Xerobank questions ?

I have no clue why XeroBank hasn't taken the wiki offline. It's been dead for about two years, I believe. Someone needs to do some cleanup, IMHO.

 

All kidding aside, what I'm seeking is your real evidence against "clowns like Topletz". Examples of real evidence include, in no particular order: (1) CIA contractor Abraxis bought Anonymizer.com; (2) penet.fi was compromised; (3) they got Jim Bell and Toto; (4) JAP installed a backdoor for LEO; (5) eGold got hosed; and, (6) evil Tor exit nodes can do X, Y or Z. I can document any of that. What I've gotten from you are gossip and insults. So be it.

And just to be clear, public disclosure of vulnerabilities is arguably the only way to assess the reliability of security, privacy and anonymity services. In other words, peer review. Re XeroBank, until you can prove that you've compromised it, and post the evidence for all to see, you're just blowing smoke.

 

LOL!...You are jealous as Hell, aren't you?

 

I did in fact say "I wouldn't trust them." I never specified what I didn't trust about them though. Was it the privacy, anonymity, or the security of Xerobank's product (Torrify/XB Browser) AT THE TIME?
Note the posted date/time of the posting: June 5th, 2007, 01:23 PM

When I said that, I was referring to the security of Torrify/XB Browser. What wasn't know to the rest of the world was the exploit that was being explored at that time. It later became more obvious as the security problem was addressed.

http://archives.seul.org/or/talk/Aug-2007/msg00034.html (Date: Sat, 4 Aug 2007 14:23:12 -0400)
Notice the dates....2 months apart.

For the record, Xerobank was vulnerable at that point in time...just as everyone else who was using Tor for web browsing. Every browser on every OS (except those who used JanusVM) was affected, not just Torrify/XB Browser.

More logical, really? Why spend hours fighting with one or two people in a forum when I could be working on ways of securing "several hundred thousand people" (from Roger's post) who may or may not be vulnerable to the unknown exploits of tomorrow?

Do yourself and the rest of us a favor, make sure you known the whole story before you try and twist the truth by turning a vague comment into something it's not. The fact is; that short comment about Torrify/XB Browser was eluding to something much, much bigger at the time and you have taken it way out of context because you don't know the whole story. If you call me out again to "a firefight", don't expect a dialog to follow.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have work to do.

 

Translation: I won't answer any tough questions.

Translation: I want everyone to think I'm too important to deal with you.

It is exactly this kind of arrogance and cockiness I got tired of from Xerobank. Notice Kyle didn't take the trouble to clue anyone in or try to answer all the many questions regarding XB. It glaringly stood out to me. And notice what pushed his buttons in order to post?

 

You're jealous of Kyle too?

 

It's not jealousy, caspian. I suspect that it's bad blood from the 2008-era split between Steve et alia and the Tor community. Check out Usenet if you're interested (and very patient).

 

Okay thanks for explaining that. It's hard to tell where some of the criticism is coming from sometimes.

 

Indeed. And, FWIW, I should have stressed "suspect" more. All I'm relying on for that guess is the observation that PooseyII seems to like Tor.

In any case, whatever the nature of his problem with them, it goes back for years -- "Been that way for years with these guys".

 

Hang on a second. He was writing that question to me and I feel I must defend myself. I'm not jealous of anyone at all. If you look at my prior posts, feel free to search them, I was a staunch defender of Steve and Xerobank for a couple of years. I was a user and recommended them here. So, my current problems with XB have nothing - at all - to do with some old argument with Steve and TOR. Zilch.

 

OK, I take that back. I didn't notice that caspian was directing that comment at you, and assumed that it was PooseyII I totally get your issues with xB.

 

So Xb's forums are still offline.
..And Steve said he was going back to enjoy his "day off" about three weeks ago. I'm resigning to the fact that they just don't care about customers anymore.

 

It works just fine -- faster and more stable than ever. Who needs a support forum Well, OK, I admit that I'd feel differently if I needed support And hey, I'd probably ask here.

