internet surveillence self defence ( safe and secure browsing )

[majithia23]

Surveillance Self-Defense International

6 Ideas For Those Needing Defensive Technology to Protect Free Speech from Authoritarian Regimes and 4 Ways the Rest of Us Can Help

Peter Eckersley, [email protected]

Introduction: The Internet remains one of the most powerful means ever created to give voice to repressed people around the world. Unfortunately, new technologies have also given authoritarian regimes new means to identify and retaliate against those who speak out despite censorship and surveillance. Below are six basic ideas for those attempting to speak without falling victim to authoritarian surveillance and censorship, and four ideas for the rest of us who want to help support them.

I. Ideas for Activists and Others Facing Authoritarian Regimes

• 1. Understand Risk Assessment
  The first step in trying to defend yourself against digital surveillance and censorship is to understand the concept of risk assessment. Risk assessment is the process of deciding what threats you face, how likely and serious they are, and how to prioritize the steps you can take to protect yourself. EFF's section on risk assessment in Surveillance Self-Defense can help you with this assessment.1
• 
  2. Beware of Malware
  Malware is a catch-all term for computer viruses, worms, trojan horses, keystroke loggers, spyware, rootkits and any other kind of software that makes a computer spy on you or act against your interests.
  If a government is able to install malware on the computer you are using, then it doesn't matter what other steps you take: your files and communications will be subject to surveillance.
  If you have your own computer, you need to be sure to install security updates and run anti-virus or rootkit scanning software. You also need to understand that these measures only offer limited protection. For one guide to anti-virus and firewall software, see the Tactical Technology Collective's "Security in a Box" guide.
  It is important to note that if you are using a shared computer, such as a computer at an Internet cafe or a library, the risk of surveillance by malware may be greater. If you need to use a public computer for sensitive communications, you should use a bootable USB device or CD (such as Incognito) to mitigate the risks posed by malware.
  You can use a bootable USB or CD for the most sensitive things you do with your own computer, too.
• 
  3. Choose the Least-Risky Communications Channels
  You should be careful in choosing the channels through which you communicate with other individuals and activists.
  • Talking in person is usually the safest way to speak (unless others are watching you, or your location is bugged).
  • Understand the risk associated with phone calls. Most governments are able to record who calls whom, and when, all of the time. Currently, most governments outside the US/EU have a more limited, albeit unknown ability to record and listen to the phone calls themselves. For instance, it is believed that they will be able to tap phones, but only a limited number (perhaps a few thousand) at any given moment. You should always assume that a call to or from a phone belonging to an activist, or regularly used for activism, may be bugged.
  • Avoid SMS text messages. These pass unencrypted through major telecommunication providers and are easy for a government to harvest and analyze on a massive scale.
  • Protect Internet communications by using encryption2 and by choosing (preferably offshore) service providers that are trustworthy and unlikely to cooperate with your government.
    Here are two channels which are easy to use and which offer some protection:
    • Use the OTR instant messaging plugin. This is easy if you and the people you communicate with can install the Pidgin or Adium X instant messaging programs on your computers. Details on how to do this are available here. Disable logging to ensure that if your computer is seized, your communications aren't on it.
    • Use a webmail provider that supports https encryption. Services like RiseUp.net place a premium on their users' privacy. Gmail supports encryption, but you must enable it in your settings and consider whether you can trust Google not to hand your communications to your government.3 Make sure every that time you send or receive an email, the pages uses https — otherwise, your messages could be intercepted.

    There are many other ways to arrange for secure communications, although many require more technical expertise. See SSD for further detail with respect to securing email.

    [*] Encrypted Voice-over-IP is possible, but many VoIP services do not support it. Two exceptions are ZPhone and Skype. Unencrypted VOIP is very easy to tap, including most telephone cabinets at Internet cafes.

    The level of security afforded by the popular commercial VoIP service Skype is unknown. We believe that countries with sophisticated intelligence services will find ways to defeat Skype's security, while less sophisticated intelligence services may be confounded by it. China is known to have produced its own trojan-infected version of Skype. It is also known that there are weaknesses in Skype's security architecture.4 You should assume that the intelligence services of countries like the U.S., Israel, Russia, or Cuba could defeat Skype's encryption. But as far as is known, most less developed countries are unlikely to be able to decrypt Skype's communications in the near future.

  [*]

  4. Use Encryption to Prevent Surveillance and Censorship of your Web Usage

  Censorship and surveillance of Internet connections are intimately connected: it is difficult to censor communications without at the same time being able to watch and understand them, because it is difficult for the censorship system to tell the difference between the communications it intends to block and those it does not.

