this post was submitted on 04 May 2024

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Privacy

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What VPN are you using? (feddit.nl)

submitted 10 months ago by helenslunch@feddit.nl to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

104 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I use Proton. But I continue to run into more and more websites and services that detect my VPN and refuse my connection, or just run literally 40 captchas in a row until I just give up.

I use Proton because it has a "suite" of products under a single subscription, but that benefit is losing it's allure as some of their products are pretty shitty from a user experience perspective, their customer support is atrocious, and they don't seem to pay any attention to what their users actually want.

Does anyone track known VPN servers? Is there a specific provider that causes less problems? Does anyone test different VPNs for detection?

Thinking about cancelling my subscription and moving to Mullvad.

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[+] LemmyKnowsBest@lemmy.world -16 points 10 months ago (8 children)

um I don't use a vpn. Please tell me why I should use a VPN. It's just something that costs money that seems unnecessary. I have nothing to hide. Why are you all hiding behind VPNs? What am I missing?

[–] firefly@neon.nightbulb.net 7 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

@helenslunch@feddit.nl

"I have nothing to hide ..."

Nice story, bro.

When you post a real photograph of yourself, wife, kids, and all your social security numbers and bank account numbers, along with a complete history of all video rentals and library books, and your private confessions of folly, vice, and sin-- post all that on your Lemmy profile, then I'll believe you have nothing to hide.

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[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 7 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

A VPN doesn’t protect you the way OP thinks it does. It just hides your IP address from the websites you visit. Of course, now instead of one website seeing that you visited it, one organization can see everything you visit.

Basically it just moves your trust from your ISP to your VPN provider. So yeah, if you don’t need that, and you don’t need to get around geo blocks, you don’t need a VPN.

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[–] duckythescientist@sh.itjust.works 5 points 10 months ago

Because mainstream porn sites are blocked or require age verification in my state. Other good reasons are to avoid some issues when torrenting things or to "be" in another country to get around Netflix and other streaming service region blocks.

Privacy and avoiding man in the middle is kinda bullshit. Nearly all websites use TLS, so mitm isn't possible. And it's only privacy from your ISP.

[–] pipariturbiini@sopuli.xyz 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It protects your data from snooping or man-in-the-middle attacks on untrusted networks. Or your internet service provider.

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 3 points 10 months ago

Not really. Unless you’re visiting unencrypted websites. If you’re using HTTPS and DNS over HTTPS, your ISP can only see what IP address you’re connecting to, not the traffic.

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[–] hperrin@lemmy.world -1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

There’s always the option of renting a low cost VM in the cloud and running your own VPN. They will probably monitor your traffic though.

[+] helenslunch@feddit.nl 6 points 10 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

[deleted]

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Depends what you’re using a VPN for. If you’re using it for privacy, yeah, it wouldn’t help. If you’re using it for geo locked content, it works great. Or for privacy from specifically your ISP.

[+] helenslunch@feddit.nl 4 points 10 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

[deleted]

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world -1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (2 children)

If you’re trusting any other VPN provider, then you’re already willing to trust someone. What’s the difference between trusting Proton and trusting Digital Ocean?

If you’re only visiting HTTPS sites then your ISP already can’t snoop your traffic. A VPN gives you very little added privacy.

No matter what you use, you’re really only protecting yourself from your own ISP.

[+] helenslunch@feddit.nl 8 points 10 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

[deleted]

[–] firefly@neon.nightbulb.net 1 points 10 months ago

@hperrin@lemmy.world

VPN + Tor = incognitopottamus

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world -1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

You think that using a VPN is protecting you from the website you’re connecting to logging that traffic?

No. The website sees the traffic. The only thing they don’t see is your home IP address. That’s not even a useful piece of information for tracking someone. Home IP addresses are usually dynamic.

Websites track you through cookies and etags, and VPNs do not block those. If they did, you wouldn’t be able to log into any websites, and you would always be redownloading JS, CSS, and fonts you’ve already downloaded.

[+] helenslunch@feddit.nl 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

[deleted]

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

Also, please prove to me that you are blocking etags, because that is bonkers.

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

What personal information do you think the VPN is blocking? Like, exactly. Precisely what information do you believe the VPN prevents a website from seeing about you?

I understand the difference between first and third party cookies. You said you were trying to prevent the website from tracking you. A website’s cookie for its own domain is first party. If you block that cookie, it’s harder for them to track you, and also you can’t log in.

Your IP address is not very useful for tracking you.

Residential IP addresses change often.
They’re usually shared by a family or organization through NAT.
You will often have different IP addresses throughout the day as you switch between WiFi and cell data.
Your different devices may or may not share an IP address.

The major ad trackers use cookies and etags to track you. They don’t use your IP address.

[+] helenslunch@feddit.nl 1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

[deleted]

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Then we agree that’s the only advantage. So your original reply is wrong. A cloud VM running self hosted VPN protects you exactly as much as a commercial VPN with regard to the website you’re connecting to.

[+] helenslunch@feddit.nl 1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

[deleted]

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

So just make a snapshot, and every time you want a new IP, create a new VM from the snapshot. Or if there’s an option in your cloud provider, just request a new IP.

Whenever you connect to a VPN, you use the same IP address the whole session. You have to reconnect to a different node whenever you want a new IP.

But I feel like you’re just being contrarian here. Your objections aren’t rooted in any sort of actual concern over privacy, and I don’t think you really understand the systems you’re using. In other words, you’re just being paranoid.

If you want true privacy, use Tor.

[–] therealjcdenton@lemmy.zip 12 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Nice try fed, won't narrow me down that easily

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[–] iiGxC@slrpnk.net 18 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Mullvad, it has ipv6 and way better linux support than proton

[–] Molecular0079@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

No port forwarding though :(

I used to use Mullvad but after they disabled port forwarding I switched over to Proton.

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[–] totikom@lemmy.ml 2 points 10 months ago

Geph were not mentioned yet. It will likely not solve the problem mentioned by OP, but it is VERY censorship resistant.

[–] notnotmike@programming.dev 4 points 10 months ago (5 children)

Apparently unpopular but I use Mozilla VPN

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[–] anton2492@lemmy.nz 1 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Please don't downvote this [too much] but...

I'm not seeing ExpressVPN get mentioned here or elsewhere anymore except for the odd YouTube ad (perhaps this is already a tell-tale sign).

Their website states that they run it off RAM and they don't keep logs.

Is there something wrong with it / did something happen to it that I'm not aware of? (I've been a customer of theirs for some time now)

My aim with using VPN is to maintain data privacy across my Windows, iOS and Android devices, and be able to access geofenced media (e.g. a different country's Netflix library), with minimal to no access issues during browsing or streaming. What's the go-to these days?

[–] greywolf0x1@lemmy.ml 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

why are ppl scared of downvotes or being downvoted?

[–] Ilandar@aussie.zone 6 points 10 months ago

I think they cause a lot of people psychological distress, either because they can't handle disagreements or because they interpret them as a personal attack. If this sounds like you (the person reading this comment), please do yourself a favour and disable scores in Lemmy's settings. You don't have to live with reddit's moronic upvote/downvote culture here.

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[–] pineapplelover@lemm.ee 3 points 10 months ago

Proton, sometimes you might need to connect to a random server like something in Philippines for example, then you won't get captcha. If I encounter a site that flags my server then I do that.

[–] bloodfart@lemmy.ml 3 points 10 months ago

Mullvad air and proton. Several computers and infrastructure thingys I have access too in addition to a handful of vpses. Nebula for overlay networking.

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