The general consensus seems to be that telcos are not required to keep records of IPs you visit, but that they will anyway since they have it and excluding that info from retention would be more trouble than not excluding it.
After reading that article on Telstra getting an 18 month extension, I doubt anything will come of this. Itāll slowly and quietly be wound back much like the hair brained idea of that spams and scams bloke
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I was poking about this morning, and had a look at NordVPN which a friend of mine has been using for a couple of years. It seems to be on special at the moment, might be worth trying it out. The issue of possible slowdowns always gets me.
What are the google IP addresses? Might be worth going with that whilst making a decision.
You mean Googleās DNS servers? 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4
Iām having a good experience with Getflix. I use it anyway to get US streaming services via its DNS, but it also offers full VPN. I tried it a few weeks ago to buy a Steam game in Russia, and again yesterday to try a full browser session using a US server and both were great.
A little OT.
What are the key differences (speed, security) between using
- a VPN
- Tor
@ bennyling, yes thats what I meant, but in the end I jumped on a year of NordVPN.
I was going to get Getflix but there was something in their explanation of the way their VPN works that made me think it was a glorified smartDNS and not much better than smartDNS only.
This is the article which explains it:
https://getflix.zendesk.com/hc/en-gb/articles/203743254
I remember coming across a new VPN service, and for the life of me I cannot find the website. It was someone who basically took Docker + DigitalOcean and made a service where by they could provide multiple vpn end points per Digital Ocean vps. Was so professional and good price too. If I find the URL will share.
In the meantime, you could seriously setup your own for $5 a month using DigitalOcean $5 plan, and install a VPN server on it. As detailed here.
EDIT: I found the website I was looking for. Check out backroad.io might be worth using the demo to see what its like.
Thatās a different service from them, @kyte. Check this article out instead: https://getflix.zendesk.com/hc/en-gb/articles/204475964-Full-VPN-Introduction
Iāve got a Digital Ocean referral code too 
Oh bugger. I would have preferred Getflix, and all, and got it cheaper as well. I wonder if Nord will give me a refund.
Anyone have experience setting one of these up, and using it? I already have a couple DO VPS servers, and might look into it.
I canāt imagine it would be difficult to do if your already great with Linux.
FWIW, I use VPN Unlimited, mainly because
- Itās pretty cheap
- There are many, many different exit points (with different performance in many cases)
- There are apps for both OS X and iOS, so all my Apple devices can have VPNs
I mainly use it when Iām travelling and using any free wi fi, or dodgy hotel stuff, just to add a level of security via encryption
I have been using Witopia for several years.
Have found it good, maybe not the cheapest, but always works well.
Used it recently for the upgrade to El Capitan when there were widespread download problems.
Iām currently using ExpressVPN which works well and is very easy to set up. Unfortunately it doesnāt play nice with my Usenet setup. I think itās because I use Internode and the VPN doesnāt allow Internode to verify Iām with them.
Does anyone know how to get around this issue, or will I just need to find/pay for a new host server?
Pretty sure Astraweb whitelists Node users on the basis of IP range, so using any VPN will break that. The only fixes would be to funnel Usenet usage outside the VPN (not even sure thatās possible) or to get a paid Usenet service that doesnāt care what IP youāre coming from.
I download almost exclusively through Usenet so bypassing the VPN would defeat its purpose in my case. I already use Unblock US for DNS - Iām wondering if I even need a VPN?
Rule 1 of usenetā¦