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Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

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Re: Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

#151

Post by ookkay »

nobody9999 wrote: post #148
aydyn wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure they aren't just giving you a politically correct answer? In my estimation the main reason people use VPNs is for pr*n and piracy and they may not want to just flat out admit it.

>In my estimation the main reason people use VPNs is for pr*n and piracy I get the piracy part, but why would someone want/need VPN for pr0n? That's not a gotcha or snark, I don't understand why folks would "need" vpn for that (assuming it's not* non-consensual, which includes hidden cameras and/or animals or children -- neither of whom can actually provide meaningful consent) as long as it's legal.

Pornhub is blocked in 21 U.S. states (including Texas and Florida) and heavily crippled in the UK.

Re: Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

#152

Post by JdeBP »

davepeck wrote: post #140
kfreds wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way I see it there's four use cases: - protecting your privacy from your local ISP, WiFi, school, government etc - protecting your privacy from some forms of online tracking - circumventing censorship - circumventing geographical restrictions If you combine masking of your IP address with a web browser that protects you from various types of browser-based fingerprinting, you are more in control of your privacy on…

Hi! Thanks for your deeply non-silly reply; it's nice to (virtually) meet a cofounder. If you have time, I'd love to hear your thoughts on Mullvad's campaign here in Seattle. For what it's worth, I suppose my perspective boils down to: the first three issues aren't issues here in town, or can be addressed in more direct ways (we have a wide choice of providers; 1st party browsers and services cover the gamut of track…

At this point I'm reminded of Tom Scott's honest VPN advertisement, contrasting how VPNs are advertised (on YouTube, at least) with the main features that they really provide.

* https://youtube.com/watch?v=WVDQEoe6ZWY

Re: Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

#153

Post by kfreds »

joecool1029 wrote: post #144
kfreds wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way I see it there's four use cases: - protecting your privacy from your local ISP, WiFi, school, government etc - protecting your privacy from some forms of online tracking - circumventing censorship - circumventing geographical restrictions If you combine masking of your IP address with a web browser that protects you from various types of browser-based fingerprinting, you are more in control of your privacy on…

There's a niche fifth reason. Roaming between upstreams while not having open TCP connections drop. I use multiple ISP's and on mullvad I can swap which wifi/ethernet I'm on and all my connections stay up since wireguard is stateless.

Good point. That is indeed a distinct fifth reason.

Here's a sixth one: for some users it can improve latency, bandwidth and/or even cost.

latency/bandwidth: because of weird peering agreements between ISPs / ASes.

cost: there are networks where consumers pay per MB for international traffic, but not local traffic. Consumers can sometimes establish a VPN tunnel to the local data center and get an unmetered international connection, because the data center has a different agreement with the monopolistic consumer ISP.

Re: Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

#154

Post by nobody9999 »

ookkay wrote: post #151
nobody9999 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>In my estimation the main reason people use VPNs is for pr*n and piracy I get the piracy part, but why would someone want/need VPN for pr0n? That's not a gotcha or snark, I don't understand why folks would "need" vpn for that (assuming it's not* non-consensual, which includes hidden cameras and/or animals or children -- neither of whom can actually provide meaningful consent) as long as it's legal.

Pornhub is blocked in 21 U.S. states (including Texas and Florida) and heavily crippled in the UK.

>Pornhub is blocked in 21 U.S. states (including Texas and Florida) and heavily crippled in the UK.

Fair enough. And likely a host of other sites too, I guess.

Re: Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

#155

Post by kfreds »

davepeck wrote: post #140
kfreds wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way I see it there's four use cases: - protecting your privacy from your local ISP, WiFi, school, government etc - protecting your privacy from some forms of online tracking - circumventing censorship - circumventing geographical restrictions If you combine masking of your IP address with a web browser that protects you from various types of browser-based fingerprinting, you are more in control of your privacy on…

Hi! Thanks for your deeply non-silly reply; it's nice to (virtually) meet a cofounder. If you have time, I'd love to hear your thoughts on Mullvad's campaign here in Seattle. For what it's worth, I suppose my perspective boils down to: the first three issues aren't issues here in town, or can be addressed in more direct ways (we have a wide choice of providers; 1st party browsers and services cover the gamut of track…

Sure!

Regarding tracking concerns, masking your IP address is a necessary but insufficient first step to improving your privacy online. ISPs typically don't allow their users to do that per-device in a UX-friendly way. Protecting against browser fingerprinting is something that Mullvad Browser does quite well, thanks to it being a fork of Tor Browser.

As for circumventing geo restrictions, you're absolutely right. We make an effort to get it to work, but ultimately privacy and censorship is much more of a priority for us. That's why we don't advertise it.

