VPNs ---- Not the Free Kind

originally posted by: Gothmog

originally posted by: Grimbone

originally posted by: Gothmog
VPNs are Ok.
For a while .
You still have a MAC address , though , that cannot be altered.

You can physically change your MAC by flashing the ROM chip on the NIC or using spoofing software.

en.wikibooks.org...

Software "spoofing" does not work that well.
And flashing the MAC is illegal (or used to be)

A ethernet card cost 10 bucks ... 2$ if u buy 100 from China

a reply to: chr0naut

After all that? Whose "server", "tower", "relay" are you using?

Do all that? You still are using the world's "net" to connect, rt? But with "encryption"? Really...

Like a "cloud" I'm gonna store alllll my personal stuff up there with them?

"But, it's en-Cripted!" Ha. Balderwinkle.

Just an opinion. Use em if you...ahem...feel the need to....

a reply to: Gothmog

TCP/IP is hardware agnostic and doesn't care about the underlying hardware in a pure sense, you can run it over token ring etc which don't have a 48 bit mac address and it while not common is possible to have software configurable mac addresses as theres loads of old sun sparc machines with cc:00:ff:ff:ee:ee as theirs as when the battery dies the admins cant be arsed to find its real one and just give it that.

originally posted by: markovian

originally posted by: Gothmog

originally posted by: Grimbone

originally posted by: Gothmog
VPNs are Ok.
For a while .
You still have a MAC address , though , that cannot be altered.

You can physically change your MAC by flashing the ROM chip on the NIC or using spoofing software.

en.wikibooks.org...

Software "spoofing" does not work that well.
And flashing the MAC is illegal (or used to be)

A ethernet card cost 10 bucks ... 2$ if u buy 100 from China

But , every NIC chip has a MAC.

originally posted by: Maxatoria
a reply to: Gothmog

TCP/IP is hardware agnostic and doesn't care about the underlying hardware in a pure sense, you can run it over token ring etc which don't have a 48 bit mac address and it while not common is possible to have software configurable mac addresses as theres loads of old sun sparc machines with cc:00:ff:ff:ee:ee as theirs as when the battery dies the admins cant be arsed to find its real one and just give it that.

erm , no

What if.. VPN is all about getting people to expose themselves.
People that want to hide stuff gets a VPN, so getting a VPN will put you in a spotlight, exposing yourself.
And the data you send and get to your computer is still being sent from your house..no matter how many VPN you use

a reply to: Gothmog

A tcpip header has no mention of a mac address nor does it need one as it's not that part of the network stacks problem, like a postcard or letter you give it the address of the person and after that might as well be classed as magic.

Mac addresses should be unique and with its layout of manufacturer plus a unique number but iirc there's basically a 3 byte code for the manufacturer and 3 for the unique sub value but some companies have been found to be reusing addresses but unless you are in the same broadcast zone its unlikely you will meet a duplicate.

This takes me back to uni in the late 1990s doing CS and having to do essays on this sort of stuff and even got to muck around with some expensive networking gear to prove segmentation was happening.

originally posted by: Gothmog

originally posted by: markovian

originally posted by: Gothmog

originally posted by: Grimbone

originally posted by: Gothmog
VPNs are Ok.
For a while .
You still have a MAC address , though , that cannot be altered.

You can physically change your MAC by flashing the ROM chip on the NIC or using spoofing software.

en.wikibooks.org...

Software "spoofing" does not work that well.
And flashing the MAC is illegal (or used to be)

A ethernet card cost 10 bucks ... 2$ if u buy 100 from China

But , every NIC chip has a MAC.

And every hex editor works on a NIC.

originally posted by: a325nt

originally posted by: Grimbone

originally posted by: Gothmog
VPNs are Ok.
For a while .
You still have a MAC address , though , that cannot be altered.

You can physically change your MAC by flashing the ROM chip on the NIC or using spoofing software.

en.wikibooks.org...

No, not really.

Yes, unequivocally really.

a reply to: Grimbone

No.

You can't physically change your MAC.

Remember when flashing required a blacklight?

I don't think you know what you're talking about, at all.

Not that any of it matters in the context of a software vpn.

originally posted by: Maxatoria
a reply to: Gothmog

A tcpip header has no mention of a mac address nor does it need one as it's not that part of the network stacks problem, like a postcard or letter you give it the address of the person and after that might as well be classed as magic.

