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> You just replaced ISP tracking with VPN tracking. Yeah, that's the point. People have infinitely more choices for VPN providers than for ISPs. The VPN provid

> You just replaced ISP tracking with VPN tracking. Yeah, that's the point. People have infinitely more choices for VPN providers than for ISPs. The VPN provider could be in another country. You can even run your own VPN on hosted infra.

raverbashing 4y ago
> You can even run your own VPN on hosted infra True. But we know very few people do that
- tsimionescu 4y ago
  So now you trust the infra hoster AND their own ISP.
  - dahfizz 4y ago
    You will always have to trust someone. Having more options when choosing who you trust is a good thing. Does that make sense to you?
simondotau 4y ago
> You can even run your own VPN on hosted infra. This comes with its own risks and you lose some advantages of a commercial service, such as being "lost among the crowd" of other VPN users.
- s_ting765 4y ago
  What if you provision a new IP address every other week/month? i.e Assuming the provider allows it and the cost is negligible
  - simondotau 4y ago
    If your hosting provider makes similar privacy guarantees to a similar VPN provider, then perhaps. For bonus points, use a hosted VM and commercial VPN in serial. Again though, if the US Government is a potential adversary, there's still risk here. Intelligence services could have a 0-day on your linux distro, or an operative within the hosting company. If they get access, they can turn your hosted VM against you.
    - s_ting765 4y ago
      I think you just have to assume there's a possibility that the infrastracture can be compromised at any moment. For both of these two options. Guarantees from providers are valid until the day they are not. Though a point has to be made about using a hosted VM for VPN purposes, you have some level of control about which specific software, configuration and encryption schemes etc. you want to use for your stack. Only downside is that currently there isn't sufficient hypervisor protection from the host kernel afaik. However I do agree with you that either way, the risk threshold is too high if you are concerned about high level state actors. Neither commercial VPNs nor hosting providers can solve the "anonymity" problem for you.

raverbashing 4y ago

> You can even run your own VPN on hosted infra True. But we know very few people do that

tsimionescu 4y ago
So now you trust the infra hoster AND their own ISP.
- dahfizz 4y ago
  You will always have to trust someone. Having more options when choosing who you trust is a good thing. Does that make sense to you?

simondotau 4y ago

> You can even run your own VPN on hosted infra. This comes with its own risks and you lose some advantages of a commercial service, such as being "lost among the crowd" of other VPN users.

s_ting765 4y ago
What if you provision a new IP address every other week/month? i.e Assuming the provider allows it and the cost is negligible
- simondotau 4y ago
  If your hosting provider makes similar privacy guarantees to a similar VPN provider, then perhaps. For bonus points, use a hosted VM and commercial VPN in serial. Again though, if the US Government is a potential adversary, there's still risk here. Intelligence services could have a 0-day on your linux distro, or an operative within the hosting company. If they get access, they can turn your hosted VM against you.
  - s_ting765 4y ago
    I think you just have to assume there's a possibility that the infrastracture can be compromised at any moment. For both of these two options. Guarantees from providers are valid until the day they are not. Though a point has to be made about using a hosted VM for VPN purposes, you have some level of control about which specific software, configuration and encryption schemes etc. you want to use for your stack. Only downside is that currently there isn't sufficient hypervisor protection from the host kernel afaik. However I do agree with you that either way, the risk threshold is too high if you are concerned about high level state actors. Neither commercial VPNs nor hosting providers can solve the "anonymity" problem for you.