Finally, the campaign isn't just about getting more customers. We started Mullvad for political reasons, and now we have the resources to spread that message further. Governments around the world are warming up to the idea of mandatory device-side mass surveillance and backdooring E2E encryption. We're trying to build public opinion against that.

Re: Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

#156

Post by afiori »

zoeysmithe wrote: post #24
fujigawa wrote: post #7

Commercial VPNs will go down as one of the greatest money-making schemes of the last decade. Outside of a few specific use cases their sales often rely on leveraging non-technical users' fear of what they don't fully understand. I have non-technical friends and relatives that have fully bought into this and when I asked why they use a VPN I got non-specific answers like "you need it for security", "to prevent identit…

This is my feeling too. I also don't think these people realize how none of these groups can refuse a subpoena so the scenario of "the government coming after me," doesn't get addressed either. Worse, some of these are tied to foreign nation state intelligence, who are now analyzing your data when before they couldn't because they didnt have a relationship with your ISP. Domestically, I wouldnt be surprised if all of…

I use mullvad and the main reasons I pay the 5$ a month are:

1) I do believe it is quite private

2) the socksv5 proxy is useful to prevent qbittorrent connecting to the internet at work by mistake

3) if the network is spotty or a bit unstable the vpn hides the instability from apps

4) I don't trust my isp DNS

5) geoblocking (mullvad is not the best at this though)

Re: Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

#157

Post by roywashere »

kfreds wrote: post #155
davepeck wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi! Thanks for your deeply non-silly reply; it's nice to (virtually) meet a cofounder. If you have time, I'd love to hear your thoughts on Mullvad's campaign here in Seattle. For what it's worth, I suppose my perspective boils down to: the first three issues aren't issues here in town, or can be addressed in more direct ways (we have a wide choice of providers; 1st party browsers and services cover the gamut of track…

Sure! Regarding tracking concerns, masking your IP address is a necessary but insufficient first step to improving your privacy online. ISPs typically don't allow their users to do that per-device in a UX-friendly way. Protecting against browser fingerprinting is something that Mullvad Browser does quite well, thanks to it being a fork of Tor Browser. As for circumventing geo restrictions, you're absolutely right. We…

I’m surely happy to not live in the UK at the moment. And Indonesia of course. If I would live in one of these countries I’d be using VPN. And maybe in the (not so distant) future this is preferable in the US too.

> We're trying to build public opinion against that.

Good on you!

But to be honest; it seems that it would be in Mullvads interest if the US starts requiring “open encryption” for internet services! Then more people would feel the need for VPNs

Re: Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

#158

Post by dahrkael »

dongcarl wrote: post #117

I'm surprised no one has mentioned iCloud Relay-style Multi-Party Relays yet: https://www.privacyguides.org/articles/2024/11/17/where-are-... It greatly improves on the existing VPN trust model by separating the "who" (connecting IP, potential payment info, etc.), from the "what" (IP traffic). You no longer have a trust a single entity not being malicious or compromised. Disclaimer: I run obscura.net, which does exac…

so now i have to trust two providers doing the right thing instead of one?

Re: Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

#159

Post by dmurray »

kfreds wrote: post #153
joecool1029 wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a niche fifth reason. Roaming between upstreams while not having open TCP connections drop. I use multiple ISP's and on mullvad I can swap which wifi/ethernet I'm on and all my connections stay up since wireguard is stateless.

Good point. That is indeed a distinct fifth reason. Here's a sixth one: for some users it can improve latency, bandwidth and/or even cost. latency/bandwidth: because of weird peering agreements between ISPs / ASes. cost: there are networks where consumers pay per MB for international traffic, but not local traffic. Consumers can sometimes establish a VPN tunnel to the local data center and get an unmetered internatio…

How about a seventh: in solidarity with people who are facing censorship or oppression.

Like, if only dissidents and malcontents use a VPN (or TOR or HTTPS or E2E encrypted messaging apps) then if you want to reduce dissent, you can just round up all the VPN users and have them shot. If everyone uses VPNs for normal internet use, that becomes impractical.

Re: Who Owns, Operates, and Develops Your VPN Matters

#160

Post by crossroadsguy »

fujigawa wrote: post #7

Commercial VPNs will go down as one of the greatest money-making schemes of the last decade. Outside of a few specific use cases their sales often rely on leveraging non-technical users' fear of what they don't fully understand. I have non-technical friends and relatives that have fully bought into this and when I asked why they use a VPN I got non-specific answers like "you need it for security", "to prevent identit…

On the contrary so far to me only the so called non-technical users' VPN use cases have made any sense to me - "I want to access/do this site/streaming/p2p. I can't do this without a VPN. Hence I am using a VPN". That's it. No drama, no virtue signalling, no lecturing. Just a need.

It's the technical users whose myriad VPN use cases rather baffle me which in most cases eventually achieve little to none other than some sort of feeling of satisfaction or maybe placebo.

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