Best VPN?

[notimp]

Yes.

I trust google not to cancel my accounts on grounds of 'someone with my IP address downloading (or streaming) a file from their servers'. And I trust them furthermore not to share the information - that someone did with the arguable rightsholder of that content.

What I don't do is 'copy that stuff into my account' to 'download faster', because in that case - I make myself personally identifyable - and also violate their terms of use. In which case - they could ban my account(s), which I dont want them to do.

Google has a vested interest in not 'spying and telling' on their users, when this would lead to litigation. Because thats a chilling effect - that would have people scream in agony, in numbers, that google doesnt want to see.
-

This doesnt extend to any illegal behavior with a higher punishment threshold. I expect them to tell in those cases (terrorism, ...). But that is because different legal venues are available to get personally identifiable information on purpatrators in those cases.

Issue here is 'need for reasonable suspicion' to saveguard your personally identifyable information might get waved for more serious crimes.

But yes I very much dont expect google to go to Nintendo to engage in "show and tell". And even when engaging with law enforcement (not in China), I expect them to protect your individual privacy over 'copyright claims', that cant be claims - before they go to a rights holder and 'show and tell'.

The same way I trust a VPN provider not to do so as well. Even if they are owned by McAffee nowadays.

edited in this part: (More on the China example: Issue with protecting customer data there is, that gouvernments might require direct data access on a 'mass access' level from a provide like google. But then - I don't expect the chinese government to got to Nintendo to 'show and tell' either. So even with them there is a reasonable expectation of privacy - against foreign companies.. )

 

[linuxares]

https://support.google.com/transpar...n&visit_id=637181580978125641-2659777249&rd=1

There we go.

 

[notimp]

Nintendo now a country?

Nintendo now petitioning the government of Japan to make a formal request to hand over IP records of Google users that might have downloaded a game from their servers once? Without being logged in. (Reverse IP lookup with data retention databases that are illegal in my country?)

On grounds of "we have nothing, but you must have - please gimme?".

From my POV Google tells Japan when to jump (in all cases google related) and not the other way around.

That even goes for other US companies - because multinationals guard their own interests.

What this comes down to is the following:

If you are Nintendo (rightsholder). And you have nothing. You don't have a legal case to get anyones personally identifiable information (when they surfed to what internet site and did what). And everyone else in the chain has an interest to not give out their own customer data to some other company based on as much as a 'qualified suspicion', in a piracy case - when that will hurt their business model (public reaction).

I know that Zuck believes that privacy is dead. But it isnt that dead, dead. (Its still worth more than getting you for the equivalent of 'stealing an apple' when the apple owner didn't see you. (Not the best analogy I ever came up with.. ))

edit: The way getting caught for torrenting worked was, that there were law firmes with nothing better to do than to set up operations to scoop up torrent files, then run torrent clients, simply to collect IP addresses of everyone sharing the content in the process of downloading it.

In that case they had IP address, log of the criminal behavior, higher level criminal behavior (distributing illegal content) - because people broadcasted that information to everyone and their mother, trying to get more sources to download from (or upload to).

Then those law firms wrote letters to legal departments on part of the rightowners, in cases where they caught many users - trying to hoodwink them into suing, after a chilling effect ("people get caught doing that stuff!") was established, which made no sense for the companies, because they hit their own customers. (Baaad PR.)

You literally had to reach people as dumb as Metallica - for them to see any sense in this.

As this didn't work out in the long run, those same law firms, then directly went to governments with "reasonable suspicion of criminal action" (IP addresses in logs documenting potentially criminal behavior), in some cases got them to force ISPs to hand over personally identifiable information (higher level of crime (distributing illegal copies)), and made a business out of sending warning letters with a cease and desist, grafting fees off of people that didn't know better.

Now that people arent broadcasting ther IP anymore (necessarily) (not torrenting), the entire issue is 'solved' - no VPN needed. Until a company actually goes after streaming or filehoster users, which none has done in the Mega case, or in the rapidshare case, or in the openload case, or...

But VPNs are still being sold as an insurance policy. Because it makes everyone involved money.

Every good hacker will tell you 'don't use VPNs' to do illegal stuff, because you forgetting to set up your anonymization ecosystem even once, even with redundant failover setups, exposes you maybe forever to an actor like google, or your local gouvernement (if it does a full take, and keeps metadata).