 

No negativity here, we're soon on to bigger and better things

 

Could someone tell me what protocol Xerobank uses? I know Steve has talked about this time, and time again when explaining its better than the rest for anonymy because you do not leak DNS if your system is configured correctly. Protocol as in SSL, L2TP, PPTP, IPSec, etc..

 

Actually Lockbox I need to apologize to you. I thought that I was responding to a Poosey post. I have never been under the impression that you were a competitor. Sorry.

 

I'd be happy to offer suggestions. However, it'd be helpful to know what machines you'll be using, what app/OS combinations you want to run, and which identities need each.

For example, I'm currently using a modest quad-core server with 8 GB RAM, running Ubuntu Lucid x64 Server + GNOME desktop. It's running Oracle VM VirtualBox, with a few VMs running. I'm typing this in a VM running Ubuntu Lucid x86 Desktop, and connected via a VPN using one of my XeroBank accounts, with all non-VPN traffic blocked. Everything that I do as Hierophant occurs on this VM, and nothing else.

Another VM is dedicated to non-anonymous email (no VPN). There are other VMs, each dedicated to a particular online identify/activity, and each connected via an appropriate VPN. Although there are additional physical servers, the details aren't relevant here.

 

Basically, XeroBank uses OpenVPN for client connections to its virtual network. Regarding the virtual network, what I know is what anyone can see -- there are entry/exit nodes in Texas, Illinois, Canada and the Netherlands. I have no actual evidence how they're connected, what other components there are, or how it all works.

Based on XeroBank's statements, I understand that OpenVPN establishes encrypted channels between clients' machines and XeroBank exit nodes. I also understand that, within the XeroBank network, each client's encrypted VPN traffic is multiplexed with other traffic, and re-encrypted. There's also exit node crowding. FWIW, I typically let XeroBank choose the optimal combination of entry and exit nodes.

Regarding the OpenVPN connection, the best strategy would be to study the connection scripts and logs. That's not on my plate today.

And BTW, what prevents DNS leaks if the VPN drops isn't part of XeroBank, per se. It's the IP routing rules that one can set. See the last two documents at https://xerobank.com/support/articles/. Those approaches would work for any VPN, I believe.

 

What is "really low-end laptop" for you? What OS do you want/need to run on the host? And on the VM(s)? In my experience, Ubuntu/VirtualBox/Ubuntu is quite snappy, even on minimal hardware.

One can run ttylinux in as little as 32 MB.

Yes, you want usenet via the VPN, but don't want to run the client in a VM, because it's a memory hog. As I recall. Could you run the usenet client in a VM, and force it to use virtual memory? That might be too sluggish, I guess.

Another idea - create a virtual network, and two VMs. Use one VM for just the VPN. Use the other VM for all of your apps. Configure the prerouting chain in its mangle table to route the usenet client (and whatever) via the VPN VM, and everything else via the host NIC. With VirtualBox, there's a rich command-line syntax via VBoxManage.

 

I realise this is slightly off-topic (but still pertains to the subject): Does anyone know what caused this dramatic spike in 2008?
http://postimage.org/image/b9w849wk/

 

XeroBank was promoting its then-new version, I believe. See mid-2008 discussion on Wilders.

 

I see Steve posted on wilders recently defending xerobank being detected as malware . Nice to see he has lots of time on his hands despite the support forum still out of action

On august the 19th, i was told the forum conversion was already complete and " just hasn't been exported and released into the CMS" Now i'm no expert but would this take more that 50 days to do Or maybe the NSA just needed more time

 

Is anyone having problems with losing connection with the Xerobank Network? I have been the last few days. The little green tap interface on the toolbar turns orange, and says connecting. I've rarely ever had this happen in the past, but now it seems to be happening often. Like once every hour or 2. This is happening on US to Canada, US to Netherlands, and US to France.

 

I haven't noticed that.

 

I have been. Big time.