Anyone tried XeroBank (formerly Torrify)

Update: Sign-up server is back up.

 

I have a question: I am going to use the xerobank service but I was wondering: what would happend if I would use another VPN service over xerobank? Like relakks AND xerobank togheter?
What would be the routes? Would it create a double layer of security or not?
How would it work exactly?
Thanks

 

This is a very bad idea. Relakks and others like FindNot leak your DNS requests, so anyone monitoring them will know what you are doing. You risk a lot and don't get much additional anonymity. Furthermore, Relakks and most other VPNs are going to be a lot slower, and adding more hops, slowing down your browsing experience. Additionally, it doesn't enhance your security to trust your traffic to two VPNs, it lowers it. Bad idea all around. Use one or the other but not both.

 

Signed up for a Plus membership last night, haven't gotten the xB Browser working yet. I've tried the version available in the member profile which is 2.0.0.6 I believe and I've tried 2.0.0.10a. Neither version works and with both I find the following in the xBBrowser_Client.log:

Is there a trick to it or what? Any help is appreciated, I'm eager to start using this product

 

When I first signed up to try XeroBank Pro, I had an Iphantom hooked up. I did not know much about these kinds of services so I didn't really even give it much thought. But once I tried XB Pro for a while, I unhooked the IPhantom. But I did hook it back up for a while when I had some problems with XB fast kicking me off. Reliable seems to be doing okay now though.

Iphantom plus XB pro is slow but I don't see how it could hurt. Everything has to go through that IPhantom box first. It conceals DNS requests if you have it set to do so. So I would imagine that my ISP only sees encrypted data going to IPhantom, and IPhantom only sees encrypted data going to XeroBank.

I did some experiments with those links that expose a true IP when using tor. I tried it over top of XB and on top of Iphantom. While connected to tor in Firefox with the vidalia bundle (scripts allowed), the link bypassed tor but showed only XB or IPhantom as my true IP. It never showed my actual true IP. So if they both can handle flash and java and conceal DNS requests, I would think that it would be okay.

However, it is too slow. I tried a comparison with Iphantom and XeroBank for downloading rapidshare links. IPhantom seems to be capped as to how fast it can go. But when I tried XeroBank fast, I was shocked. I recently upgraded my internet connection to an advertised 20MB connection. I use Free Download Manager, so the rapidshare links are fast anyway because it breaks them in to sections. But rapidshare is what I prefer to use so that is what I tested. I don't really understand all of these P2P services yet, and I am not sure that I fell comfortable with that.

But anyway, XeroBank fast was not really that much slower than my bare internet connection. I don't really understand these speeds though. They advertise 20MB, but it never says that when I download. Without using anything, the fastest speed was showing close to 3,000 kb/s. XeroBank's fastest speed was close to 2,000 kb/s. Iphantom varied around 250 kb/s. I was astonished at how fast xerobank fast was able to download. Woo Hoo! I sometimes unhook everythig just to get faster downloads....(I know...I know,,,, that's a Cardinal Sin....but I am trying to do better), but it seems that my connection through XeroBank responded to my fatser ISP connection. I did not expect that.

 

Hey Steve

Is a new xB Machine still on its way?

Any release date planned already?

I'm of course overly excited, he he

Thor

 

I purchased the xerobank plus service yesterday. I am getting the message that the proxy servers are not accepting connections and that I should contact my network administrator. I logged in to xerobank's website and there is not way to contact tech support as all of the links are either dead or redirect to the home page. Anyone have any suggestions? I just gave them $96....I surely want this to work. Thanks in advance.

 

We've got a couple guys working on the new xB Machine. I demanded some beautification of it, and had some crazy ideas. The upshot is this may go from a simple VM project to a full bootable LiveCD. The unpacked version, I understand, is around 4,400 MB, but compiles to 320MB. So I expect the image to grow to around 9,000 MB by the time we are done so it fits on a full CD.

 

We don't do tech support in this thread. You'll have to use the mail form if you can't contact support, or email me offlist. I've forwarded your note about the links not working, and I logged in and saw something strange going on with the menu system so that has been forwarded.

 

Oh oh, no no, we want VM! It's great to fire up a new OS inside of our WinXP that we do most of our computer things. Me and many others are not ready to move to Linux. With a bootCD I would have to close my XP down, boot linux, do secure communication, close down, boot up xp, work, close down boot up linux for communication, no no, impossible...

 

The issue, as I understand it, is that the VM can't run some of the beautification programs securely under Xen, and it may require direct hardware access to video cards. We're still kicking around the ideas.

