Divide and conquer policy for privacy.

Divide and conquer policy for privacy --> VPNs from Russia/China?

Here is an idea. We know that Russia does not coorporate with NSA and the US gov't since edward snowden is a free man. Would it be wise for US citizens to seek email hosts and VPN providers in Russia? Sure KGB will know everything about you but I highly doubt that they would give up any of that information to the NSA.

UPDATE Please as much as you can withhold from political discussion. Just provide details on services in China/Russia

 

Everytime I try to keep up with privacy related discussions I find myself in a bewilderment. Why do you think the Russian government to be better than the U.S. government in terms of privacy rights just because of Mr. Snowden?

 

I have no desire to be spied upon neither by US nor by Russia... Just saying...

 

Simple. Russian govt is better for US citizens and US govt for Russian citizens since they wont really talk to each other (ie Snowden case).

 

I would rather pick a "low profile" country's services than Russia or US.
Maybe south American ones, India, etc.

 

It's politics, you can't just simplify it like that. Nebulus and dogbite already answered it nicely.

 

There is that general vibe its best to pick a country that would be less helpful.

Russia I guess sounds a good idea, looking at stats of users via my VPN provider I can see most are connected to Sweden and Netherlands servers. Course this does not mean they would not help US or UK or other English speaking authorities.

And it all depends on your trust level with the VPN provider, are they really committed ?

Take one look at the 3 bad VPN providers that have worked or conducted investigations ie, proxy.sh, earthvpn (data center), hidemyass.

No one wants to be snooped or ratted out on, so for these 3 companies then to delcare we have privacy as the main agenda of their companies

 

You're asking the wrong question. Start with the assumption that both have equal abilities to access and decrypt your data, monitor your personal info, and track your movements. The question to ask is which is more likely to use that info against you?

In world affairs, there's a common theme in how the major powers operate. It applies to nations, groups within nations, and individuals, and can be summed up with one simple statement.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend.
Make your decisions accordingly.

 

Uhm... both?

Unless the enemy of your enemy is actually your enemy but pretend to be a non-enemy, yet still silently being your enemy without you knowing it as your real enemy, in which your initial enemy is probably your friend. Or maybe both are your enemies but you just don't realize that because all of us have too many enemies since we have our own goals, which will make anyone to be enemies to each other.

 

Someone would need to be very interesting for Russia and the US, for example, to cooperate. If you're running botnets etc, cooperation is not unlikely. For China and the US, there's clearly less chance of cooperation. Some of the most bulletproof hosting operates out of China. And if you're in the US, neither Russia or China can do much to you. Do you think that they'd reveal their surveillance capabilities, or put their covert agents at risk, just to attack some VPN user?

For most of us who aren't operating botnets etc, crossing political spheres of influence is probably good enough. That's especially so if your trail includes multiple such crossings. And if you add Tor to the mix, and don't get pwned by some exploit, you're very likely safe.

 

For now I guess we can play the border hopping game, but eventually you'll find it's all joined at the top anyway and one day (soon) the borders will be gone for real. You're already being conditioned to accept this by terms introduced into everyday language such as "global village, "one world" etc

But...yup make hay while the sun shines.

 

Man, you're more paranoid than I am, and that's saying a lot !!!

[Only kidding ]

 

I doubt there will be anytime soon that Russia/China/USA will become one. These 3 powers are competing with each other for finite resources. Which for privacy means we are going to be winners.

 

I realize "soon" is subjective, but that their will be a one world govt. with a one world leader, is not.

All the wars and rumours of wars and other turmoils are nothing but manufactured scenarios to bring this about.

 

ughhh no politics please. privacy only related stuff.

 

The point of this post is to discuss how to exploit that Russia/China/USA are potentially unwilling to share intelligence.

 

Well, I've used insorg.org's VPN service <-http://www.safe-inet.com/->. They're fairly expensive (190 USD per year) but they accept Bitcoins, offer even three-hop VPN routes, and have servers in 18 countries, including China. And they have good tech support

I don't know good VPN services in China. That may be a contradiction in terms But I have seen recommendations of good VPN services for getting out of China.

Also, I wonder how cooperative China and Russia are these days. Nested routes like "Sweden > Russia > China > Malta" or vice versa might be hard to compromise.

 

Yandex offers a portfolio of excellent services, for example these:

https://mail.yandex.com/

https://disk.yandex.com/

https://maps.yandex.com/

 

Yup Yandex is pretty good. I already have an account at Runbox but I may use this russian email for all other less private communications. Although their maps are not as good.

 

On Yandex and the NSA...

"If you are a reporter, whistleblower, or ever speak to foreigners, they [NSA] probably care. If I were an American investigative reporter, whistleblower, or worried about conversations with foreigners, I’d use Yandex exclusively, probably via the Tor network. Unlike Google, Yandex is guaranteed NSA-free, as it is based in Russia. It is not completely NSA-proof, as they doubtless have other tricks, but at least our spooks are not sitting on the servers."
-- http://takimag.com/article/hiding_in_plain_sight_scott_locklin/print

If I were to guess, I’d say Yandex is probably in bed with the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), not the NSA. In the modern world, I prefer being indexed by the FSB to the NSA. The FSB is a much smaller threat to American civil rights than our own spooks, sadly.

 

Here's a peep inside Yandex's St. Petersburg office, FWIW:

http://www.dezeen.com/2012/09/03/yandex-saint-petersburg-office-ii-by-za-bor-architects/

Not sure where people "work" in these kinds of "spaces"... Probably just for show and tell?

 

It depends on where you are. In the US, for example, FSB is probably less of a threat than NSA. If you're in Russia, FSB is clearly the greater threat. If you're in Syria, both probably are, but Syria's FSB clone is most threatening.