[interested_observer]

There are a number of items you can do to help maintain a semblance of privacy while on the Internet. @lightbox has done an excellent job with his posts!!!

• Does the Internet really care if you are John Jones at 42.66.72.3? No - because you are essentially already uniquely identifiable through the OS your PC uses, the type of browser you are using, and how it is configured. You have already been fingerprinted by the Internet. Try this (it's safe by the way) - Am I unique? - also here are some tools (replicated with items below) - Am I unique?

• To somewhat prevent browser fingerprinting - What is Browser Fingerprinting and How to Avoid It

• Log on to your account on your ISP and opt out of any sharing. You will probably need to do a search on your ISP privacy options. This is probably the easiest. Does this guarantee privacy or that your ISP will honor your opt out - no, but it's a reasonable start.

• Browse a bit more anonymously - How to Browse the Web Anonymously - Techlicious

• You can also make yourself a bit more difficult to track by "hardening" your browser - How to Harden Your Browser Against Malware and Privacy Concerns | Gizmo's Freeware or you can just use a pre-hardened security browser - Best 8 secure browsers 2017 | Security | Techworld

• Also, you should consider hardening your home network to a degree - http://www.usar.army.mil/Portals/98/Documents/Slicksheet_BestPracticesForKee...workSecure.pdf

• You can also create noise that is associated with your Internet "identity", thereby devaluing your real actual browsing habits. There is a new utility that you can add into an empty browsing window that will just bounce across a lot of random sites.. - After vote to kill privacy rules, users try to ?pollute? their Web history | Ars Technica Here is a link to the actual utility - https://noiszy.com/

As you begin to be more proactive, you need to understand that by taking and exercising various options, you will be essentially waving a red flag that you have something to hide and thus will be making yourself somewhat of a target. So, you need to understand that by using a VPN that you may actually be attracting the attention of the NSA / CIA / FBI / GCHQ and who knows who else - The NSA Is Targeting Users of Privacy Services, Leaked Code Shows | WIRED

• Ok - VPN or Virtual Private Networks - basically allow you to create your own private tunnel to communicate across the Internet. Not all VPN services are equal. You might want a VPN service that takes your traffic to another country. If your intent is privacy, then you need to check to make sure that 1) the VPN service is not logging all of your activity; and 2) if the VPN is taking your traffic to another country, that that other country does not have laws requiring the VPN service to maintain logs of your activity. Also, there have been bogus VPN services setup - VPN Traffic, Use Spikes in Wake of Death of User Privacy Rules | DSLReports, ISP Information

• 6 Best VPN Service in 2017 Reviews: most secure and fastest - BestLeap
• Special Offer: The world's fastest VPN will protect your online privacy - ScienceAlert

• For those of you using smart phones for surfing - even if you are using a VPN, quite a few carriers have installed snoopware on your phones that will defeat using a VPN.

• You can also have your home router - if it supports VPN, be the VPN end point and support all of your home PCs. For other traffic like Netflix you can use the router's DMZ (De Militarized Zone) capability to separate the traffic that the VPN would create problems with.

• For added protection for the truly suspicious - you can either chain or double wrap VPNs -

• Chaining - CyberGuerrilla 2012 » How to Chain VPNs for Complete Anonymity
• Double Wrapping - On you home router use VPN service A and on your PC use VPN service B. So you are tunneling your clear traffic through VPN B first and then again through VPN A.

• You should also consider not using your ISP's DNS (Domain Name Service). OpenDNS is excellent to use, but you might as well go the whole hog on this and use DNScrypt - DNS Security with DNSCrypt | OpenDNS

__________________

Do you do home banking on your home PC? You then might consider doing -

• Get a cheap Chrome Laptop and use it for ONLY your home banking, placing stock orders, etc. AND NOTHING ELSE. Only plug it into the Internet when you are using it - otherwise disconnect it.

• Use a Hypervisor on your system and have multiple virtual machines setup. Use one for general browsing and the other for your banking activities. Here is one that has been under development for about 8 years now - https://www.qubes-os.org/

---

Last edited by interested_observer; 04-16-2017 at 01:07 AM.

[lightbox]

Excellent info, @interested_observer! I'm going to look into those DNS options and possibly setting up my router's DMZ for certain traffic. Thank you for posting instructions.

