Ready to install VPNs...

[SEAPOPSICLE]

It seems like there's some ready to install vpn in my linux.
Alot of it is the familiar ones too, I've seen their sponsor in youtube and such so I am skeptical with the legitimacy of the vpns bc they seem to dump their money on advertising it than anything.
Which one do you guys trust?

 

[wjlesaulnier]

It seems like there's some ready to install vpn in my linux.
Alot of it is the familiar ones too, I've seen their sponsor in youtube and such so I am skeptical with the legitimacy of the vpns bc they seem to dump their money on advertising it than anything.
Which one do you guys trust?

I've been using Privateinternetaccess (no spaces) for years. They have an easy Linux installer and their Linux app looks just like their Windows one. To get the best deal I searched their name on Youtube, narrowed the search to the past year and checked the links in the descriptions under the videos. Check several- I ended up with 2 years plus 4 months for $57. Checking Youtube links from VPN videos usually gets the best price for any VPN.
Privateinternetaccess has 2 types of kill switches, choice between OpenVPN or Wireguard protocols, split tunneling, etc. And MANY servers around the world.

 

[Brickwizard]

I don't bother per se with VPN's I just use Firefox with add-ons for my bulk of work, if i want unanimity when on the net i use the tor network browser or better still Anon surf [both free and in most distribution repositories

 

[MikeWalsh]

TBH, until the UK's OSA (Online Safety Act) came into force last year, I never needed anything like a VPN. The OSA is supposed to make everything safer for children, so a whole list of sites have been assembled where, if adults want to access them, they have to prove they're over 18.

Most of the sites that have been targeted have basically said "F*ck you" to the UK, since it would involve a shed-load of expense on their part to continue operating over here.....so most of 'em have pulled out.

Unfortunately, the "net" has been cast wider than intended, and a whole bunch of perfectly innocent smaller sites have been dragged into the firing line & gotten tarred with the same brush......including a few I've belonged to myself for many years. For these, I find that the Opera browser's built-in "VPN" works for what I want it to do.....though in all honesty, it's not REALLY a VPN as such; more of a re-direct mechanism. But it does what's required.

VPN users are also gradually being identified & targeted, by the state. The gov't want to see VPNs outlawed & banned.

On top of all this, the UK gov't really want everyone to start using a compulsory digital ID for everything.....and the human rights lobby over here are having a field day with this one ATM. Given half a chance, Keir Starmer's crowd would like to turn the UK into a police state.....and nobody over here feels the least bit inclined to cooperate.

Our web access is beginning to shrink. The "powers-that-be" have decided they know what's best for us. Sh*t happens.

(shrug...)


Mike.

 

[f33dm3bits]

TBH, until the UK's OSA (Online Safety Act) came into force last year,
VPN users are also gradually being identified & targeted, by the state. The gov't want to see VPNs outlawed & banned.
Our web access is beginning to shrunk. The "powers-that-be" have decided they know what's best for us.

I disagree with the OSA and I'm against banning VPN's but I'm not going to get into why because that would be getting too much into politics. But I hope something changes soon because it seems be a problem in more places the direction headed.

 

[MikeWalsh]

@f33dm3bits :-

Sorry, Maarten. I never thought about the political aspect of what I said. Delete my post if you feel that would be best.....I won't complain, honest!


Mike.

 

[f33dm3bits]

Sorry, Maarten. I never thought about the political aspect of what I said. Delete my post if you feel that would be best.....I won't complain, honest!

There's also a technical aspect to your reply and sometimes the two meet, you didn't go deep into it just shared some technical facts and some views and it didn't come out in a negative way. No replies with heavy emotion were resulted by it, so it seems fairly neutral to me because of that. If another mod disagrees with me, then they can take action because of the previously state reasons I don't find it necessary to edit your topic.

 

[KGIII]

, if adults want to access them, they have to prove they're over 18.

How were they expecting sites to do this?

As for VPNs, I've used PIA, NordVPN, and now I'm using Windscribe. (I think I still have time remaining on my NordVPN account.) I didn't have a great reason to switch to Windscribe, but it was less friction, and it has all the features/privacy I'm after.

Of those, they all have one thing in common that really matters to me. They have all been audited by an independent third party.

They all essentially offer the same services. In all three cases, their privacy policies could be interchangeable with just a few words changed. They're all three fit for purpose.

In my case, while I do have the application installed, I largely only use the VPN as a browser extension. That's really my area of concern, and the VPN is to watch things not reasonably available in my location. For example, I like to watch IMSA races. They're geolocked (TV contracts) and available on Peacock. However, Peacock does not work on Linux, regardless of your browser choice. Simply put, their DRM does not support Linux.

