Silly question: Are there any truly private ways to interact online?

[OneGrassRoot]

I'm a tech idiot, but I'm wondering if there are any online formats or platforms that are truly private and unable to be viewed by the government or others with the means to access information?

:shrug:

[Atman]

1. No.

You can try encryption, but everything you post goes through some other computer...more likely, lots of them, and there are copies and records.

[RedCloud]

11. If you and someone else change codes all the time... yes!

It's like this. We look for alien signals thinking they will send noise and light. What if they like sending skin reaction signals instead? How could they be decoded if we do not even have the knowledge to check for that?

So letters, numbers, pictures. Today just the primes mean something. Tomorrow another pattern.

Change font size. Change language bases. Only stuff at a certain part of each page. Colors, etc.

And keep varying the crap out of it.

[TheCowsCameHome]

2. Actually no, however

if you send me ten crisp $50 bills I'm sure I can come up with a few suggestions.

:rofl:

[alc]

3. sort of

If you and the person you want to interact with really want to, you can ensure that nobody (even governments) can read your messages. And if you are both very careful (in all parts of your life), you can ensure that nobody (even governments) knows you are communicating. Doing this would be very inconvenient for both of you compared to other ways of interacting online. You need to assume the government can decrypt your messages if they get it (which is why some people answer your question "no"), so there is a lot of additional effort to keep them from getting complete messages (which they may do through social engineering or planting physical keyloggers in your keyboard. so you need to be careful in all parts of your life to not draw attention or give up information that would help them).

There are lots of ways to get pretty close (>99.999% private) as opposed to "truly private" that are not so inconvenient.

* I have worked on bank-to-bank network communications over the internet and a number of other secure systems and have pretty good knowledge of both the methods of communicating and attacking those communications.

[oldhippie]

9. Agree with all you said ......

When I was thinking of such things a few years ago I figured that a combination of a strong PGP encryption and sending the emails via anonymous remailers (such as the Quicksilver client) was a close to secure as a private citizen could get. Do you have any thoughts or experience on them?

But you're right, it is a great inconvenience and any little slip up in procedure can compromise your security. Most people would not have the discipline to do it consistently.

[JCMach1]

4. Skype is actually encrypted

Skype is a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) system developed by Skype Technologies S.A. It is a peer-to-peer network in which voice calls pass over the Internet rather than through a special purpose network. Skype users search for other users to connect to, enabling them to search other Skype users and send them messages.

Skype uses 256 bit AES encryption to encrypt communication between users,<1><2> complicating the decryption of these communications.<3> Skype's encryption is inherent in the Skype Protocol and is transparent to callers. This integration enables the regular use of (as of 2010) completely private communication by the general public... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype_security

Doesn't mean it can't be hacked, but...

[OneGrassRoot]

7. Interesting....

Thanks for this. Another reason to download and use Skype.

:thumbsup:

:)

[negativenihil]

13. you're assuming...

...that Skype is safe because its encrypted - however, there's no way to verify that each client generates it's own key and that they all aren't using the same seed or master key - which could and probably is being shared with the feds to monitor these communincations.

Never trust a corporate encryption protocol - odds are the keys have been shared with the feds already....

[JCMach1]

15. Well for normal use! If you 'need' to encrypt it's another story...

Caveat emptor... nothing is 100% safe...

...If these calls are being made over Skype the conversations are being encrypted by 256-bit long Skype encryption keys are a length that at least in theory, would take a literal eternity to crack.

The National Security Agency may not be able to intercept them. Or even know that they are going on.

That’s according to Bruce Schneier, chief technology officer at Counterpane Internet Security.

Schneier tells the AP’s Peter Svensson that even if Skype’s encryption is weaker then believed, it would still stymie the type of broad eversdroppoing that the National Security Agency is said to be performing. That eavesdropping is believed to involve scanning up to millions of calls at a time for certain phrases.

Even a weakly encrypted call would force an eavesdroopper to spend hours of computer time cracking it, adds Svensson via Schneier.

Skype’s chief security officer Kurt Sauer tells Svensson that there are no "back doors" that could let a governmentpass the encryption on a call. He does add, however, that the company complies with all government requests in this area... http://www.zdnet.com/blog/ip-telephony/expert-skype-calls-nearly-impossible-for-nsa-to-intercept/919

[negativenihil]

5. There sure is.

However, it's not something that can easily be done by someone not hyper technical.

For those techies reading this reply and wondering what i'm talking about.... "Darknet". Private point to point vpn connections among trusted sources. tunnel all private communications through it, and change your encryption keys every few months.

it can and does work.

[OneGrassRoot]

6. Thanks for the informative replies...

I appreciate it.

:hi:

[Ichingcarpenter]

8. Yes...Skype accounts and conversations between members is encrypted

The US govt. wants this stopped.

[ironrooster]

10. Yes. no.1, do not use windows or mac os - no.2 , use what is called a one time pad

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-time_pad

[Gravel Democrat]

12. VPN=Better than Nothing and sometimes free-Browsing the FAQs on these pages should be helpful

http://vpncentral.blogspot.com/2010/08/top-10-free-vpn.html

"Listed below you will find a compilation of the 10 best free VPN (Virtual Private Network) services.
The list will be updated regularly. Please inform me by Mail if you know another good and free VPN provider.
Protect your privacy, surf anonymously by hiding your real IP and bypass geographical blocks from certain sites"

The thing is the server might be a plant (heh). Search some forums, some VPNs are trustworthy, others not.

[bemildred]

14. Use high-grade encryption with your own keys, use anonymous remailers/proxies.

You can probably do pretty good with SSH connections too, as long an you are using private encryption, but you need some sort of anonymous proxy/remailer/forwarder to prevent a routing trace, and they can still tell you are doing that.

"Some assembly required."

[cprise]

16. Invisible Internet Project (I2P) looks best overall

Its both secure and anonymous, and it handles most types of traffic (email, IM, P2P, Web, etc). You can get it at geti2p.net.

Tor is more famous, but also more limited. It doesn't allow P2P transfers and can be attacked/blocked more easily than I2P. It also lacks a specific email solution, so for most people it is limited to browsing web sites.

Mixmaster / mixminion are anonymous email forwarding systems. You would probably need to use PGP with these.

IMO those are the most notable anonymous systems.

The other options that others have mentioned in this thread offer privacy WITHOUT anonymity. In fact, wanted people have been arrested as a result of using Skype not because their conversations could be eavesdropped (they probably can't be), but because WHO they called was a giveaway.

Hope this helps!

[SoCalDem]

17. Probably not.

The best thing is probably to lead such a boring (and safe) life that no one would be interested enough to "follow" you:)

If you lead a "dangerous" life, the first thing "they" confiscate is your computer, so any workarounds you have ON it, would be discovered ..

Maybe communicate via anonymous computers as libraries etc & use fake names:shrug:

[mmonk]

18. You can have servers that protect from prying eyes

but as long as a server has access, not truely or completely private.