But at the same time your trusty piracy blog tells you - oh no, use a VPN - you want to be safe? Do we really believe that, the average Joe can now be trusted with opsec, or are we sure, that no one will have a bad VPN experience, because companies have stopped persecuting individual users after piracy figures fell, because of other deterrence measures?

Well - my VPN works especially well, since almost no one is suing individual users anymore, I have to say...

 

[Zalex]

Hi,

Check out ProtonVPN.

2 or 3 Free locations and unlimited data.
Win, Android and OpenVPN, (not sure about Apple OSs)

Torrent, not allowed.

Redmi Note 7 Pro | Tapatalk

 

[notimp]

I insist, that people in here are still not getting the picture.

IP adresses are usually getting cycled by ISPs. ISPs in many jurisdictions arent allowed to keep connection logs. In some jurisdictions, they have to - for at least 6 months, but they are only allowed to share that with the government. Gouvernment isnt interested in provoking revolts, or catching petty thieves. (Also accessing that data usually is linked to very serious crimes, otherwise privacy protection laws should trigger). ISPs have no interest to loose you as a customer.

Google ('good guys filehoster') has no interest in targeting its service users for potential copyright infringement on behalf of other rights owners. In no scenario ever - would even they be caught giving out access data en mass to any other company. Legally they are even prevented from doing so, without anonymizing the data first.

Nintendo (rightsholder) as a result never gets your IP. If you are only downloading, or streaming. With torrenting it is different. If you torrent - maybe use a VPN. (Especially if you torrent popular stuff.)

But even the business model there - for suing individual users, is basically over its expiry date.
--

Whats happening instead is, that rightsholders try to get people into subscription models (cheap at first, raise cost later on), because you get empty spending across a larger population, lower cost of acquisition/entry, and much easier than piracy.

So industries saw another model to move forward within digital ecosystems. (Artists still get effed, no one asked them what they wanted.)

Consumers saw new 'most easy'. (Netflix and Spotify)

So piracy numbers fell. (So piracy culture became less prevalent.)

So very few people are interested in suing their own (more than potential) customer base - on behalf of some lawyer capturing IP adresses, and trying to sell his/her treasure trove.

Changing DNS so your ISP doesnt have your browsing history is a good idea anyhow, and 'free' (means that another dudes service will have your browsing history - to sell, usually anonymized). But your ISP will never go out to a potential rights owner in principal, and show and tell, because of their users potentially breaking a piracy law.

They just dont.

They have to if a court asks them to. To get a court to ask them to, someone must 'find your IP adress in the context of a piracy infringement being commited' (in a specific time window, because IPs usually get cycled). That someone has to be a rights owner, or a law firm working on behalf of a rights owner. Because no one else has interest. And they dont get your browsing behavior - neither from google (filehost), nor from your ISP, nor from a warez board. Furthermore - in the same log, where someone also has listed your piracy infringements.

So a connection is never to be made. By anyone.

Not even by ad networks, who probably could.
-

Rightsholders are basically coasting on the scare tactics they put in place in the torrent era, and easier methods to consume their content, which ensured that piracy numbers fell. In the process they still made sure to pay content creators less, but ey - that was because of piracy, right?

Everyone that tries to tell you something different ist trying to sell you bonus insurance - thats not needed by anyone, if they are not torrenting.

That you get a bunch of articles mixing up downloading and torrenting (also sharing and distributing (higher punishment level)) doesnt help.
--

I personally use protonmail, so I don't have anything against them, and I use PIA (for region masking) - now owned by freaking McAffee, until my yearly subscription runs out -

- but the truth is, that anyone trying to sell you on "a more privacy focused VPN from a smaller company - now that PIAs ownership structure changed" for piracy reasons, is bullshitting you to no ends.

The first company that gives out its access logs to anyone other than a governmental agency (because off affiliations, or laws) - is out of business, as soon as their users will hear that or the rumor spreads. If its owned by google, or McAffee, or protonmail - doesnt matter, in the context of piracy. (It might matter in the context of corporate espionage, or who knows what.)

The first file host that also gives you 'users that downloaded this also downloaded..:" recommendations, will be out of business - because it means, that they try to monetize on access logs, which their users - en mass - wont find appealing. Their job is to delete those logs after 24 hours (to 3 days (operating requirements)) so no one can pressure them to hand them over. Or - if they are google, to show the stink finger to any other governement or corporation that ask them for that data on grounds of 'could you please - we have nothing, but we would like to take a look'.

ISPs job is to keep their userbase happy if not pressured by law to do otherwise.