 

Don't get me wrong Steve, but as a user who was beginning with your Torrify stuff I am still waiting for the E-Mail program you had promised to be released "within days" somewhen before christmas over a year ago!

Hope the "new XeroBank" will not consume such an amount of time and especially the new machine will see the light of day asap...

Are you still planning to release an all-in-one solution being a VM as well as a bootable system as well as a runnable execetuble (as once stated in Torrify times)? That should be the way to go imho, as it can be made like in this distro:

http://www.erikveen.dds.nl/qemupuppy/

 

Zikarus,

Ah, the fond days of Torbird. Well, I released a beta of Torbird awhile ago, and then recently i released a barebones of xB Mail. We still have to lock down the configuration though. A few thousand mozilla settings to pour over, alas. The reason xB Mail hasn't *yet* been released is because... the Tor network just doesn't allow SMTP exit except from two nodes. So it would be useless for the tor user, I think. It would have to be tailored to the XeroBank user. So here is what we are combatting: we want to distributed the credentials, but not in plaintext or base64 for storage. That would be horrible. This isn't like the browser, where you don't get into someone's info with just the browser credentials. If someone captured your mail program, they could read it. So we've been sniffing at a way to say force Master Password, but make the user generate a new token... it is difficult to say the least. A tricky proposition.

So xB Mail, the program is technically ready, we just want it figured out right for immediate distribution, getting it right the first time instead of generations of evolution like torpark went through. I have a hundred emails a week from people still using torpark, can you imagine that with torbird? no thanks, i'll make sure we do it right. And yes, it is a side project to have finished since we're all being whipped working on XeroBank 2.0. Good god it is nearly done, I'm informed.

Steve

 

Ticket system is back up after switching its domain base.

 

Upgrades going on with the client server. Demos are now no longer offered from the website, but are offered directly from the software when you download it. VPN management upgrades coming. Moving the whole network to TCP. Waiting for firefox 2.0.0.12 so we can release the next xB Browser.

 

xB Mail in heavy development. New function scheduled for xB Browser to remove torcircuitstatus.exe and internalize the code into xB Browser. New keytest software developed for helping users debug connection problems. Mail server deployment images ready. Changing official promotion of mail servers to TLS on port 25.

 

I also just purchased the service and my cc acct. was debited the $96, however, my account on XB has not been activated and there is no way to contact tech support through the website. What's the deal?

 

Joe,

Are you having some difficulty locating or reaching support links? Login using your credentials at https://login.xerobank.com to open a support ticket. If your account is unable to send support tickets for some reason, you can submit one through the website as well at the support page.

 

local proxy authentication in xB Browser for xB Plus has been added.

 

'Bad Transaction ID' installer bug located. Caused by inetc returning "0D 0D 20" preceeding transaction ID. To be fixed by 2.0.0.12a.

 

The difficulty that I'm having is that despite my credit card having been debited for the $96 several days ago, when I log in to the Xerobank site my user account is still listed as inactive, with the payment as "pending".

If I use the drop-down navigation to browse to "Contact-Clients" I get a 404 page not found error. And clicking on "Support Ticket" in the main navigation bar just brings me back to the user home page https://client.xerobank.com/user_home.php.

 

I had that problem once and it was Dalpay just taking longer to verify I guess. A guy from Dalpay actually called me when I first ordered. It kinda gave me the creeps. It was like he was trying to make sure that he believed me or something. Never had any problems since though. My bank contacted me this last renewal though and she was acting really concerned about it and wanted to make sure that I ordered something. I am not sure why.

 

As you may be wondering why you aren't hearing back, it is because we took care of both of those issues, Joe included.

I'm always interested to hear how things go with billings and how local banks react. Especially American banks.

So this crazy thing just happened. I loaded up xB Browser 2.0.0.10... The version you guys have is like living in the dark ages. This internal version we're working on... the experience is extremely different.

Can't wait to release it.

 

Wow that sounds great. Can't wait to try it.

I am going to be buying a Plus account for a couple of friends. I was wondering if they decide that they want to upgrade to a Pro account, can they do that by just paying more later (making up the difference)? I know that is probably not possible but I thought I would ask anyway.

 

In a few weeks it won't matter. The benefit of Pro is that you get VPN and more email space. All legacy accounts will be upgraded, and Plus accounts will have access to VPN software after they do the upgrade process, and Pro accounts will be able to use their transaction ID to load up SSH connections into xB Browser. Both accounts will get bandwidth upgrades, Pro accounts will get larger upgrades.