Privacy
A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.
Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.
In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.
Some Rules
- Posting a link to a website containing tracking isn't great, if contents of the website are behind a paywall maybe copy them into the post
- Don't promote proprietary software
- Try to keep things on topic
- If you have a question, please try searching for previous discussions, maybe it has already been answered
- Reposts are fine, but should have at least a couple of weeks in between so that the post can reach a new audience
- Be nice :)
Related communities
much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)
AirVPN with privacy focus and port forwarding
There are literally dozens of us!!!
In all seriousness tho, I like the fact that Eddie supports amnezia wireguard.
Heck yeah! I've been using them for about a year now. I'm happily going to pay for another year.
Airvpn actually looks really good even though I've never heard of them. Cheap, has all the features I need and they have existed for a long time.
Mullvad but the founder is a fascist so ill change that after my time runs out
I’m not defending Mullvad, but this does lack more context.
What context? Only thing I can think of it was a private donation rather than made by mullvad itself
It was the co-founder, Daniel, that made the donation, the other founder, Fredrik, “did not like that he made this donation”.
Edit: I’ll include a link to Mullvad’s official response to the controversy since it’s relevant.
I switched from Mullvad to IVPN after the Mullvad troubles. IVPN seems good to so far, does everything I need and hasn't been proven untrustworthy/politically dodgy yet.
Mullvad troubles
what troubles?
AirVPN. I switched from proton a while ago because it was a pain to do port forwarding. AirVPN lets me have multiple ports forwarding with ease. And they take xmr as payment!
Proton, because its fast and reliable in my experience so i never felt the need to switch, plus i agree with their policies.
Wondering why you are considering leaving ivpn?
They appear to be 1 of only 2 trustworthy vpns now that mullvad left the building
airvpn being the other
Mullvad for stuff that matters. Which is 24/7 on all devices.
Airvpn for piracy and only for piracy.
Ivpn, windscribe, proton or whoever else isn’t obviously an idf cutout and running a deal for scraping and bypassing geoblocks.
If I’m at home:
Device > WireGuard Tunnel > ProtonVPN Endpoint
If I’m disconnected from my home network:
Device > WireGuard Tunnel > Home Network > WireGuard Tunnel > ProtonVPN Endpoint
Essentially created my own multi-hop network, works like a charm.
I just today started using the new Tor VPN app. I have been using InviZible from F-Droid in SOCKS proxy mode for almost 2 years now, but not all apps support directing their network traffic through a SOX proxy. And so, some apps I was not able to do over Tor. I think the day will come where we as free people have to abandon the clear net entirely and do everything over Tor and I2P. The clearnet is going to become nothing except for ID upload verification screens.
Ivpn: canary, audited, anonymous accounts purchasable with crypto or cash, no performance issues, no logs (allegedly), open source protocols and clients.
I really like their blatant honesty in "Do you really need a VPN?"
Fundamentally, the only use case of a VPN is if you trust them with your traffic more than your ISP. Since I've had multiple ISPs that serve up adds instead of 404s and will threaten you for using p2p protocols it's easy to trust a VPN more. As best I can tell Ivpn is just a couple of security peeps running a VPN service cause they can--could they be corrupted or a honey pot? Yeah, but the anonymous accounts help mitigate that risk, and the reality is that even an anonymous account can be tied back to your IP. So don't do anything illegal illegal on just a VPN and it'll prolly be fine.
And they're not advertised through everyone with a platform.
Considering what my ISP is I think I'd trust any vpn with a FOSS client over them...
Kinda surprised no one recommending Nym.
Never actually used them, but this is my note about them in my vpn spreadsheet
'Pricey if doing per month, not if doing for year. Lack of transparency, shit website. Dodgy feel.'
I still use PIA, but only for a couple of things running in containers. I use wireguard as my private vpn for my own services
Do you have any thoughts on the Kape buyout? https://usernotices.com/finance-and-business/advertising/who-is-the-new-owner-of-pia
Because of who Kape is, and their ties to Israeli military, I personally consider them a threat actor instead of a valid VPN choice for my needs.
https://blog.boycat.io/posts/expressvpn-israeli-ownership-1b-privacy-risk
Proton currently but probably switching to Windscribe soon due to increasingly invasive advertising.
Njalla. I switched to that after Mullvad was called out. I asked a refund which they got me. I compared some VPNs and no other seemed to fit. I miss some Mullvad stuff but at least they aren't fascists.
Well, currently using mullvad because I paid cash and have months left.
However I tried ivpn with their one week option (two bucks!) At their basic plan.
I find speeds better on mullvad, but they're otherwise comparable. I like both apps fine on android. If I was already on ivpn, I would not switch to mullvad for the minor speed uptick, since prices are comparable and switching multiple devices can be a very tiny annoyance.
In the past, I've used airvpn and proton for extended times (over six months). Proton is over priced, speeds were only marginally better than their free options, and iirc they were a pain about linux setup (I could be mixing them up with someone else though).
Airvpn worked great as a vpn. Port forwarding was an absolute cunt to get working for me. I suspect user error to be the biggest factor. Their android app sucks, and setting it up via other methods is preferred. But, at the time, they also lacked the built in ad/tracker blocking that I've enjoyed with mullvad and ivpn.
I did use nord briefly at one point. Worked fine, but at the time I was in need of port forwarding, and they had stopped offering that.
The only reason I'm maybe switching away from mullvad is the dubious political alignment of one of its owners. It really does work well for me, and is consistently faster than others I've tried, even with multi hop on. Even there, I'm not fully sure that the exact choice made by their part owner is exactly as bad as the common reaction is, so while I am likely switching away, I still can't really state that it's horrible to use the service.
The party he donated to has one big issue that's a hell no for me, but it might not be there for everyone, and other aspects of the party slate are less objectionable, or even agreeable. In other words, I'm not mad at anyone that shrugs the donation off. It ain't my business to judge people over such a narrow subject.
THAT being said, ivpn really is essentially the same service in terms of functionality. They even have servers that are in the same data centers. There's several in the US in specific that are 100% in the same center once you go looking at the lists of exits. And I know there can't be that many exact matches in cities across the world that aren't from the same location. Since VPNs rent either virtual or hardware space in data centers to provide exits, if a given company doesn't break from that, you won't see a major difference between them.
Windscribe. I like their no-nonsense approach.
Any reason you are looking to leave ivpn? I'm using Mullvad until my time runs out and then switching due to the fascism thing. I was looking at ivpn as one of a few possible options, so I'm curious of people's experiences.
Currently, Mullvad. Waiting for my time to run out then I might give NymVPN a go.
Private Internet access, they have port forwarding
YSK Private Internet Access was acquired by a sketchy Israeli spy company
Mullvad, then switched to IVPN a couple of months ago. Both are recommended in privacyguides. They have solid privacy policies and are regularly audited.
None for the time being, and I don't know what I should use if I were to need one. I already use Proton for email so it wouldn't be my first choice to give even more data to one company, even if they still seem good (though their marketing is relatively aggressive, which feels offputting).