Do you encrypt your browsing traffic?

Necuno

Necuno

The Piper
I'm curious do you encrypt your browsing traffic with services like ssh proxy or vpn ?

I've been looking around for a decent vpn and so far it seems that it's either strongvpn or acevpn. The other option is to use a ssh proxy connection. The reason why is probably just paranoia and need to just surf anon and encrypted :D. Though this can come in handy when grabbing that odd UK title for xlive or using something like hlulu.

Obviously with mweb you'd have to split your downloading traffic via routing when using a vpn, but with socks it's not a problem.

V
 
Did it when torrenting back when BlackVPN was still free.
Haven't really done anything since then. Don't really have much to do with torrents any longer anyway.

The closest I get to encrypting traffic now is forcing https on Facebook on my laptop in school.
 
Why?

Unless it is super sketchy illegal stuff, your ISP won't hand over the info to anyone so encrypting it won't serve much purpose. If they hand it over without a court order they'll burn in the fires of public opinion.

With dubious browsing (as opposed to illegal) you're much more likely to run into trouble with tracking cookies. e.g. Those Facebook Like buttons...they report the sites you view back to facebook servers even if you're logged out of facebook. To combat this you'd use something like the FF addon Ghostery. An alternative approach is to install multiple browsers and use one solely for sketchy stuff.
 
HavocXphere said:
Why?

Unless it is super sketchy illegal stuff, your ISP won't hand over the info to anyone so encrypting it won't serve much purpose. If they hand it over without a court order they'll burn in the fires of public opinion.

With dubious browsing (as opposed to illegal) you're much more likely to run into trouble with tracking cookies. e.g. Those Facebook Like buttons...they report the sites you view back to facebook servers even if you're logged out of facebook. To combat this you'd use something like the FF addon Ghostery. An alternative approach is to install multiple browsers and use one solely for sketchy stuff.
Click to expand...

My sentiments exactly.

If you've got Ghostery installed why would you need to encrypt your browsing? Unless you're hacking or doing dodgy downloads, or something of the like :/
 
HavocXphere said:
Why? <snip generalizations >
Click to expand...
psychogenik said:
My sentiments exactly.
Click to expand...

why not? some vpn have nice things as automatic filtering for all sorts of adware as well as any other malicious files. I suppose you can say why bother when you have a firewall and something like abp, then again why not if it's there then no need for any of those things. However that's not why I have a multivpn service. Sometimes like with xbox I would like to have a game that's region specific and you have to have either us or uk ip to get it, and in those cases it's quite handy to have one. Besides it's only costing me 7usd and I think that's quite cheap compared to strongVPN.

Other reason is just why do I need to surf insecure and have my habits tracked and logged even if it's just gaming/tech sites in general. There is also the few cases of needing to appear that you originate from certain country like for ABC.com, or netflix or hulu and so on, not to forget that I've gotten few sites that blatantly blockout RSA ips just because they had one too many cases of Credit card fraud. Finally you might want to connect via someone's wifi (public) and those are really not a good idea unless you at least have ssh or very basic vpn like pptp.

So you see you could use it for more cases than just illegal porn or illegal software, I really don't understand where this closed boxed mindset/understanding comes from and is just as silly as the one of heavy usage MUST be because of pirating. Some of us actually can use the net for more than just warez.
 
Pr⊕phet said:
I really don't understand where this closed boxed mindset/understanding comes from
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You asked about encrypting browsing traffic.

Not hiding your IP. Not filtering malicious files. Not filtering adware. Not xbox region issues. Not blocked SA IPs. All of those things you can do without encrypting browsing traffic.

As it so happens, the two are often combined into one product in practice & so the distinction is often fuzzy in people's heads. I simply choose to answer exactly the question asked. Amazing how that gets interpreted as "closed boxed mindset".

Pr⊕phet said:
Some of us actually can use the net for more than just warez.
Click to expand...
Look at my post again. I did not mention warez. Or piracy. Or porn. Or illegal porn :wtf:. Or heavy usage. You read those things into my post.

The only reason I even mentioned the sketchy/illegal angle is because you said:
Pr⊕phet said:
The reason why is probably just paranoia and need to just surf anon and encrypted :D.
Click to expand...
Since encryption on its own is useless for avoiding tracking I concluded that the paranoia you mentioned is related to something (mildly) sketchy. This was, I admit, a mistake on my part. Paranoia implies delusion and irrationality, while if there were something sketchy to hide then it would be a valid concern and hence not paranoia.

I don't care what content you are or are not looking at, but I figured I'd help you out by pointing out that the privacy benefits you think you're getting aren't there. Hell I even told you how to fix it.

The only plausible privacy benefit of encryption for browsing so far in this entire thread is the public wifi thing....which I'd imagine is little more than a fringe case for most people.

Why? <snip generalizations >
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Lets see: I referenced the legal procedure (court order), the ISPs motivation for not disclosing (public opinion), a specific recently revealed privacy flaw (FB Like while logged out). And 2x specific solution to the tracking problem (Ghostery & 2nd browser). Thats a whole heap of specifics. Short of implementing the Hardvard method it doesn't get any more specific than that.

Also, I think I've met my "Making Enemies" quota for the day. :o
 
Had a bad day yesterday & you just happened to be on the receiving end of my rage. The post was unnecessarily harsh and vicious & for that I apologize.:o

Also, mad props for not raging back & responding calmly. :)
 
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