Let’s not turn this into what the Reddit subreddit of Piracy has turned into and that’s an endless sea of questions that are all the same - “Do I need a VPN?”.
And the loud and vocal answer to such a question is - yes. Yes you do need a VPN for pirating. Nobody gets a VPN for casual use and I’m under the impression that VPN services know a lot of people are going to be going to them for pirating and not just accessing content out of their country. And it’s for that reason, is why I’m skeptical on entrusting my activity with the bigger VPN names available.
I use ProtonVPN myself, by the way.
Pirating under your raw IP address, only will set you up to get pegged by your ISP whether it’s in a short time or a long time. I’ve only ever gotten one single ISP letter in my entire 26 years of pirating and it was simply because I downloaded without a VPN. Well I was also downloading off of someone else’s network to take the fall, but I was confronted about it either way.
And I’ve gotten away with so much pirating because of my careful cautiousness when it comes to pirating. That and this applies to the United States, but the statue of limitations is 3 years when it comes to copyright infringement. So, good fucking luck to any ISP or so that wishes to try and nail me for something I downloaded 10 years ago, but I digress.
But a large part of me avoiding so much does contribute to having a VPN. So, yes, VPN is required. Please don’t ask anybody in the pirating community 100 questions that are all just ways to ask whether or not you need a VPN. You do.
VPNs are not required. Instead of egressing on your ISPs network, you’re egressing on someone else’s network. It’s kinda like paying for a second ISP so you can egress your ISP to go encrypted to your other ISP. What does it accomplish other than putting you in another law jurisdiction?
Even purevpn who said “no logs” handed over data.
"In 2017, PureVPN, which advertised a no-logs policy, supplied connection logs to the FBI during a cyberstalking investigation. These logs enabled the identification of a suspect by linking activities to originating IP addresses. "
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PureVPN
"In 2016, IPVanish, another provider asserting a no-logs policy, furnished user data to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security during a child abuse investigation. The information shared included the user’s real IP address and connection timestamps. "
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPVanish
You pay them, and for what? To just take their word for it? Sorry but it’s impossible to run a reliable network without some level of logging.
Not to mention that there have been documented instances Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), have been misused, leading to concerns about domestic surveillance.
This section allows the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) to collect communications from non-U.S. citizens located outside the United States, even when those communications are routed through U.S.-based companies, such as cloud providers, internet service providers (ISPs), and tech companies.
At that point do you think you’ll get some form of compensation from the VPN provider?
I work for a VPN company. There may be many shitty VPN companies that do keep logs, but not all of them.
You just need to pick the right ones, ideally audited ones.
Also, VPNs are absolutely required in some countries if you’re using public torrents. Even if they’re not required in your country right now, you’re still advertising that you’re doing illegal stuff if you don’t use one.
OK some countries, ya I get it - I’m not in one of those countries so for my country, my view stands. Also you do keep some logs, else it wouldn’t be possible to troubleshoot connection issues. Active VPN sessions, etc, who is connected to what IP, session duration, etc.
no we don’t lol. There’s no way for us to connect an account to any of the traffic on our nodes.
I applaud your mistrust though.
Lol. To think you need to sniff actual unencrypted traffic to deduce information and draw lines is ridiculous. You don’t need to do that to incriminate someone, especially if there’s other evidence.
No not unencrypted traffic. Any traffic. If a subpoena comes in like “hey this IP did a piracy pls tell us who it was” there is no way for us to answer that. Any VPN that doesn’t have that is a scam. Sadly, a lot of them are.
Strong assumption there. It is only “illegal” because Disney said so?
If the mouse comes after your ass unfortunately yes they do kind of get to decide what is and isn’t legal. A lot of it depends on your country’s relationship with the US.
In most jurisdictions, piracy is illegal no?
So, you understand how things work then right? Or are you being hypothetical?
No, it’s actually embraced by communities such as this sprouting up. Are you a caveman or something?
