so, just wondering - why are y'all using a VPN when connecting to eccie and/or oh2?
it's not like you are sending/receiving financial acct info or personally identifiable information.
Originally Posted by pmdelites
I’ll take a stab at answering this:
If you don’t use VPN, you are sending Personally Identifiable Information (PII) to these sites. IP address is PII. It is tied to your computer or phone and can be traced back to you. You are also telling your ISP (Internet Service Provider) that you are visiting these sites if you don’t use a VPN. Not that you can’t trust sites like ECCIE or OH2, but they might be compelled by the govt. someday to turn over their IP address logs, in which case they have to comply.
Using VPN alone cannot protect you since the VPN providers can also be compelled to turn over their logs in which case they have to comply too. Not that anyone would be super interested in our logs—unless there is a serious crime worth spending that much effort and money (on part of the govt.). Since all of us here are law abiding citizens who only partake in the hobby by exchanging our money for a providers time (and not the sex which might happen
—that too only in our fantasies/dreams), we have nothing to worry about (LOL); nevertheless, it’s always better to protect our privacy.
One solution to even be more safe and private is to use a “Double” VPN, where your computer or phone connects to a server outside the “Five Eyes” (like in a country like Switzerland), and that server in turn connects to a server in the US, which finally connects to these sites (ECCIE/OH2). It’s pretty hard then for the govt. to get your true IP unless they go to a court in Switzerland to get a subpoena to get your IP. Law abiding citizens like us have no reason to fear that they will go through all that trouble to get our true IP (and hence our identity). Double VPN is also called Secure Core by VPN companies like Proton VPN.
Remember, we are not committing any crimes nor do we intend to; we are just trying to protect our privacy, that’s why we use a VPN. At least that’s the way to approach this.
PS: excuse my typos or any grammatical errors. Typing this on a small screen.