charter obviously covers too many services and devices for a single answer. However, you could consider switching to a secure email service such as ProtonMail, and a secure messaging service such as Signal. ChatSecure, WhatsApp and Apple’s iMessage also encrypt messages.

You can’t make smartphone use private because you’re always being tracked by the cellular network. However, you can turn off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth when you’re not using them – they can also be used to track you – and use a VPN for web access. Remember also that many smartphone apps request permissions that enable them to track you.

Last words

As an ordinary citizen with a life, you can’t hide from the security services, any more than you can defend your house against a tank regiment. If they want to hack your devices, they will. If you’re an investigative journalist, human rights campaigner, one of Snowden’s collaborators etc, you need a higher level of security.

But if they are not out to get you, why act as though they should be? It’s probably better to be as inconspicuous as possible, while limiting the amount of data that might turn up in some bored agency’s random fishing expeditions.

 

I think that VPNs are – or soon will be – normal enough not to attract undue attention. There are already plenty of reasons for using a VPN, to protect yourself in a world of hostile Wi-Fi hotspots (hence HotSpot Shield, Hide My Ass etc) and other online threats. That’s why many large businesses use VPNs. The fact that they may also shield you from some state snooping is just a bonus.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/nov/23/censor-non-conventional-sex-acts-online-internet-pornography

 

 

[Togijak]

@steven36

 

I think you know that the first places in this review  The Best Anonymous VPN Services of 2016 are sponsored. That is the reason

Quote

Our VPN Provider Criteria

• Operating outside the USA or other Five Eyes countries.
  More: Avoid all US and UK based services.
• OpenVPN software support.
• Accepts Bitcoin, cash, debit cards or cash cards as a payment method.
• No personal information is required to create an account. Only username, password and Email.

We're not affiliated with any of the above listed VPN providers. This way can give you honest recommendations.

why I prefer the list from privacytools.io

[pc71520]

Do VPNs offer

complete Anonymity

or just/only some layers of Privacy? 

 

What about ISPs?

 

[Togijak]

@pc71520

 

If your client is good / the configuration is OK (no leaks) and you don't lock into any account on your name etc. you ar almost anonym. Your ISP only can see where is the IP from your VPN provider. I think it is a good idea to read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_private_network

[virge]

The op's article states PureVPN is the one to use. What VPN do you all recommend/use ?

[Cobaltius]

5 hours ago, Togijak said:

@steven36

 

I think you know that the first places in this review  The Best Anonymous VPN Services of 2016 are sponsored. That is the reason

why I prefer the list from privacytools.io

 

Here is another good VPN comparison site:

 

https://thatoneprivacysite.net/simple-vpn-comparison-chart/

[steven36]

7 hours ago, Togijak said:

@steven36

 

I think you know that the first places in this review  The Best Anonymous VPN Services of 2016 are sponsored. That is the reason

why I prefer the list from privacytools.io

One is sponsored and the other site is all tinfoil hatie witch is worse?  I never heard of no one using PIA having any problems and it's cheap ..While some of the VPN not in the USA caused people problems . It's comparing something that happen at Lavabit Email  witch  chose to shut down instead of disclosing private data and never gave the government what they wanted  even though they had a gag order to not to say it was for Snowden..

 

How is that any different than CyberGhost  leaving Germany and moving to Romania  because of law enforcement there  was after there data ?  iF CyberGhost had to leave that tells me you cant trust vpns  in Germany? And we know you cant trust VPN in the UK now . If there's is no logs there very little info to give  that's main thing. and some VPN not in the USA had people arrested before . So can we say tinfoil hat much ?  Please investigate instead of taking some sites word for it.

 

I been using a VPN since 2011 of some type some were even giveaways  and even free ones and i never had no trouble regardless  The worse thing I do is p2p and download from filehost. People need to stop comparing themselves to  Snownden you may as well face it you're just  a everyday joe . so you need to stop acting like you're some type of activist or journalist when you're not that's a good way to draw attention to yourself. I read reviews  over at reedit of all different vpns .  

 

[steven36]

21 hours ago, Jobe said:

Cyberghost black friday deal 70% off premium 1 year

UK=£12-50

Euro-€15-00

Good deal.

I used it for free but i would never buy it  they inject Advert  cookies into IE  every time you use it ,also  they use cloudflare witch keep logs it shows up in internet sniffing logs , now they have this crap 

1. Quote

    

   1. Prevents online tracking
   2. Protects against malicious attackers
   3. Ad-blocker

    

   if you use these features  it installs a root certificate which allows them to perform MITM attacks on all SSL sites.

[Togijak]

3 hours ago, steven36 said:

I used it for free but i would never buy it  they inject Advert  cookies into IE  every time you use it ,also  they use cloudflare witch keep logs it shows up in internet sniffing logs , now they have this crap 

1. if you use these features  it installs a root certificate which allows them to perform MITM attacks on all SSL sites.

 

good to know and it sounds like you know much more than I do about witch VPN provider user can trust = which affordable VPN provider non rich user can trust?

[pc71520]

Authorities (security services)

can tap or bypass VPNs and ISPs...

 

[strumz]

Hi Steven36

Would you recommend Hideallip, I'm using it on trial at the moment, but I have a Qs.

 

It seems to work well but when donwloading a large file ie a film at say 3Gb it slows the download from 8Mb/s to half a Mb/s, in time terms it increases from 4 min to about an 1hr 10 min.

 

Is that normal for any VPN?  Yet some VPN's say say they won't slow you down, or is it just the slowdown price you pay for anonymity?