[conspire] VPN

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Ehud Kaldor (ehud.kaldor at gmail.com):

> Make it a non US provider (like *proton in Switzerland) and that makes
> it an international headache to get such logs.

Point well made -- one of _many_ damning flaws in the commenter's
rhetoric.  Just because logging may exist and someone might disgorge
some of their contents doesn't say anything about the likelihood --
completely aside from there being considerable difference between
HideMyAss and reputable competitors.

> Another benefit of a provider is that your exit traffic is multiplexed
> with many others, which makes it even harder to untangle.

Well, that depends on the nature of information available to an
antagonist.  (E.g., if the VPN provider wants to collect and disclose
that data, grep works just fine.)

> Also, and I apologize up front, calling a VPN service a "glorified
> proxy" is a privileged statement. In this country the <insert name of
> infamous secret service> does not take you to re-eduction because you
> said something on Twitter, but there are many places where that's the
> case.

Ehud, this is not only lazy rhetoric, but, more to the point, also
misses its target completely:  Author Sven "joepie91" Slootweg's screed
had a veritable ton of logic and factual problems, but sneering at real
state-grade tyranny was _not_ among his many sins.

His phrase "just a glorified proxy" is _designed_ to sound telling, but
doesn't actually say anything.  "[Network] proxy" does indeed mean a
remote gateway to which some or all of your traffic is tunneled.  Ergo,
a VPN service is one.  Great job, Sven!  You've figured out how to use
your dictionary.  But has Sven said anything substative, above and
beyond showing he knows what a technology term means?  Nope.  Not a
blessed thing.

Reading his piece, you wait to hear why it's necessarily a bad deal to
pay $10/month for a network proxy -- and you're still waiting as you
reach the last of Sven's sloppy handwaves.  It's sleight of tongue.

> But if you just want the first hop of your traffic to be more opaque
> (even just to avoid Comcast's snooping DPI), a VPN service is a good
> layer (asking with tor and more).

It's a fair point, that VPNing out _first_ to, say, Finland before
connecting to your various Internet errands means your nosy local ISP
cannot even note down that on Friday, Dec. 9th, a device in your
household made a series of https calls to the Bank of Frostbite Falls
Web site.  (You swap that extremely minor privacy loss for the same loss
if the VPN provider becomes nosy.)  Personally, I think that concern's a
little silly, but horses for courses.