Not the same guy, and I don’t mind piracy at all, but being embraced by a community doesn’t make something not illegal.
That’s very much decided by the law of the land you live in, and in most lands it’s classed as a form of theft or copyright infringement, which is illegal.
Also, bit rude to suggest he’s a caveman for making a perfectly valid point
Well in that sense you’re breaking the law of your land by commenting on such a forum since we’re on the high seas here if you didn’t notice?
And no, I didn’t intend to be rude if you’re inferring that but it’s blatantly clear what this forum is for and them being employed by someone who purports to protect their privacy selling such a service but then feigning ignorance
if “it’s illegal”, is telling.
I’m aware of where I am, as I said before I have no problem with piracy - my main point was that just because we’re fine with it, doesn’t just magically make it legal - which is what you were implying.
Feigning ignorance of what? That it’s probably not the greatest idea to be flogging around your actual IP address while doing potentially illegal/unlawful activities?
From my PoV, @PotatoesFall@discuss.tchncs.de wasn’t feigning ignorance, the question was a retort to a non-sequitur. One’s view on the validity of laws (i.e. only being illegal cause Disney said so) doesn’t change them - I’ve seen enough “Sov Cits” find that out the hard way to not make that stupid mistake.
That’s the thing - it is legal. Whether you’re in a public library, torrent swarm, or on the high seas. Makes no difference if you want to play by every law; of every land.
You could be there all day playing whack-a-mole but ships cruising by don’t really care since that bounty is shared already.
Most doing heavy lifting here is my point.
Is it most tho?
I’m not sure. When in doubt, use protection right? I know at least a couple where it is illegal
lol, likes porn eh?
https://iknowwhatyoudownload.com/en/peer/
I love these labels and torrenting porn is so noobie it’s not even funny, and don’t most use Bing for that?
Is that for @PotatoesFall@discuss.tchncs.de’s IP?
Cause if they’re working for a VPN company and recomennding you use a VPN, surely they must be using a VPN themselves
How is this guy seeing users IP addresses?
That’s part of why I asked, cause I’m sceptical they can see it in the first place, never mind that’s its probably not Potato’s actual IP given how much they’re advocating VPN use
To an extent, you are correct. You have to have a certain amount of trust in your VPN provider. Kape, which owns most of the big names, is not trustworthy. You absolutely shouldn’t use them.
Others have been audited or otherwise had their log-free claims validated. Names like Mullvad and Proton. You are correct that logs are important for reliability, but these can be very limited in scope. If the logs are useless at an individual level, or might meet both requirements. Others might only log on certain servers, or in dev/troubleshooting scenarios. You don’t necessarily need logs in all production scenarios. This is particularly true if you can still access real-time data.
But even if the VPN provider isn’t trustworthy, there is something to be said about the trust being relative. AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast have all shown that they are completely untrustworthy. I would even trust Nord over any of them, and I do not trust Nord.
I…what?
How am I paying for another person’s ISP when I’m mooching off of their network to pirate from?
Okay, so the two examples you’ve provided about those VPN services, have nothing to do at all about piracy. One is about cyberstalking and the other was about a child abuse investigation. Those are arguably more serious than piracy in comparison.
The fuck are you on?
Look up how routing and VPNs and NAT work, then you may understand. VPNs existed in the business world long before consumers started becoming aware of them as “this lets me watch netflix in country X and pirate shit!” services.
You’re missing the point. The point is that the “protection” doesn’t necessarily work, regardless of what you’re using it for, which undermines the purpose.
If you are paying for something and you ultimately get busted and in financial trouble for using a service that says they’re going to shield you from this stuff, you don’t think you should get compensation? They aren’t delivering their end of the bargain.
I’m not defending their argument but they’re saying that a VPN is like paying for a second ISP to hide traffic from the first not that you’re paying for someone else’s ISP like the seeder of a torrent.
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