  There are many ways to use encryption to protect your communications against surveillance and censorship. You can use some Internet services with their own encryption built-in (see above for instant messaging, or webmail using https). But if you want to use encryption to protect all of your web browsing, try one of the following:

  • Use Tor. Tor will encrypt your communications and bounce them around the planet before sending them on to their destination. It offers a high level of protection against eavesdropping by your government5 and is not hard to use. The greatest challenge with using Tor is that it often slows browsing down a great deal; expect page loads to be slowed down by ten seconds or more.
    If you live in a country where the very fact that you use Tor might be seen as grounds for singling you out for arrest, further surveillance, or other unwelcome scrutiny, you should only use Tor in combination with a Tor Bridge. See section 6 below.
  • Use an encrypted proxy or Virtual Private Network (VPN) to tunnel your traffic overseas. This approach offers slightly less protection than Tor but tends to be faster. There are many ways you can try this:
    • Use a public, SSL-encrypted proxy server. Understand that unless you know who runs a proxy, there is a chance that it is run by your adversary.
    • If you have access to a Linux or Unix account overseas, you can instantly create your own encrypted proxy server using the ssh program (which comes installed on Mac OS X and Linux computers, and can be easily installed on Windows). Here are two pages discussing how to do that.
    • Use a service like Hotspot Shield.
    • Use an overseas VPN service. Companies such as Relakks sell access to services of this sort.

  [*]

  5. Be Careful of What and Where You Publish

  • Avoid publishing material under your own name, or including facts that might be clues to your identity, unless you are willing to take the risk that authorities will target you for reprisals.
  • Avoid publishing material through hosting services that have a commercial presence in your country, or which are likely to cooperate with your country's government. Be aware that some countries have treaties which lead them to assist other countries' law enforcement requests.
  • Only publish material through services that use https. You should see the https prefix in the browser address bar, and an unbroken lock icon in your browser window: not just during login, but the entire time you are using the site.

  [*]

  6. Should I use a Tor Bridge?Tor Bridges are a more discreet way to connect to the Tor network. Normally, if you use Tor, someone watching the network could observe that your computer was connected to the Tor network.6 If you use a Tor Bridge instead, it will be much harder to tell that you are using Tor.

  If you use Tor and live in a country with a strong tradition of Internet censorship, your government might suddenly start blocking connections to the public Tor network. In that case, you should have a Tor Bridge address ready for use if that happens.

  If you live in a country where the mere fact of using Tor might expose you to unwelcome attention or worse, you should never use Tor without configuring it to connect through a bridge.

  You can find information about how to configure Tor to use a bridge at: https://www.torproject.org/bridges

  You can find some addresses of Tor bridges at https://bridges.torproject.org/, or by sending email to [email protected] with the line "get bridges" by itself in the body of the mail.

II. How Can I Help Others Around the World Escape Surveillance and Censorship?

Perhaps you don't live under an authoritarian regime, but you'd like to help people who do. At the moment, here are our main suggestions:

• 
  1. Run a Tor Relay
  Donate some of your bandwidth by relaying encrypted traffic between Tor nodes. Follow the instructions at the Tor Project's website, but be sure to disable exiting from your machine, unless you intend to run an exit node (see section 3 below).
• 
  2. Run a Tor Bridge
  Act as a bridge, to help people in countries with extreme Internet-censorship and surveillance practices. If you aren't sure whether you should run a relay or a bridge, read the Tor Project's advice on the subject.
• 
  3. Consider Running a Tor Exit Node
  Unlike running Tor relays and bridges, running a Tor exit node requires significantly more care, organization, and commitment. Tor exit nodes are the machines which pass traffic out of the Tor network and on to its final destination on the Internet.
  Exit nodes are vital to the operation of the Tor network. But, unlike the rest of the network, much of the traffic they carry is unencrypted. Tor exit nodes are the machines that will be fetching websites for dissidents in Iran or Burma to read; they are the machines that will be sending blog posts on behalf of those dissidents; they are the machines that will leave digital logs behind on the websites and servers they visit. But because Tor can be used for any purpose, it is also possible that Tor exit nodes will generate complaints about copyright infringement, web-spamming or other forms of antisocial network activity – and those would be associated with the exit node's IP address.
  If you decide to run a Tor exit node, it is important to anticipate the possibility of such complaints, and ensure that you don't get blamed for antisocial things that a few of the hundreds of thousands of Tor users do. You should therefore read the Tor project's advice on running exit nodes.
• 
  4. Run a Proxy for Friends
  If you have friends in a country where Internet censorship is a problem, you could run a private proxy for them. Unfortunately, in order to do this securely you will need to obtain an SSL certificate for the proxy; this is quite an involved process.
  If you run a Unix-like operating system, understand what shell access is, and trust your friends, you could give them shell accounts to use to create a personal proxy with ssh -D.