And privacy laws keep your browsing history / linked to your personally identifiable information safe, so no one can sell, or even hand over for free - that information. (With ad networks, you always get an ad id, remember?) Ad long as no one is trying to sue you and asks for that information with a courts order, or in a 'legally facilitated pipeline to a a rights owners consortium' (three strikes) (but that consortium also has to provide infringing IP addresses first.).

As a result. No court cases so far for illegally downloading (while not also uploading and freely sharing your IP asking for other sources with the world (I'm torrent client, searching for connections...), or streaming so far.)

Please intervene, if this changes (although it is not obvious how it would).

But until that happens - advertising people into using VPNs for 'anonymity' and them conflating that with 'piracy protection' in any cases other than torrenting (VPN might protect you while torrenting), is simply an addon insurance sales scheme.

You have bad feeling.
You know you do something wrong.
You want to protect yourself.
Ad banner tells you 'buy Brillo'.
Brillo is for privacy.
You use brillo.
You dont get sued.
You very happy.

Has nothing to do with Brillo,
but you very happy.

 

[notimp]

Torrentfreak on behavioral modeling.

https://torrentfreak.com/new-anti-piracy-campaign-piles-on-the-scare-tactics-but-whos-scared-200307/

You know you are doing something wrong.
Other people tell you you are also financing criminals. (Not that untrue, you know. )
Criminals want to steal your passwords.
And your identity!
Dont do it.

What is behavioral modeling.

Article from today.

Just so you know some currently employed methods..

edit: Also interesting: Current percentages of pirated vs legal use (as indicated by surveys) per media sector, in the UK:
https://torrentfreak.com/as-uk-pirates-swarm-to-live-sports-movies-hardcore-pirates-diminish-200225/

 

[DaFixer]

I use NordVPN mainly for torrents/websites and usenet to get my stuff.
For 3 years I leeched 18TB....

 

[notimp]

Usenet costs money. You leave paying information with the server provider. You trust in the server provider not to keep your download logs.

Usenet is basically a server infrastructure, that copies the entire usenet database from one server to the next one, and then gives you access to whatever it copied after a short while (think overnight). Anyone can upload.

Usenet providers also get busted.

So structurally it is not different from a filehost site (in terms of what you are doing legally), although it is more decentralized. Also remember that there are different legal jurisdictions.

Streaming sites basically do the same thing these days with caching services (CDNs). And the next battle is to get CDNs who very obviously are covered by safe harbor to not cache certain sites content, within their jurisdiction, if a national court says so. CDNs currently are what brings you piracy 'fast'.

Also there are CDNs that are run by piracy scene providers, and those seemingly are self replicating once you take them down. And there are those run/used by filehosters which would fall in the middle.

Dont quote me on that. Thats 'kinda' how it works. If you need more info, do more specific research first.

Its all an endless cat and mouse game, for a while now - but at least the consumer is kind of out of the crossfire for a bit now (if he/she doesnt advertise their IP on their own (is torrenting)).

Also - dont forget to (also) buy content legally. Otherwise everyone will want to sell you "life experiences" and "overwatch as a service" next.

 

[mariopepper]

It may depend on your purposes. Nowadays vpn has became more popular because a lot of people were forced to work remotely so vpn is needed atribute. If you need vpn for work you should better check some paid versions with good reviews. Or if you don't know about vpn at all check https://veepn.com/what-is-vpn/

 

[dAVID_]

Just a quick reminder for everyone in this thread:

A VPN doesn't really provide anonymity. Your VPN provider can see your real IP address.
It is impossible to know for sure if your VPN provider actually enforces their "Strict No-Log Policy".
Hackers (kids with Kali Linux) can't really sniff your packets on an unsecured network if you use HTTPS. SSL stripping might have been a problem some years ago but nowadays your browser will alert you if it suspects such an attack.
You can't calculate someone's home address with an IP address. You can only know their generalized location (e.g Mexico City, and even this can be inaccurate).

Tor Browser is your best bet for browsing the web anonymously.

 

[Hugrenlo]

I have no problems with using NordVPn together with Avast. NordVPN is one of the best VPN, according to Reddit, so it means that a lot of people are using it and have no problems. Whenever I connect to a bad WIfi network with my laptop, I get a notification from Avast. When I am using NordVPN, I never got any notifications. It means that it is completely safe. The cybersecurity of Avast is on a high level. This is why I trust it. I never had problems with accidentally downloaded files online since I started to use Avast Antivirus.

 

[geekesmind]

I use windscribe