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Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

freenetproject.org

341–350 of 443 posts

Re: Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

#341

I like the fact that I can expose a machine using tor. Its .onion address becomes something analog to a public ip address[0]. It even works behind a nat, so I can ssh to a machine of mine from anywhere in the world. The problem: the other point must support tor to access it. Anyone knows a way using these overlay networks, tor, i2p, freenet, to expose a service on a machine behind a NAT to be accessed through the int…

If you don't want additional software requirements client side, then it means you need a publicly-routable IP address on your server, or at least publicly-routable IP/port pairs. This can be achieved in a few ways:

- use a VPN from a net-neutral ISP to obtain a real public IP address over VPN (5-10€/mo)

- route specific ports to your own machine from an internet-facing server (via SSH/Wireguard/VPN tunnels) ; unfortunately it makes it impossible for different people (backend servers) to share a single routable port

- reverse proxy specific protocols to a backend server, using for example TLS SNI (or eSNI) headers ; a single internet-facing server can serve many different vhosts to separate backends, where TLS encryption is terminated on the backend

But of course you can run tor/i2p and other crypto-secure routing protocols (yggdrasil, zeronet, cjdns...) to expand the ways to reach your server. I'm unaware of good protocol-agnostic address discovery... for tor we usually do TOFU over DNS (eg. onionMX records) or HTTPS (HTTP2 Alt-SVC headers). The GNU Name System, at least on paper, sounds like the perfect crypto-secure naming scheme that could securely bootstrap addresses from names, but i don't think it has broad adoption yet.

Re: Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

#342
post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This is a bold and unsubstantiated claim. I'm fine with that but its non the less the hard truth there is nothing like the 1st amendment in any other place. >For other actions that are protected under the 1st amendment? Depends.... To be in the right doesn't mean you win the court case that's true but in the EU you dont have the 1st amendment, you dont have the right to free speech. If the court system does its job…

> in the EU you dont have the 1st amendment, you dont have the right to free speech. Most EU countries have some rather close analogue of the US First Amendment in their law or constitution. Sure, pretty much all of them have various exceptions, so there's no absolute free speech -- but then the US has such exceptions too, and thus also lacks absolute free speech. On the whole, IMO your comment is much more wrong tha…

Name a single place and the law that is remotely comparable to the 1st amendment. It doesn't exist. There are some analogue yes but they all have exceptions like the one mentioned above where arbitrary the holocaust is excluded or certain other topic are excluded. Or the free speech only applies if your speech is considered satire or has some arctic value. etc. etc.

>but then the US has such exceptions too, and thus also lacks absolute free speech.

No, it does not the fist amendment is very clear and short enough to not have any loopholes in there. People just intentionally misinterpret it and then come around and say you can scream "bomb" in an airplane in US airspace therefore you dont have free speech in the US. This just shows the lack of understand what free speech means. Its not about having the right to make audible noises of any kind at any time and place. Similarly if you order a person to kill someone and do so with your voice trough the act of speaking, you are committing a crime.

Re: Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

#343

I've run Freenet twice in the last twenty years. Maybe 2006, 2012? Each time CSAM was surprisingly visible. Maybe these days it's kicked off to a corner but back then it was pretty much a click away. I'm going to have to say if that's the basic motivation for censorship resistant communication in the USA, I am disappointed and sad. Wonder if it's actually useful in places where you actually have censorship, or if it'…

If y'all only try to see if there is CSAM and then uninstall when you succeed, then of course the CSAM percentage will become high because only the CSAM perverts do not leave! So instead keep using it and actually put the other content onto it yourself! Hosting on Freenet is free and easy, you just upload a site and post it to FMS and it will be online for many years if people keep accessing it. You don't need any se…

The problem really, really isn't the percentage. It is the total number.

Re: Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

#344
post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More like pictures of modern child abuse, child slavery (IE: ownership, sale, etc), and brutal torturous murder. Basically anything you've thought of the NSA or other intelligence agencies intercepting, it was wide out in the open there. The types of things you'd see kids telling themselves about urban legends of the "darkweb", well, it was extremely real and in the open on Freenet...

