Ask SN: How to be more private on the Internet? How to do 2nd Identities?
921 sats \ 19 comments \ @x 14 Sep 2022 bitcoin
Hey fellow Bitcoiners, is there a guide, on how to achieve more privacy on the internet? How to setup a second identity or use a pseudonym correctly?
I try to be as private as possible on the internet, but I think I can still improve some things.
I would appreciate some ideas and experiences.
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887 sats \ 8 replies \ @WaraiOtoko 14 Sep 2022
A resource that I found useful would be Privacy tools and if you have the technical skills self hosting apps is powerful. A good thing to get started with is obviously a bitcoin node :-) a good second would be something like a private Nextcloud on a VPS so you don't have to rely on Google/Apple cloud.
My experience so far has been that there is not a singular thing you can turn on for privacy. It's more of an awareness of how we are exploited and mass surveilled by big tech/government in a digital society. There are always things to improve for anyone that cares about privacy, and many things come down to trade offs.
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444 sats \ 1 reply \ @spookydub 14 Sep 2022
For anyone interested in learning more about self-hosting privately, this YouTube channel has some great tutorials: https://youtube.com/c/402PaymentRequired
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12 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin 14 Sep 2022
402PaymentRequired is fucking awesome! 100% recommended!
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21 sats \ 0 replies \ @deleted231216 14 Sep 2022
deleted by author
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10 sats \ 0 replies \ @tenuous 15 Sep 2022
Great post thank you.
I will add that data is the biggest business on earth so there are not many interests aligned with "privacy", it is a trigger word. By definition you are demonetizing the S&P 500. Better to use victim language in the current climate. The best language is used by the radical left "this is not safe for me because i am in [protected group]". Or play up the victim card even more "i have a stalker" "I am involved in a lot of social justice charity work" etc. And if you don't think that works, look at all the legit criminals still getting away with wearing masks in public, LOL.
There is so much money and effort spent on activism I think we just need to direct a little bit of the messaging toward our own goals.
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0 sats \ 3 replies \ @moneroshill 14 Sep 2022
good advice but a bitcoin node will do nothing for you. It is no real improvement over SPV
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216 sats \ 2 replies \ @Taranis 14 Sep 2022
not leaking your addresses and balances to a strangers node is something
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0 sats \ 1 reply \ @moneroshill 14 Sep 2022
Unless you are very careful to run your node over tor, you are going to leak your address whenever you emit a transaction.
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341 sats \ 0 replies \ @Taranis 14 Sep 2022
most bitcoin node packages are currently tor by default, masking your IP and you also use a VPN to mask TOR use to your ISP
you will leak your transaction's address(es) when transacting, but not all your addresses to obtain your overall wallet balance. using samourai wallet's toolkit can help for transacting privately.
mutinywallet.com looks promising for private lightning network transactions
godspeed
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350 sats \ 0 replies \ @sp 14 Sep 2022
Not a big expert, but normally you don't pretend to be "someone else", you would rather present yourself as member of a company/organization/foundation and get every piece of privy information from it (address, phone lines, accounts and credit cards...). You can play this card once, or you can play it multiple times, "hopping" through organizations that control other organizations, preferably across different jurisdictions.
There was a very good article from Jameson Lopp, you can find it here: https://blog.lopp.net/modest-privacy-protection-proposal/ There's also an interview with Peter McCormack (done almost four years ago) here: https://www.whatbitcoindid.com/podcast/personal-privacy-and-safety-in-the-surveillance-age-with-jameson-lopp
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436 sats \ 0 replies \ @Taranis 14 Sep 2022
this may be of use:
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Online Anonymity https://anonymousplanet.org/
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326 sats \ 0 replies \ @DeezSats 14 Sep 2022
Regarding self hosting I have some personal do's and don'ts.
Do use a nym and lightning when buying domain names. Do use a nym and lightning with your vps provider. Do host services from home using Tor hidden addresses, or through a vps intermediary like tunnelsats.com Don't host services from home using clearnet. Don't assign a registered domain name to your home IP
Do use VPN 100% of the time for your phone and personal computer, recommend mullvad or lnvpn.net Do burn cookies and site data off your browsers regularly except for trusted sites like SN Do use a browser that blocks fingerprinting or returns fake data, DDG does it and brave does, I think. On desktop there are browser extensions for it.
