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Mullvad exit IPs are surprisingly identifying

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Re: Mullvad exit IPs are surprisingly identifying

#81

Post by notpushkin »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #66
faangguyindia wrote: post #63

I maintain a list of "23034 IPs to blocklist.txt" blocked IPs they contain all VPN providers. Often VPN providers seed Geofeeds with wrong data, this is why i use traceroute and ping network to locate their real location.

I have a script that logs IPs for any traffic coming in to my servers on ports that don't accept traffic. I then block those IPs from accessing ports behind which there are services. If they're checking my locked doors, I don't want them coming in my unlocked doors.

This might be a good idea, but consider banning them for, say, a couple hours at a time. It’s easy to rotate IP, especially if you’re using a residential proxy service, and there’s a good chance you’ll end up blocking real users using the same ISP.

Re: Mullvad exit IPs are surprisingly identifying

#82

Post by colordrops »

lorenzohess wrote: post #23

The purpose of a VPN does not include anonymizing users with respect to the sites they visit,so it shouldn't be too surprising that Mullvad doesn't enforce unique exit IPs. Users who want anonymity should use networks like Tor.

Isn't Tor a us government project that has been shown to be deanonymizable?

Re: Mullvad exit IPs are surprisingly identifying

#83

Post by tommica »

solenoid0937 wrote: post #32

> As an example, imagine that you are a moderator on a forum and you suspect that a new face is actually a sockpuppet of a user you banned the day prior. You check the IP logs, and despite using different Mullvad servers, both accounts resolve to the overlapping float ranges 0.4334 - 0.4428 and 0.4358 - 0.4423. This gives you a >99% chance that they are the same person. This sounds like how I'd design a VPN if I were…

> This sounds like how I'd design a VPN if I were an intelligence agency.

So does your comment...

Re: Mullvad exit IPs are surprisingly identifying

#85

Post by 8cvor6j844qw_d6 »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #73
asdff wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes you wonder...

Every now and then there are articles like this one about something that Mullvad may or may not be able to do better, and there are always comments about whether they're an intelligence front. I don't know the answer, but there are two ways to take it: 1. Submarining to destroy confidence in an actually trustworthy, decent VPN company 2. They're an intelligence front. For me, Mullvad have the appearance of the greate…

[dead]

Re: Mullvad exit IPs are surprisingly identifying

#86

Post by RandomGerm4n »

wg0 wrote: post #36
Cider9986 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VPNs are not snake oil. They transfer the trust of your internet activity from a place of low-trust, your ISP, to a place of high-trust, ideally a trustworthy VPN like Mullvad, IVPN, or Proton. Among other benefits. If you don't like your ISP creating a profile of you and selling it to target ads to you, you should use a VPN. >Should I use a VPN? Yes, almost certainly. A VPN has many advantages, including: 1. Hiding…

How is private company (VPN) is more trustworthy than an other private company (ISP) and how do you expect them to protect your identity in face of determined state actors that are afer you? What power is in $2.99/month that it offers so much security? Why is that at least 40% of sponsorship to YouTube Creators seem to be from VPN industry? What is that they know and we don't know?

In many countries, a VPN provider can be significantly more trustworthy than an ISP. In Germany, for example, you can have your home searched simply for insulting a politician. The ISP will then immediately hand over the data to the authorities, which most VPN providers do not do. The same goes for torrents. If some random law firm sends a letter to Telekom saying, “Hey, your customer downloaded a movie please give us his data,” they’ll do it right away. Mullvad, ProtonVPN, or even dubious VPN providers like NordVPN don’t do that.

Re: Mullvad exit IPs are surprisingly identifying

#87

Post by tanh »

solenoid0937 wrote: post #32

> As an example, imagine that you are a moderator on a forum and you suspect that a new face is actually a sockpuppet of a user you banned the day prior. You check the IP logs, and despite using different Mullvad servers, both accounts resolve to the overlapping float ranges 0.4334 - 0.4428 and 0.4358 - 0.4423. This gives you a >99% chance that they are the same person. This sounds like how I'd design a VPN if I were…

Yeah I'm sure one day it will transpire Cloudflare is affliated with intelligence agencies too. The solution to a "sudden DDoS" is to put their website behind Cloudflare. Wonder who can do those sudden attacks?

Re: Mullvad exit IPs are surprisingly identifying

#88

Post by connorboyle »

> As an example, imagine that you are a moderator on a forum and you suspect that a new face is actually a sockpuppet of a user you banned the day prior. You check the IP logs, and despite using different Mullvad servers, both accounts resolve to the overlapping float ranges 0.4334 - 0.4428 and 0.4358 - 0.4423. This gives you a >99% chance that they are the same person.

I don't see how the author is arriving at this ">99% chance" purely from the numbers provided in the article. Assuming the first (banned IP) seed and the second seed are both in the range 0.4423 - 0.4358 (a stronger assumption than is justified by the example), all this tells us is that the first and second IP addresses both have seeds in a range that would contain 0.4423 - 0.4358 = 0.65% of all Mullvad users, which 0.0065 * 100,000 = 650 users. We've eliminated >99% of users as "suspects", but we haven't actually gotten >99% accuracy in identifying an individual across multiple exit IPs.

In more Bayesian thinking, the overlap in potential seeds is great evidence to think these IP addresses represent one and the same person (or Mullvad VPN account at least), but as far as I can tell, that's not what the author is saying.

Re: Mullvad exit IPs are surprisingly identifying

#89

Post by cubefox »

jesterson wrote: post #12
Cider9986 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VPNs are not snake oil. They transfer the trust of your internet activity from a place of low-trust, your ISP, to a place of high-trust, ideally a trustworthy VPN like Mullvad, IVPN, or Proton. Among other benefits. If you don't like your ISP creating a profile of you and selling it to target ads to you, you should use a VPN. >Should I use a VPN? Yes, almost certainly. A VPN has many advantages, including: 1. Hiding…

> place of low-trust, your ISP, to a place of high-trust, ideally a trustworthy VPN like Mullvad This is highly subjective statement. Almost all commercial VPN services farm and sell your data. Just by that, my ISP is definitely high trust point while any commercial VPN is a low trust.

> Almost all commercial VPN services farm and sell your data.

Citation needed.

Re: Mullvad exit IPs are surprisingly identifying

#90

Post by m00dy »

notpushkin wrote: post #81
BLKNSLVR wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a script that logs IPs for any traffic coming in to my servers on ports that don't accept traffic. I then block those IPs from accessing ports behind which there are services. If they're checking my locked doors, I don't want them coming in my unlocked doors.

This might be a good idea, but consider banning them for, say, a couple hours at a time. It’s easy to rotate IP, especially if you’re using a residential proxy service, and there’s a good chance you’ll end up blocking real users using the same ISP.

yeah, I'm using https://proxybase.xyz for this. It's like Mullvad but for proxies. No kyc, no email but supports xmr.
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