1. 1. Many aspects of the SSD website were designed for people living under U.S. laws; these may not be applicable in other places, but the risk assessment principles are universal.
2. 2. Encryption uses math to transform a message in a way that makes it unreadable to anyone except those that have a means of decrypting the message. You can protect the security and privacy of your information by encrypting it before sending it over the Internet. If encryption is used properly, the information should only be readable by you and the intended recipient.
3. 3. Google Gmail is a good choice from a computer security perspective: it gives you secure email and instant messaging with other people who use Gmail in https mode. The biggest problem with Gmail is that Google might be compelled by your country's laws to disclose your email to the government. This is especially a risk in Western countries, and any other countries where Google has offices and corporate operations that might subject it to local law. Smaller services like RiseUp.net are exposed to fewer jurisdictions, but you should be mindful that your government might regard the very fact that you use a small, privacy-preserving email service as grounds for suspicion.
4. 4. Problems include: the fact that Skype is typically installed from http:// sites and could readily be tampered with by a third party; the fact that the Skype corporation acts as an authentication and PKI broker, and could itself execute man-in-the-middle attacks; and the fact that remote code execution bugs are periodically found in Skype. For a detailed analysis of Skype's cryptographic design, see http://www.secdev.org/conf/skype_BHEU06.handout.pdf
5. 5. Note that while Tor always prevents eavesdropping by your network, ISP and government, you should be careful sending usernames and passwords over http:// with it, since those have to leave the Tor network and travel to the web server unencrypted. https:// websites are safer in that respect.
6. 6. The signs are that your computer connects to a large number of Internet addresses, all of which are in the public directory of Tor nodes.

source -- eff.org

[Sl@pSh0ck™]

good reading. thanks ;)

If anybody wanna know the information that you are giving away right now as you visit sites click here

[jalaffa]

good reading. thanks ;)

If anybody wanna know the information that you are giving away right now as you visit sites click here

Your computer is connecting to the internet at Stockholm, 26, in the SE - Guess I'm doing something right :lol:

[spootnack]

good reading. thanks ;)

If anybody wanna know the information that you are giving away right now as you visit sites click here

Your computer is connecting to the internet at Stockholm, 26, in the SE - Guess I'm doing something right :lol:

It smells IPREDator, isn't it ? :D

++

[Bizarre™]

Thanks for the info :)

[implague]

i need to ask the question does the private browsing is secure? :unsure:

[Sl@pSh0ck™]

i need to ask the question does the private browsing is secure? :unsure:

Private Browsing, only allows you to browse the Internet without your browser retaining any data about which sites and pages you have visited. This is helpful when you do not want other users of your computer to see or access such information. But that's just about it.

[HX1]

https://wiki.mozilla.org/PrivateBrowsing .. should shed some light on exactly what Private Browsing does.. You are not however secure from the things being discussed on the first post.. Information still flows freely between you and other networks.. so taking the necessary steps involved ( like getting the Vidalia Bundle ... and reading up on it.. ) would be advisable.

Private Browsing is basically like having all of the items that you store.. when browsing ( that should be cleared and deleted when it closes if you have the settings right ).. and it disallows the storage of those files ( which can be recovered unless properly erased and overwritten ) recording of things like history. So even though you clear certain items.. they can still be brought back and recovered forensically or just by a knowledgeable user... SO Private Browsing is a better choice but yet it still not a full method of being secure because you have many methods in which things of this nature can be done.. Main point is to cover all bases and realize what can be accessed, and how.. Many steps.. an they are not all the fault of your browser..

Asking rather or not something is secure on the web these days is really not a matter of receiving the right answer.. Its the fact that you question it.. If you question it then therefore there must me something that is not.. Which then leads you to the next thing, which would be rectifying the situation.. In some cases it may even sound crazy that someone ( a normal person ) would go to certain lengths... But then again we socially use some of these points as entertainment.. regardless of result r implication.. and truth.. ( Shouldn't state what should be done with people like this.. )

There is a lot of difference between explaining how a computer work, how you use it.. and how it should be done.. and it changes from user to user.. The think tank sometimes is better off coming from yourself.. and doing your homework.. Many people don't even get lulled into a false sense of security by thinking, " It will never happen to me..".. in many cases they just have bad habits.. no knowledge of it.. or are taught incorrectly .. or even fro themselves.. to just barely accomplish what they are trying to do as they need to.. so persevering to cover it well.. and consider all points... would be a good idea..