Mac addresses should be unique and with its layout of manufacturer plus a unique number but iirc there's basically a 3 byte code for the manufacturer and 3 for the unique sub value but some companies have been found to be reusing addresses but unless you are in the same broadcast zone its unlikely you will meet a duplicate.

This takes me back to uni in the late 1990s doing CS and having to do essays on this sort of stuff and even got to muck around with some expensive networking gear to prove segmentation was happening.

I used to believe such.
"I wish I didn't know now , what I didn't know then."
Seger - Against the Wind

originally posted by: DontTreadOnMe
a reply to: chr0naut

Thanks, but way over my pay grade

TOR is free!

If you start with the TOR browser, it's a no-brainer to use the basics.

Of course, you can go to the 'nth degree and configure your own gateway and all sorts of stuff, if you want to contribute to the community.

Thing is that no system is perfectly safe, especially the ones that sit in chairs.

If you were to design the uncrackable system, the crims could still simply bypass it by beating you around the kneecaps with an iron bar until you told them the password.

originally posted by: mysterioustranger
a reply to: chr0naut

After all that? Whose "server", "tower", "relay" are you using?

Do all that? You still are using the world's "net" to connect, rt? But with "encryption"? Really...

Like a "cloud" I'm gonna store alllll my personal stuff up there with them?

"But, it's en-Cripted!" Ha. Balderwinkle.

Just an opinion. Use em if you...ahem...feel the need to....

The advantage of encryption is that if they get faster hardware & algorithms to crack the passwords, you can trivially increase the size of the encryption factors so that it'll still take them more time than there is time to crack it.

And TOR has been cracked, but it does make their job stupid harder, if you use it.

a reply to: chr0naut

I may have to at least try that out.

a reply to: DontTreadOnMe

This whole VPN business is pretty much a great big ruse. A Virtual Private Network (VPN) works between two points. Your destination address can't stand up a VPN tunnel unless it has a VPN arrangement with whomever is trying to set up the tunnel. So all you're really doing is setting up a VPN between you and whoever the VPN provider is, but your data still has to go from the VPN provider to the destination. Now, they could theoretically encrypt it, but the destination would have to know what the encryption was, and have rules in their firewalls to allow this traffic through (and/or establish a VPN between those two points).

So, another way to say this is...you could have a VPN arrangement with an employer (as an example). You could stand this VPN tunnel up through an ISP, to the final destination (your employer). This would be a secure connection. However, if you did the same thing with a VPN provider to say your bank, where you don't have a secure code key (or fob, or on your phone) then the connection would only be truly secure between you and your VPN provider. From there the traffic would traverse the Internet just like any other traffic. Yeah, it could change some IP addresses and change some of the encapsulation, but the data is still the same.

It's a fancy term, techno-jargon, to sell smoke and mirrors to the unsuspecting or less knowledgeable. Just like the "cloud" (the biggest ruse next to global warming!), especially cloud computing (which was designed to make long haul carriers fabulously rich).

I work on VPN's every day, all day.

ETA - TOR is a completely different ballgame, and I don't mess with TOR at all. I understand basically how it works, but I stay far, far, away from it because then you're basically starting to deal with the "dark web" which is a pretty risky area. You may not be on the dark web proper, but you're traversing the same paths it does. I am by no means a TOR expert, but TOR is one of the gateways to the dark web.

a reply to: chr0naut

Yep...you know we can only protect ourselves so much from our end...and depend on access, servers, browsers,etc to SEND the damn things, en-Cripted.

But...we don't own those things. "They" do...

Merry Christmas

Thanks for all the input guys. Much appreciated.
Going to save my money and stay away from TOR and free VPNs as well.
We surf safely, for the most part, and use antivirus and Malwarebytes.

I figure there's more to worry about these days.

I wish you all a very Happy New Year, one that is nicer than 2020 has been.

Used on any box with an Intel I-5 or I-7 processor, High-speed Swiss VPN : PROTON VPN free (or paid) works best, you can also install it on your handphones : protonvpn.com...
The free version is still lightning fast, I detect no connection problems at all, never.

The free version now has more than 1 free accessible VPN server per country :
USA : 5 Free servers, >100 Paid PLUS and Basic servers ; per TOR / P2P
Netherlands : 9 Free servers, 68 Paid PLUS and Basic Servers ; per P2P.
Japan : 3 Free servers, 11 Paid PLUS and 9 Basic servers, per Basic.
Plus 40 + other countries with Paid Premium servers ; some with TOR / P2P, some with P2P, some basic.

