General Rules of Anonymity

MistaMiyagi · Dream Team

Bees,

Be smart. Protect your identity and your files, especially if you are using an always-on broadband such as cable, DSL, or school network.

Always keep your OS updated
Always run an antivirus program.
Always run an antispyware program.
Always run a software - or better yet, hardware - firewall.

If you want secure communications, use PGP.
If you don't want to be tracked, use an anonymous remailer.

If you want to truly avoid problems, shy away from instant messengers and peer-to-peer (P2P) filesharing or use a P2P client that is known to not contain spyware.

Micro$oft updates --
Windows Update - http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com

Free antivirus programs --
Downloadable avast! Antivirus http://www.avast.com
Online virus scan - http://housecall.trendmicro.com/

Free firewall program --
ZoneAlarm - http://www.zonelabs.com/store/content/company/products/znalm/freeDownload.jsp?lid=zaskulist_download

Windows XP SP2 is not enough alone! You have been warned...

Guest · Sat Feb 12, 2005 6:56 am

Yes, I dream with a 1.5mb connection, and I have all those things installed,
God, but if I go on without protection,
I get 30 virii per session,

I use A good antivirus/firewall, and anonyminity proggy, Jap,

It protects me well,

syn

jackoozzi · specialist

You have to have them i use
Adware for spyware
Avg for virus
Outpost for firewall
And i used to use Anonymizer till i found out the hard way that the people i most wanted to avoid just intercepted everything at your isp and it was of no help at all

mind · Sat Feb 12, 2005 9:15 am

squidippy · Mon Feb 21, 2005 1:33 am

Well look at it like this, if they really really want you they've got "green lantern" or whatever they hell it's called. Fortunatly the people that have it CIA, FBI, ect, only hunt really, really big fish. And S/D is guppy, completely by design.
But anti-virus, anti spyware, is a must to maintain your computers integrity and potential.

nubee · Master Archiver

its called "magic lanter"

http://www.msnbc.com/news/660096.asp?0na=x21017M32&cp1=1

weedar · Mon Feb 21, 2005 5:07 pm

Of course a truly paranoid person would boot from a CD-ROM that either
ran the OS off the disc or re-installed it on the hard-drive every time (like
some Internet Cafes do) - that way they would not bee able install the
keylogging software. A good example that comes to mind is booting from a
Knoppix (llinux) disc.

malatesta · Tue Feb 22, 2005 2:00 am

..its an OS that runs on a usb stick drive, flashcard and even from an ipod apparently, bypassing the host machines OS just like knoppix.

http://www.metropipe.net/ProductsPVPM.shtml

From what I'm told (I have never used it) it requires a pretty up to date CPU to run this at a reasonable speed.

Guest · Wed Feb 23, 2005 8:07 am

here are some links i found elsewhere:

MargaretThatcher · Fri Mar 04, 2005 6:41 am

The above metropipe virtual machine works but is pretty slow. It uses the QEMU virtual machine to run a cut down version of Linux. It will run on Windows and Linux and seems to do a good job of automating to connection to the host's network - i.e. run it, and it just works.

QEMU has just released an accelerator module for the virtual machine so it runs at almost native speed, but this needs to be installed on the host, making the thing less portable.

The other problem I can see is the host operating system paging virtual machine memory to disk, leaving traces.

If they can solve the speed and paging issues, this would be an excellent tool.

nubee · Master Archiver

i found bootable livecd's the best, as there may be issues with embedded linux (within windows) still beingable to be keyloggeed by something runnning in windows...?

Guest · Mon Mar 07, 2005 3:57 am

If you grab a anonymous proxie, and turn off java, and still do a whois on yourself, showing that your ip is cloaked, then be careful,
Because your still not safe,
You must completely remove Java, which may mean, changing browsers, to something say like firefox,
Because of a security lookphole in Java, Your identity can easily be given away, even though you are completey anonymous, on a who-is find,

Here's an example:
http://www.stayinvisible.com/images/scheme.gif

syn

karmapolice · Wed Mar 09, 2005 3:33 pm

Anti-Spyware (beta) from Microsoft
Free , work very well .
http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx

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Antivir Personal Edition
Free, Daily Ref update, free support , and don't eat all your memory.
http://www.free-av.com/

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FireFox
The BEST browser on the earth ! , very customizable , fast . ultra secure , RSS enable , anti-popup/mad active-x integrate.
http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/

links to many security's and Privacy's extensions (addons) for FireFox
https://addons.update.mozilla.org/extensions/showlist.php?application=firefox&version=1.0&os=Linux&numpg=10&category=Privacy%20and%20Security

brixtonj · Tue Mar 29, 2005 9:09 pm

MargaretThatcher · Wed Mar 30, 2005 6:43 am

Why do you trust the people in Anonymizer?

You should never trust anyone by choice, trust is what you have to do when you have no choice. For example, I don't trust my friend - I don't need to. I've known him for years. I now how he behaves. I let him in my house whenever he wants and I have a pretty good idea that he is reliable and won't steal anything. I know him and therefore I don't need to trust him. I know my girlfriend well and don't trust her - I don't need to, I know her and think it is unlikely that she would cheat on me. Trust is what you do when you can't quantify the chance of the other party cheating on you and have no security to guarantee their behaviour. Never trust anyone if you have the choice: to do so is foolish.

If you use Anonymizer, this is exactly what you have to do. Who runs them or does anyone else have a tap into their servers? You don't know. Is there anything to stop them doing this? No. The situation is the same with all commercial anonymizing services. JAP was compromised and were decent enough to let on. The others may not be.

You say we should trust them. Why?

If you want an anonymizing proxy, use TOR. The source code is open and the setup makes it very difficult to snoop.