One other thing, this generation of decentralized social media, aka fediverse, has some issues with privacy and encryption is often an afterthought. Hosting a decentralized social media server like mastodon may be less private than having an account on someone else's decentralized social media server. Same goes for self hosted email. Nostr is like next gen decentralized and it fixes at least the social media part.
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360 sats \ 1 reply \ @deleted231216 14 Sep 2022
A great in-depth guide: https://anonymousplanet.org/guide.html#introduction with a Matrix chatroom: https://matrix.to/#/#anonymity:matrix.org
For anonymous accounts, you can use a Whonix Workstation VM on a computer: https://whonix.org This allows you to automatically route all software through Tor without IP leaks. If you run a VPN in Whonix, you will still be fully protected by Tor, but the website will see the VPN's IP address (useful to avoid Tor blocks).
For apps (e.g. Telegram or Signal), you can run Anbox emulator in Whonix Workstation: https://agorism.blog/anarkio/anonymous-telegram-account and use an anonymous SMS verification service like https://smspva.com or https://juicysms.com for Bitcoin/Monero or try a free service such as https://sms24.me or https://onlinesim.ru/en
For email, https://protonmail.com or https://onionmail.org are fine. https://relay.firefox.com is a free email forwarding service and https://rainmail.xyz is good for disposable email addresses.
If a service requires a credit card for subscriptions and doesn't accept Bitcoin, you can use a KYC-free Visa gift card such as https://paywithmoon.com, https://coindebit.io or https://thebitcoincompany.com. Alternatively you could use a Bitcoin-friendly personal shopping service such as https://sovereignstack.tools/rerouter, https://proxysto.re or https://shopinbit.com/concierge-service-ordering-service (Note: Some services may reject prepaid cards such as DigitalOcean or even require government ID KYC such as Contabo. If this happens, look for a KYC-free Bitcoin-friendly service. In this case, 1984.is, Njal.la and Bitlaunch.io are good alternatives.)
Some opsec tips: Only use your Whonix Workstation to login to this anonymous account. Don't login to any real life accounts in the same browser or VM. Don't post photos, locations or voice chat. Don't use KYC services. Mix any earned/donated Bitcoin (via Whirlpool or Monero) before you withdraw it via a KYC-free exchange.
Username tip: You can use a Paynym as a random username and avatar: https://paynym.is For this, you can use Samourai Wallet in Anbox or Sparrow Wallet in Whonix Workstation.
For real life privacy (including accessing jobs, housing, healthcare, mail, sim cards, etc. without government ID), look at agorism: https://anarkio.codeberg.page/agorism and https://agorism.blog/anarkio/crypto-agorism
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100 sats \ 0 replies \ @TommyAllArk_io 14 Sep 2022
We provide Prepaid Cards and Gift cards as well at https://AllArk.io
And we have zero KYC and zero interest in ever implementing it.
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121 sats \ 0 replies \ @nullama 15 Sep 2022
You might want to setup a smartphone that is not tracking you 24/7.
I wrote a guide to do just that here
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10 sats \ 1 reply \ @DarthCoin 15 Sep 2022
here is also a good YT channel about privacy https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3KeV6Ui_4CayDGHw64OFXEPHgXLkrtJO
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @x OP 15 Sep 2022
Oh that looks interesting. Thanks!
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10 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin 14 Sep 2022
You already started: you use LN and a nym that are different than your real life name/identity. Well done. Keep going like that.
Remember just one basic rule: what is private, you are doing in your private life. What is online, is already ALL public. Just by knowing how to separate these 2 things and you are already on the good path.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @DeezSats 15 Sep 2022
If you have a GitHub account with an ssh key and you create another anonymous GitHub account, use a different ssh key otherwise you just de-anonymized yourself to Microsoft Bill Gates, MD
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