So, your mileage may vary. I can speak highly of all three companies. You can actually put your own Windscribe account together with a few areas of the globe for a few dollars per month. That's what I did. I need an endpoint in the EU/UK region, the USA, and Canada. So, that's what I've chosen.

All three provide browser extensions that work fine. They all have a desktop application that lets you set it up so that all traffic is routed through the VPN. At the end of the day, their privacy policies are pretty much the same.

If you find the one you like most, just use something else in the interim and wait for them to have a sale on their (multi-)year payment plan. For example, when I used NordVPN, it was a sale where I could get three years of service for what amounted to be $24 per year.

 

[deb_user]

I use Proton VPN. It comes with my subscription. I use the browser extension because it's quick and easy. I also use RiseUp VPN, but RiseUp membership requires an invitation. It's free, although the do request donations, and I donate. It's not well known, but RiseUp has been into security and privacy from its inception years ago. I don't use any VPN all that often, but occasionally it's useful.

 

[Fymgee]

TBH, until the UK's OSA (Online Safety Act) came into force last year, I never needed anything like a VPN. The OSA is supposed to make everything safer for children, so a whole list of sites have been assembled where, if adults want to access them, they have to prove they're over 18.

Most of the sites that have been targeted have basically said "F*ck you" to the UK, since it would involve a shed-load of expense on their part to continue operating over here.....so most of 'em have pulled out.

Unfortunately, the "net" has been cast wider than intended, and a whole bunch of perfectly innocent smaller sites have been dragged into the firing line & gotten tarred with the same brush......including a few I've belonged to myself for many years. For these, I find that the Opera browser's built-in "VPN" works for what I want it to do.....though in all honesty, it's not REALLY a VPN as such; more of a re-direct mechanism. But it does what's required.

VPN users are also gradually being identified & targeted, by the state. The gov't want to see VPNs outlawed & banned.

On top of all this, the UK gov't really want everyone to start using a compulsory digital ID for everything.....and the human rights lobby over here are having a field day with this one ATM. Given half a chance, Keir Starmer's crowd would like to turn the UK into a police state.....and nobody over here feels the least bit inclined to cooperate.

Our web access is beginning to shrink. The "powers-that-be" have decided they know what's best for us. Sh*t happens.

(shrug...)


Mike.

Protecting the internet isn't an easy task, there's always gonna be people doing whatever they want (which they technically can for good or for bad) and I think that just letting know the people know about net safety is the best they can do. It's like the rights for walking or driving on the streets not all people will respect or care about the safety of everyone else and in some cases, they won't care for their own safety either.

 

[Fymgee]

How were they expecting sites to do this?

As for VPNs, I've used PIA, NordVPN, and now I'm using Windscribe. (I think I still have time remaining on my NordVPN account.) I didn't have a great reason to switch to Windscribe, but it was less friction, and it has all the features/privacy I'm after.

Of those, they all have one thing in common that really matters to me. They have all been audited by an independent third party.

They all essentially offer the same services. In all three cases, their privacy policies could be interchangeable with just a few words changed. They're all three fit for purpose.

In my case, while I do have the application installed, I largely only use the VPN as a browser extension. That's really my area of concern, and the VPN is to watch things not reasonably available in my location. For example, I like to watch IMSA races. They're geolocked (TV contracts) and available on Peacock. However, Peacock does not work on Linux, regardless of your browser choice. Simply put, their DRM does not support Linux.

So, your mileage may vary. I can speak highly of all three companies. You can actually put your own Windscribe account together with a few areas of the globe for a few dollars per month. That's what I did. I need an endpoint in the EU/UK region, the USA, and Canada. So, that's what I've chosen.

All three provide browser extensions that work fine. They all have a desktop application that lets you set it up so that all traffic is routed through the VPN. At the end of the day, their privacy policies are pretty much the same.

If you find the one you like most, just use something else in the interim and wait for them to have a sale on their (multi-)year payment plan. For example, when I used NordVPN, it was a sale where I could get three years of service for what amounted to be $24 per year.

their DRM does not support Linux!?

Now that's just anti-user practice right there! What does linux has to do with all this!? it's just a web browser for Tux sake!

 

[KGIII]

What does linux has to do with all this!?

We're a tiny percentage of their potential userbase. We also don't want things like DRM built into the kernel. So, from their point of view, it's pointless to support Linux. Due to the material they publish and the contracts they're under, they must use DRM.