[tonyblair]

Thank you for this information. :)

Nota: The link for the skype_BHEU06.handout.pdf. file has a "." at the end. This makes an error for any downloading :

Not Found

The requested URL /conf/skype_BHEU06.handout.pdf. was not found on this server.

[majithia23]

good reading. thanks ;)

If anybody wanna know the information that you are giving away right now as you visit sites click here

Thank you for this information. :)

Nota: The link for the skype_BHEU06.handout.pdf. file has a "." at the end. This makes an error for any downloading :

Not Found

The requested URL /conf/skype_BHEU06.handout.pdf. was not found on this server.

@'nivrid05'

thanks for the link . good one .

@tonyblair

you are right .

dint check this before posting .

you must have got this correct by yourself.

anywayz..

http://www.secdev.org/conf/skype_BHEU06.handout.pdf

well friends ,

i never tried Tor networks .

what do you say about this network.?

does it really slows down the internet speed ?

is it really safe than normal browsing ?

its overall pros and cons ?

thanks ..

[HX1]

The only issue it has IMO.. is that DNS requests are slower.. and thats whats happens when you bounce around the planet first..LOL to be expected..to some degree.. and if properly used it kills all of your plugins and identifying information being sent from them.. so your limited on some functionality.. but otherwise great..

PeerBlock is good too.. for Filtering ...

[implague]

well thanx for the info <_<

[Sl@pSh0ck™]

@majithia23

The only CON I see in using tor is that it would slow down your browsing speed, but with the proper reconfiguration of the torcc file you will get a modest speed (exit nodes). Tor would also block your plugins like Flash and Java so no YOUTUBE while browsing behind Tor (but this can be reconfigured to allow plugins to run). Overall, Tor does what it is intended to do, hide your real identity on the internet, but of course nothing is perfect. You will need a lot of reading to understand how Tor works and how to configure it properly to suit your needs.

To get you started:

HOME

FAQ

Tor Manual

[DKT27]

Good article. :)

Tor is a chain proxy so it's very good. But is very slow and not to forget, torrents don't work with Tor. :(

[Sl@pSh0ck™]

Torrents do work in Tor, but just imagine how supeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr slooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww your download would be :lol:, also it is not advisable to prevent clogging of the tor network.

Heres how to anyway:

Torrify Bittorent

[DKT27]

I'm sure they never work. At least for me.

EDIT: Hmm. :think:

[Sl@pSh0ck™]

If it doesn't work for you it doesn't mean it is not working at all :P

[DKT27]

I'll like to hear what Biz has to say on it. :lol:

[majithia23]

The only issue it has IMO.. is that DNS requests are slower.. and thats whats happens when you bounce around the planet first..LOL to be expected..to some degree.. and if properly used it kills all of your plugins and identifying information being sent from them.. so your limited on some functionality.. but otherwise great..

PeerBlock is good too.. for Filtering ...

@majithia23

The only CON I see in using tor is that it would slow down your browsing speed, but with the proper reconfiguration of the torcc file you will get a modest speed (exit nodes). Tor would also block your plugins like Flash and Java so no YOUTUBE while browsing behind Tor (but this can be reconfigured to allow plugins to run). Overall, Tor does what it is intended to do, hide your real identity on the internet, but of course nothing is perfect. You will need a lot of reading to understand how Tor works and how to configure it properly to suit your needs.

To get you started:

HOME

FAQ

Tor Manual

thanks ,,

all right friends ,

just installed Tor and its running good .

yes , the speed has been sacrificed ,

but after running the anonymity test and seeing my ip address being present at berlin, germany ,

it did bring a smile on my face ! :)

and the speed is not all that bad ,

its just some 5 to 8 secs are taken additional to load a page .

so Tor is better than using a single proxy server ? ( except the speed ....)

is it so ?

and tell me,

is it advisable to use hostsman and peerblock , on one same computer ?

if no ,

which should be preferred ?

thanks ..

.

[Sl@pSh0ck™]

@Majithia23

Congratz! :clap: you can tweak it even more if you want to increase it's speed (using high bandwidth exit nodes only). You can also define if you only want to use IP's (exit nodes) from a certain country etc. Just keep on reading and you'll be a happy camper with Tor. And Yes, security and privacy wise Tor is way much better than a single IP proxy server.:tooth:

I haven't used hostsman so no idea bout it :dunno: but i've been using peerblock for quite some time now mainly for blocking anti P2P ip's on Bittorent, and it's working okay.

