5 ms·

Post author here. Happy to answer questions, take criticisms, etc.

by ekr____ 4y ago

gnabgib 4y ago
Why do you sometimes post your educatedguesswork.org blog posts via the r422 user?
- ekr____ 4y ago
  It's not me.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
wolverine876 4y ago
It's invaluable that someone with expertise is providing the public with this knowledge; thank you. There is too much misinformation out there. I wonder if a tl;dr with concrete advice in non-technical language would reach a much wider audience. I know the technology professionally, I already understand almost everything in the article (that I read), and I'm not sure what you are recommending - Tor? Apple's proxy service (whatever they call it)? I think Brave offers something now? Firefox VPN? Also, another reason "even the best system provides only limited protection" is that there are many other ways to track people. I know the article is about IP addresses, but a non-technical reader might not grasp that IPs are only one piece of a larger puzzle.
- IvyMike 4y ago
  Not the original author, but my blog post from last year sounds like it might be along the lines of what your looking for. It includes some specific recommendations for different use cases. https://ivymike.dev/vpn-advice-november-2021-edition.html https://ivymike.dev/vpn-advice-november-2021-edition.html
ThePowerOfFuet 4y ago
Nord VPN? Seriously?
ignoramous 4y ago
Hi Eric, thanks for this brilliant write-up. I see you touched on Private Relay and QUIC but chose to not discuss IETF MASQUE working group standardization of it. In general, as oblivious HTTP, IP over QUIC, Private Proxies over QUIC etc continues to gather pace (surprisingly, it is Google alongside Cloudflare and Apple leading the charge), do you think browsers bundling in tech (relays, proxies based on blind tokens etc) to mask IPs would be the default and free going forward? How do you see trackers adopt to this new reality, in that case? Thanks.
- ekr____ 4y ago
  To be honest, I meant to mention MASQUE as an aside, and it's in my notes somewhere to put in but it seems to have gotten lost. Anyway, I think it's great that we're seeing some new tech here, but it's of course been possible to do proxying in the browser using HTTP CONNECT for some time. The MASQUE piece is an incremental improvement over that. I think at some level the change is an increased awareness of the problem and more interest in doing something about it. It seems to me that the main obstacle to having really widespread proxying is financial: there are substantial incremental costs to proxying the traffic, someone needs to bear that. I expect this is why Private Relay is part of a iCloud+ rather than free for everyone. So, I'm not sure how that's going to shake out.

Post author here. Happy to answer questions, take criticisms, etc.

gnabgib 4y ago

Why do you sometimes post your educatedguesswork.org blog posts via the r422 user?

ekr____ 4y ago
It's not me.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

wolverine876 4y ago

It's invaluable that someone with expertise is providing the public with this knowledge; thank you. There is too much misinformation out there. I wonder if a tl;dr with concrete advice in non-technical language would reach a much wider audience. I know the technology professionally, I already understand almost everything in the article (that I read), and I'm not sure what you are recommending - Tor? Apple's proxy service (whatever they call it)? I think Brave offers something now? Firefox VPN? Also, another reason "even the best system provides only limited protection" is that there are many other ways to track people. I know the article is about IP addresses, but a non-technical reader might not grasp that IPs are only one piece of a larger puzzle.

IvyMike 4y ago
Not the original author, but my blog post from last year sounds like it might be along the lines of what your looking for. It includes some specific recommendations for different use cases. https://ivymike.dev/vpn-advice-november-2021-edition.html https://ivymike.dev/vpn-advice-november-2021-edition.html

ThePowerOfFuet 4y ago

Nord VPN? Seriously?

ignoramous 4y ago

Hi Eric, thanks for this brilliant write-up. I see you touched on Private Relay and QUIC but chose to not discuss IETF MASQUE working group standardization of it. In general, as oblivious HTTP, IP over QUIC, Private Proxies over QUIC etc continues to gather pace (surprisingly, it is Google alongside Cloudflare and Apple leading the charge), do you think browsers bundling in tech (relays, proxies based on blind tokens etc) to mask IPs would be the default and free going forward? How do you see trackers adopt to this new reality, in that case? Thanks.

ekr____ 4y ago
To be honest, I meant to mention MASQUE as an aside, and it's in my notes somewhere to put in but it seems to have gotten lost. Anyway, I think it's great that we're seeing some new tech here, but it's of course been possible to do proxying in the browser using HTTP CONNECT for some time. The MASQUE piece is an incremental improvement over that. I think at some level the change is an increased awareness of the problem and more interest in doing something about it. It seems to me that the main obstacle to having really widespread proxying is financial: there are substantial incremental costs to proxying the traffic, someone needs to bear that. I expect this is why Private Relay is part of a iCloud+ rather than free for everyone. So, I'm not sure how that's going to shake out.