[clackers]

+1 for PIA.

[grhazelton]

@interested_observer, thanks for all the info and the links! Much food for thought. It's wonderful that PentaxForums offers resources not only on photography but other subjects.

[interested_observer]

Excellent info, @interested_observer! I'm going to look into those DNS options and possibly setting up my router's DMZ for certain traffic. Thank you for posting instructions.

Hi Light - There is also other options. You can look for a home router that is able to run DD-WRT or Tomatoes (these open source software router packages are not new - they have been around for years). They run about $100 and up. What this will do for you is to run VPN clients (on your router). By the way - the cheapest one is the Asus RT-AC56U. (Amazon: $101.99)

• 5 Best DD-WRT Routers of 2017 -*BestVPN.com

Whatever router you do have is your primary barrier between you and the rest of the Internet - lock it down or it will be taken over.

• How to secure your router and home network | PCWorld

Actually, the largest privacy snoop in your system is Windows - specifically Windows Telemetry.

• Microsoft opens up on Windows telemetry, tells us most of what data it collects | Ars Technica

There is a benevolent purpose for this. It is to identify design problems with Windows, the third party device drivers ad the various application software running on your PC.

The flip side of Windows Telemetry, is that if you are worried about your ISP collecting your browsing data, Microsoft is 1000x worse, because it is collecting everything you do. Here is how you disable (most of) it....

• How to: Turn Off Telemetry in Windows 7, 8, and Windows 10 | Windows 10 content from Windows IT Pro

[wombat2go]

Thanks for the useful info on this thread.
I am familiar with ssh, I use it to support various servers around the world.
But I have one user in another country that does not want to open his port for ssh.
He wants me to use a cisco vpn client.

I am all linux here.
I have tried two times to get the Cisco stuff, but each time I cannot get through the Cisco site.
There is not much info about linux and Cisco . I think Cisco and Microsoft collaborate in the vpn?
Anybody here got a linux client working with Cisco vpn servers?

[interested_observer]

@interested_observer, thanks for all the info and the links! Much food for thought. It's wonderful that PentaxForums offers resources not only on photography but other subjects.

I retired late last year from all of this (or so I thought). The overall problem is not the ISPs per se, but Apple, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, LinkedIn, etc., where YOU are the product that they are $elling (very successfully, I might add). It's just that the ISPs want in on the game.

Thanks for the useful info on this thread.
I am familiar with ssh, I use it to support various servers around the world.
But I have one user in another country that does not want to open his port for ssh.
He wants me to use a cisco vpn client.

I am all linux here.
I have tried two times to get the Cisco stuff, but each time I cannot get through the Cisco site.
There is not much info about linux and Cisco . I think Cisco and Microsoft collaborate in the vpn?
Anybody here got a linux client working with Cisco vpn servers?

VPN is essentially a standard that everyone uses - unless you are Cisco and you follow it for the most part (until you get to a particular item that you don't follow for some reason).

• Dependent on the particular distribution of linux that you are using - to a degree.
• Need to use Cisco's IPsec arrangement.

Here are some links that should help... (in no particular order of importance).

• Easiest way to setup Ubuntu as a VPN server - Ask Ubuntu
• 5 VPN Clients for Linux - Cisco, Juniper - Tutorials - LinuxPlanet
• VPNClient - Community Help Wiki
• Installing and using the Cisco AnyConnect client with Ubuntu for UCI VPN
• Linux VPN Client for Cisco VPNs: vpnc - Getting Started - Tutorials - LinuxPlanet
• Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client Administrator Guide, Release 4.0 - Configure VPN Access [Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client] - Cisco
• How to install and configure the Cisco VPN client on a Linux computer - Micro and Nano Mechanics Group
• [projects.tuxx-home.at]

There are also some offsite services that may help you to, where they host the Cisco VPN server, that you can then externally log into.

• VPS Hosting | Managed Linux VPS Web Hosting With cPanel - BlueHost

... also, I hope that you are using the new SSH as the old one is horribly insecure.

• Akamai: 12-Year-Old SSH Vulnerability Fueling Internet-Of-Broken-Things DDoS Attacks, And Worse | Techdirt

[grhazelton]

Many thanks to all! I've set up a little "library" based in large part on the responses of these posters, and I'll "meditate" on what I should do.