[HX1]

I use these lists with PeerBlock.. ( from iBlocklist )

Tor

Wireless

Hijacked

Level 2

Level 3

Proxy

Nexus23 - IPFilterX

.. and the four that come with it by default.. without any real issues.. You do have to watch for blocking HTTP if you can't reach a site you need to get to you may have to turn HTTP Blocking off.. for a second..

Hostsman I actually have on this machine and I consider it to be a good additional program for changing the lmhosts file.. easily.. and switching between them on the fly is easy.. However using SpyBot Search and Destroy to add Immunization to your browsers, and your Hosts file.. will probably be more beneficial. I use both because I am not sure if everything listed in PeerBlock Lists covers everything that is in SpyBot's List.. Hostsman, as far as I know did or does not come with blocks for these things by default.. so you may be running it for no reason.. ( is useful though.. ) Not to mention that adding these things one at a time yourself leaves a HUGE whole for error, and vulnerability.. So you may not be as safe as you may think..

@DKT27 - uTorrent and any other program can be used with Vidalia.. as your nodes change, and your time on the network increases you will get faster speeds.. there will be times when the overall speed drops however... on your connection unless it changed recently.. I would expect that you could easily max out n keep it there.. However speeds that are maintained for days at the top of say several MB/s won't be possible.. and I have noticed some speed increases after adding the Tor filter to PeerBlock... in some cases I have experienced even normal usage as if I was on my regular network.. both with browser and other programs.. so it may just depend on your nodes and available bandwidth being shared globally..

[DKT27]

Hmm. I maynot be using Tor nowadays. Even if I plan to hide myself in uTorrent I would use a VPN over Tor only because of the speed.

[majithia23]

@Majithia23

Congratz! :clap: you can tweak it even more if you want to increase it's speed (using high bandwidth exit nodes only). You can also define if you only want to use IP's (exit nodes) from a certain country etc. Just keep on reading and you'll be a happy camper with Tor. And Yes, security and privacy wise Tor is way much better than a single IP proxy server.:tooth:

I haven't used hostsman so no idea bout it :dunno: but i've been using peerblock for quite some time now mainly for blocking anti P2P ip's on Bittorent, and it's working okay.

I use these lists with PeerBlock.. ( from iBlocklist )

Tor

Wireless

Hijacked

Level 2

Level 3

Proxy

Nexus23 - IPFilterX

.. and the four that come with it by default.. without any real issues.. You do have to watch for blocking HTTP if you can't reach a site you need to get to you may have to turn HTTP Blocking off.. for a second..

Hostsman I actually have on this machine and I consider it to be a good additional program for changing the lmhosts file.. easily.. and switching between them on the fly is easy.. However using SpyBot Search and Destroy to add Immunization to your browsers, and your Hosts file.. will probably be more beneficial. I use both because I am not sure if everything listed in PeerBlock Lists covers everything that is in SpyBot's List.. Hostsman, as far as I know did or does not come with blocks for these things by default.. so you may be running it for no reason.. ( is useful though.. ) Not to mention that adding these things one at a time yourself leaves a HUGE whole for error, and vulnerability.. So you may not be as safe as you may think..

@DKT27 - uTorrent and any other program can be used with Vidalia.. as your nodes change, and your time on the network increases you will get faster speeds.. there will be times when the overall speed drops however... on your connection unless it changed recently.. I would expect that you could easily max out n keep it there.. However speeds that are maintained for days at the top of say several MB/s won't be possible.. and I have noticed some speed increases after adding the Tor filter to PeerBlock... in some cases I have experienced even normal usage as if I was on my regular network.. both with browser and other programs.. so it may just depend on your nodes and available bandwidth being shared globally..

thanks guys ..

well i just started using peerblock .

been using hostsmsn for some time now .

they are working fine , both of them alongside .

but i think , i ll be trying peerblock for now ..

and thanks heath for the lists ...

i was just wondering what extra lists to subscribe , except the default four .

any personal preferences for these lists , or they should work fine for every user ?

@dkt

which vpn do you prefer ?

[DKT27]

UltraVPN. Seems that there aren't too many free VPN services around. UltraVPN is 100% free(as for now). ^_^

[majithia23]

UltraVPN. Seems that there aren't too many free VPN services around. UltraVPN is 100% free(as for now). ^_^

yes

do know about this service . ultravpn .

a friend of mine uses ItHidden vpn servers . he says they are good .

never tried it myself.

is ultravpn good enough or overloaded ?