 

[MikeWalsh]

@KGIII :-

Does seem strange to me, though. The rest of the world has standardised around Google's Widevine (for good or bad, depending on your point of view, of course!) Why would this ONE company decide to go out on a limb & choose a form of DRM that nobody else supports?

I have no idea what M$ are doing these days. I know they dropped Silverlight years ago.....and current, Chromium-based Edge uses Widevine (natch). Do I take it, then, that Peacock has to be accessed via an app that ONLY runs on Windows..?

(sheesh.......shakes head in amazement)


Mike.

 

[MikeWalsh]

Huh. I see...

It's not just a Peacock thing with Widevine, seems it's a Linux "thing", full-stop. Peacock uses the same DRM as everybody else.....but theirs is turned all the way up to the maximum setting at build-time. Everybody else that will stream on Linux is limited to 720p, 'cos apparently the version of Widevine supplied for Linux users is locked at a lower level when compiled.

So even now, we're STILL being treated like second-class citizens......and "punished" for not knuckling-under & sucking on the corporate teat (like "good" boys & girls are supposed to!).

Jeez. What a bugger... ('scuse my 'French') The corporate world would bleed you dry AND suck out your bone marrow for an encore, given half a chance.....because they are NEVER satisfied.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~​

Still, we should be grateful for small mercies, I guess. At least I CAN get the official streaming services. (I've just switched to Paramount +, after ten years with NetFlix. Fancied a change, and NetFlix's 5-year long run of my favourite Star Trek series has just come to an end. Paramount + has not long started showing them, and they'll be available for at least the next 2-3 years, it seems.....in addition to having some newer Star Trek films & series that NetFlix never showed).

Runs just as well in a Chrome webapp window as NetFlix did, so.....that'll do me!


Mike.

 

[KGIII]

Peacock uses the same DRM as everybody else.....but theirs is turned all the way up to the maximum setting at build-time.

I forgot to reply to this.

Let's see if my memory is correct. The 'story' behind this is actually worse than you make out.

When I looked into Peacock, it was to find a legitimate source to stream content. I tried Peacock out. They even let me create an account, knowing full-well what my headers included and knowing full-well what browser I was using. Well, their software knew this information. It's not like there was a person there pushing buttons behind the scenes.

I then made multiple attempts to stream from Peacock. To that end, I even tried different browsers. Figuring that it was DRM,I even tried spoofing my 'user-agent' to appear as though I was using different browsers.

None of this, of course, worked.

If it had worked, I'd have mentioned that already.

So, I did some searching. These searches were done a few years ago. I've not done any additional research since then. I found and followed a link to a Reddit post in one of the Linux subreddits.

In that thread, the OP had written an email to Peacock's support address, and they had received a reply. I can not quote that reply verbatim, but the reply was essentially this:

"We are not now interested in supporting Linux, and we have no plans to support Linux in the future."

It was that blunt. The email continued by suggesting that people use something Peacock supports.

In short, Peacock pretty much gave them the middle finger. The quote probably isn't 100% accurate, but it's close to it. They do not care one iota about supporting Linux.

I don't know what sort of infrastructure Peacock uses, but I would expect that the servers they're using run Linux.

 

[SEAPOPSICLE]

I love the engagement on this thread

Literally went from which vpn I should try to full blown internat discussion...

 

[Brickwizard]

I love the engagement on this thread

Literally went from which vpn I should try to full blown internat discussion...

Nature of the Linux beast I'm afraid, sit 20 experienced users around a table give them a problem, and you will probably get 20 different answers.

 

[Fymgee]

I don't know what sort of infrastructure Peacock uses, but I would expect that the servers they're using run Linux.

how Ironic, isn't it? :/

shame on them

 

[KGIII]

how Ironic, isn't it? :/

shame on them

If it is the case, then that'd be pretty crappy of them.

 

[celtic945]

I use IPVanish because it handles a ton of throughput for games and downloads but the downside is that it falls in the US/EU laws. I think Proton is a solid choice. When my subscription is up, I am going with Proton. A VPN is totally worth it because it masks your real IP so no one can see what you are doing or trace your DNS queries. In theory, authorities can get subpoena and try and pull your records but if the VPN service doesn't keep logs, there shouldn't be anything to provide. You should pick a VPN service that is routinely audited by a third party company.

I use a VPN because I have kids and they sometimes download movies and I end up getting letters from my ISP threatening to turn off our internet. You know how hard it is to control kids and what they download on the internet! So I just run everything through the VPN so I don't have to deal with the headaches.

I installed the VPN connection and cert on my firewall so the firewall establishes the VPN connection and by default all my traffic goes through the VPN. VPNs are worth it if you don't want your ISP or others seeing what you are doing.