You mean like the early 2000's 4chan random board? Sarcasm aside, that experience sounds similar to what I've seen when trying out freenet way back. On the other hand my I2P experience was quite pleasant (by just following the planet.i2p stream, basically an announcement site for new "registered" domains and torrents), with easy discovery of downloadable leaks, anarchist and conspiracy theorist blogs. Really felt lik…

I was on 4chan's random board in the early 2000s, and it was nothing at all like that.

Re: Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

#345
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ECHR contains the freedom of speech as a human right and so do most EU countries in their own constitutions. "Countless people have been successfully prosecuted for what would be covered under the 1st amendment" (and the ECHR) in the US too. The constitution only has value as long as it's enforced.

[flagged]

Trump was an asshole and awful public speaker but his policies were good for the country. The current administration is further diving the US and pushing the limits of what’s acceptable. I fear this is only the beginning of much worse policies to come.

Re: Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

#346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...hence you're not responsible for what it could be decrypted to. You do NOT want your defense in court to rest on convincing a judge or jury of this.

So we must shut down all hotels because they all unknowingly hosted some illegal activities in their rooms, e.g. if someone met a prostitute there? In fact we cannot have people rent out condos or houses anymore either because illegal stuff will happen there and the owner is responsible even if they don't know! Also we need to shut down all ISPs because at some point in time illegal data was cached on their machines…

That's just the reality of the world today. Anything regarding crimes on the Internet, it's almost always the defendant being guilty until proven innocent, especially against cops/DAs with a dearth of technical knowledge.

You may be innocent, but you'll be spending tens of thousands of dollars and a chunk of your life agonizing over it before "justice" is realized.

Re: Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

#347

I've run Freenet twice in the last twenty years. Maybe 2006, 2012? Each time CSAM was surprisingly visible. Maybe these days it's kicked off to a corner but back then it was pretty much a click away. I'm going to have to say if that's the basic motivation for censorship resistant communication in the USA, I am disappointed and sad. Wonder if it's actually useful in places where you actually have censorship, or if it'…

If y'all only try to see if there is CSAM and then uninstall when you succeed, then of course the CSAM percentage will become high because only the CSAM perverts do not leave! So instead keep using it and actually put the other content onto it yourself! Hosting on Freenet is free and easy, you just upload a site and post it to FMS and it will be online for many years if people keep accessing it. You don't need any se…

> So instead keep using it and actually put the other content onto it yourself!

“Make the place I like better by being there!”

Nah. Make the place you like better, then people will want to be there.

Re: Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

#348
post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is one more key difference - I2P has C++ implementation[1] which allows it to be run on the low-performance machines, e.g. routers. It is impossible in case of Java. I wish it had been Rust, though... [1] https://github.com/PurpleI2P/i2pd

Why would it be impossible to run Java on low performance machines? There have been mobile and embedded Java implementations for literally decades. C++ doesn't magically imbue a program with performance superpowers either. It's lazy to equate implementation language with performance profile.

> Why would it be impossible to run Java on low performance machines?

In some abstract case - yes, it's possible. In many concrete cases, including I2P, Java-written code is quite resources-consuming for anything close to the router hardware.

Re: Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

#349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...hence you're not responsible for what it could be decrypted to. You do NOT want your defense in court to rest on convincing a judge or jury of this.

So we must shut down all hotels because they all unknowingly hosted some illegal activities in their rooms, e.g. if someone met a prostitute there? In fact we cannot have people rent out condos or houses anymore either because illegal stuff will happen there and the owner is responsible even if they don't know! Also we need to shut down all ISPs because at some point in time illegal data was cached on their machines…

> So we must shut down all hotels because they all unknowingly hosted some illegal activities in their rooms, e.g. if someone met a prostitute there?

No. What they said is that you don’t want to have to convince a jury that you aren’t responsible for stuff that is on your computer

I’m so tired of people arguing in bad faith. Debate what people believe, not a stupid version you made up to score points.

Re: Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant communication

#350

For the vast majority of people, some degree of censorship is deemed a necessary evil.. Where do you draw the line when freenet evolves to be more than just free speech and starts seeing morally reprehensible services pop up..

Same question, but for the telephone.

Are you under the impression that phone calls are open season or something? There are tons of laws regulating what you can and can’t do on the phone.
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