Thread: Best way to stay anonymous?

What are the best ways to stay anonymous while torrenting? I thought I recieved a Copyright Violation Notification, but I called my ISP and they said it was a mistake. But, now I'm paranoid that maybe they will start monitoring me now since I called and ask about it. I'm just looking to remain low key, so I'm wondering how everyone else stays under the radar? I have been on the torrent scene for a long time but I've never worried about this before so I'm not bright when it comes to being anonymous. I have to much to lose and I don't want to get caught with 300 bootleg movies, etc. It would not look good on my part!

Thanks for the help! -dl

Well there is no way to say anonymous if you use torrents. You can only reduce the chance of getting catch.
1. Do not use public trackers.
2. Do not use easy to obtain private trackers that have huge user base.
3. Use torrent Encryption Protocol.
4. Use only hard to obtain secret trackers with low user base. (hard to get in private/secret trackers)

You can also try to use PeerBlock I have no experience with it but i heard good things about it.

Originally Posted by sam8cb:1089561

Well there is no way to say anonymous if you use torrents. You can only reduce the chance of getting catch.
1. Do not use public trackers.
2. Do not use easy to obtain private trackers that have huge user base.
3. Use torrent Encryption Protocol.
4. Use only hard to obtain secret trackers with low user base.

You can also try to use PeerBlock I have no experience with it but i heard good things about it.

All very good advice, except for the peerblock part. That thing is near to useless.

A couple of extra things:

- VPN
- SFTP (on seedbox)

A VPN, if you don't already know, is a virtual encrypted tunnel that all your traffic is routed through. They are technically impenetrable, and whilst you are using one your ISP won't be able to tell whether you are pirating software or checking Facebook. There are some free VPN's, such as PROXPN, although the paid ones are better for the most part.

There are plenty of topics like this if you use the search function. Apologies for not replying in more detail, but I'm typing this from my phone and my thumbs are getting tired

Good luck,
-Pulser

Edit: Forgot to add that SFTP stands for "Secure File Transfer Protocol", a quick Google search will reveal thousands of results

you should read this. Not very updated, but you will still get some advice.
Info-collection on how to not get caught for pirating

yeah, I would say pass on the peerblock, I just recently started to try to use it again because someone had mentioned it on another forum, yet I have tried it before and it had snags in it before. Although, the VPN suggestion does sound like it might be the way to go.

The tips above are all great. Forcing encryption on your torrents (if you're willing to take the potential hit on speed) and browsing torrent sites through https are good free options to help increase your privacy.

But, if you're very serious about protecting your privacy, I suggest investing in a seedbox/vps. Then, all the torrenting will be done from there and you can download from your box via SFTP.. You can even set up a SSH tunnel or VPN on your box so that you can browse torrent sites through your server as well and your ISP won't have a clue.

And a little side-note to pulser's advice, SFTP is NOT THE SAME as FTPS (FTP over TLS). FTPS just passes login details encrypted (but the data stream is still unencrypted). So make sure you're using the right one ;)

I'm not 100% certain on this point, but while encrypting your torrent traffic will keep your data stream protected I don't think it will protect your identity. Your IP will still show up as seeding data associated with copyrighted content and that's all they're looking for.

I'm broke as hell right now, LOL... So I need to find the cheapest way to stay hidden, I know everything cost something. That VPN thing sounds like a good one? Does it slow surfing and download speeds? I'm willing to take the loss though, I'd rather drop in download speed than drop the soap in jail...

There are two aspects to this. By all means do what you can. A VPN is useful and you can find *very* cheap or even free ones if you look around. Make sure that your torrent client is using mandatory encryption. Stick to smaller, private trackers if you can, use SFTP and so forth. But the keystone is using a seed box.

Which brings me to the other aspect of this. How much risk are you willing to assume? You can find a cheap seedbox for $15, sometimes even $10 a month. Personally.. and you aren't going to like this, if you can't find the $15 for a seedbox.. maybe you should be curtailing some of your torrenting temporarily. Yeah, that would suck and yeah, you *probably* won't get caught anyway. But the consequences can be draconian if you do. Is that a risk you want to undertake?

Just my two cents