Yearly costs :
VPN PLUS for 40 + countries to connect to, on 5 boxes or hand-phones = 110 euro per year, highest speed.
VPN BASIC for 40 + countries to connect to, on 2 boxes or hand-phones = 65 euro per year, high speed.

www.vpngids.nl...
A very good site to compare many VPN providers, it's in Dutch, just use Google translate on it.
They also did tests on their US servers, these were even faster.

TAILS ( tails.boum.org... ) is for normal citizens indeed THE ULTIMATE solution, probably just not for the double crossing super spy, who find adversaries like the NSA, CIA, GRU, etc on their paths.

About TAILS : tails.boum.org...

Excerpt :
"" How Tails works
Leave no trace on the computer, like a tent, you can carry Tails with you and use it anywhere.
Your secure computer anywhere
To use Tails, shut down the computer and start on your Tails USB stick instead of starting on Windows, Mac-OS, or Linux.
You can temporarily turn your own computer into a secure machine. You can also stay safe while using the computer of somebody else.
Tails is a 1.1 GB download and takes ½ hour to install. Tails can be installed on any USB stick of 8 GB minimum. Tails works on most computers less than 10 years old. You can start again on the other operating system after you shut down Tails.
You don't have to worry about the computer having viruses because Tails runs independently from the other operating system and never uses the hard disk. But, Tails cannot always protect you if you install it from a computer with viruses or if you use it on a computer with malicious hardware, like keyloggers.
See also:
System requirements
Warnings and limitations
Download and install Tails
Like a tent, Tails is amnesic: it always starts empty and leaves no trace when you leave.

Amnesia
Tails always starts from the same clean state and everything you do disappears automatically when you shut down Tails.
Without Tails, almost everything you do can leave traces on the computer:
Websites that you visited, even in private mode
Files that you opened, even if you deleted them
Passwords, even if you use a password manager
All the devices and Wi-Fi networks that you used
On the contrary, Tails never writes anything to the hard disk and only runs from the memory of the computer. The memory is entirely deleted when you shutdown Tails, erasing all possible traces.
Like a backpack, you can store your personal things in your Persistent Storage and use them in your tent.

Encrypted Persistent Storage
You can save some of your files and configuration in an encrypted Persistent Storage on the USB stick: your documents, your browser bookmarks, your emails, and even some additional software.
The Persistent Storage is optional and you always decide what is persistent. Everything else is amnesic.
See also:
Using the encrypted Persistent Storage
Installing additional software

Digital security toolbox
Tails includes a selection of applications to work on sensitive documents and communicate securely.
All the applications are ready-to-use and are configured with safe defaults to prevent mistakes.
Tails includes:
Tor Browser with uBlock, a secure browser and an ad-blocker
Thunderbird, for encrypted emails
KeePassXC, to create and store strong passwords
LibreOffice, an office suite
OnionShare, to share files over Tor
and many more!

To prevent mistakes:
Applications are blocked automatically if they try to connect to the Internet without Tor.
Everything in the Persistent Storage is encrypted automatically.
Tails does not write anything to the hard disk. All the memory is deleted when shutting down.
See also:
Features and included software
Documentation""

And much more.
You can use any computer, by inserting your TAILS Memstick FIRST in a USB port, THEN turn that computer on.
The startup sequence must be set eventually first on that box such that Memsticks will be first, before hard disks.!
That way, TAILS surpasses the OS on that box, will use only its hardware to connect to the Internet, then you can work on your own safe environment, and when you stop, the Memstick will first clean the box its memory used by TAILS and then closes down. NOTHING left on that box, no trace at all.! The Memstick is also cleaned and closed down, so any inspector will find nothing incriminating on it, when you eventually are in a not so nice country.

It is used by journalists, freedom fighters, diplomats, especially by homo boys and girls in for example IRAN, where those crazy judges convict these poor souls to be hanged from an industrial crane in public, when found guilty of being born innocently with the need to love their own same sexes.
I hope their ALLAH has a special place in mind for these criminal hardliner beasts..

Don't worry also anymore about Viruses, since you always start from a clean TAILS operating system, and TAILS is shipped with the latest anti-virus software (if you choose to install their updates automatically).
Thus you can avoid all those expensive antivirus packages, and TAILS is for FREE !