OT: Is your VPN spying on you?

Paul S. Barford

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Oct 17, 2021, 8:24:17 PM10/17/21

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If you're concerned enough about internet security to run a VPN, just
take a look through this article to ensure your particular provider
hasn't been taken over by a proxy of a certain spy agency:

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2021-10-16/malware-distributor-building-vpn-empire

Safe surfing, guys!

Chris Green

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Oct 18, 2021, 4:03:07 AM10/18/21

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I'd never use "someone else's" VPN for this very reason. As it
happens I don't use VPNs, if I want secure/anonymous connections I use
ssh.

--
Chris Green
·

Brian Gaff (Sofa)

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Oct 18, 2021, 5:27:01 AM10/18/21

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I think increasingly people want to be able to pretend to be in different
countries to get around arbitrary things like what happened to Tune in radio
in the uk courtesy of Sony and Warner, merely due to their blinkered views.

Brian

--

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Pancho

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Oct 18, 2021, 6:11:39 AM10/18/21

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This has always been obvious.

VPN good protection : Torrenting, copyright offences.
VPN some protection : Trolling, defamation.
VPN dangerous : Terrorism, major criminal activity.

Chris Green

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Oct 18, 2021, 6:33:06 AM10/18/21

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"Brian Gaff \(Sofa\)" <bri...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
> I think increasingly people want to be able to pretend to be in different
> countries to get around arbitrary things like what happened to Tune in radio
> in the uk courtesy of Sony and Warner, merely due to their blinkered views.
>

Exactly, and that's my major use for ssh, no need for a VPN, that's
really overkill.

Just set up a socks proxy with ssh:-

ssh -fTnN -D 1080 <us...@system.in.the.uk>

Tell your browser (or whatever) to use the proxy and that's it, it
looks as if I am browsing from the UK.

--
Chris Green
·

Andy Burns

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Oct 18, 2021, 6:39:34 AM10/18/21

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Chris Green wrote:

> that's my major use for ssh, no need for a VPN, that's
> really overkill.
> Just set up a socks proxy with ssh:-

> Tell your browser (or whatever) to use the proxy and that's it, it
> looks as if I am browsing from the UK.

I'm sure there are people on the Costa del Sol who wish to view Eastenders as
though they were back home, but I suspect the majority of people wish to appear
as *not* from the UK, so they can e.g. watch Netflix, so you'd need a house in
the USA ...

Chris Green

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Oct 18, 2021, 7:33:05 AM10/18/21

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You don't need a *house* in the USA, you just need an account on a
computer which is (or at least appears to be) in the USA.

--
Chris Green
·

SH

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Oct 18, 2021, 8:08:23 AM10/18/21

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can this be done from Windows or is a Linux box needed?

and it appears you're using a UK website as your proxy via its port 1080?

I would have thought any half secure website would lock down many ports,
making 1080hard to use?

Chris Green

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Oct 18, 2021, 4:48:06 PM10/18/21

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SH <i.lov...@spam.com> wrote:
> On 18/10/2021 11:22, Chris Green wrote:
> > "Brian Gaff \(Sofa\)" <bri...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
> >> I think increasingly people want to be able to pretend to be in different
> >> countries to get around arbitrary things like what happened to Tune in radio
> >> in the uk courtesy of Sony and Warner, merely due to their blinkered views.
> >>
> > Exactly, and that's my major use for ssh, no need for a VPN, that's
> > really overkill.
> >
> > Just set up a socks proxy with ssh:-
> >
> > ssh -fTnN -D 1080 <us...@system.in.the.uk>
> >
> > Tell your browser (or whatever) to use the proxy and that's it, it
> > looks as if I am browsing from the UK.
> >
> >
>
> can this be done from Windows or is a Linux box needed?
>

You can almost certainly do it from Windows using putty.

> and it appears you're using a UK website as your proxy via its port 1080?
>

No, the port 1080 is on the local computer *from* which you are making
an ssh connection to the computer in the UK. E.g. in my case it's
port 1080 on my laptop.

> I would have thought any half secure website would lock down many ports,
> making 1080hard to use?

What have websites got to do with it? :-)

--
Chris Green
·

SH

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Oct 19, 2021, 3:19:14 AM10/19/21

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but if you're browsing a website using SSH, several things:

you clearly need to connect to a SSH port on a remote computer which may
well be blocked by firewall

Even if the remote SSH port was open, The Remote wwebsite would be
wanting your credentials, aka user name and password.

And with Putty, it will want to exchange and share private keys when
connecting for teh first time to a remote computer.

You were asking whatr has websites got to do with it... well your SSH
command was:

Roger Hayter

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Oct 20, 2021, 7:48:11 AM10/20/21

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On 18 Oct 2021 at 01:24:12 BST, "Paul S. Barford" <pa...@notformail.com>
wrote:

It makes sense to use a VPN to connect to servers that would reject your own
IP address, or to connect to servers your country or ISP is blocking your
access to. But it makes no sense to suppose you are effively hiding your
activities from your government,LEAs, any other government. There are ways to
do that, but they probably don't work if anyone important actually wants to
know.

--
Roger Hayter