Canadian big brother

[Toxictoy]

CNN's reporting that Canada is considering a bill similar to the EU that would force ISP's to keep logs of people's surfing habits for 6 months, etc etc

http://news.com.com/2100-1023-955595.html

Again this affects you no matter what your country if your surfer comes from Canada or if you do any business with anyone located in Canada. Even your email would be subject to data storage.

I'm totally sickened by the tide that's turning on the internet.

[manga]

Does anybody know if the ISPs would still be able to track your internet activity if you used anonymous proxies for surfing?

[Mikey]

that's gonna be a shitload of log files. damn government.

i remember a couple of years ago when i worked in a bank, my manager had the internet logs for my groups computers and he held it up to me and asked who was spending 2 hours look at matureporn.com (or something like that). i told him not me, i wasn't into old women.

[SuPpa DuPpA fLy]

That really sucks big time, it will affect everyone in the business

[hybridea]

Originally posted by Mikey
that's gonna be a shitload of log files. damn government.

i remember a couple of years ago when i worked in a bank, my manager had the internet logs for my groups computers and he held it up to me and asked who was spending 2 hours look at matureporn.com (or something like that). i told him not me, i wasn't into old women.

lol.. at work I understand... but no f. way I'll get monitored while I'm at home... jeez... thats just plain nuts.

[rowan]

What makes you guys think this sort of thing isn't already happening? Lots of ISPs run proxies, and probably log access too. I ran an ISP (in Australia) for 5 years, and I routinely stored logs for several months, to be used for broad statistical analysis and specific problem diagnosis. However, I wouldn't dream of releasing the logs to anyone without the relevant court order.

Mandating that this information be released to some sort of central database which DOES identify you is pretty scary. :(

To answer manga's question: unless access to the anonymous proxy is encrypted, the request will still be in clear text, and the relevant packet can be captured by the ISP. Having said that, I certainly hope that ISPs don't do (or are required to do) this...

Cheers.

[rowan]

Here's an example of what is logged by Squid, a popular open source proxy:

1030591987.842 667 voyeur.camrecord.com TCP_MISS/304 106 GET http://bbs.adultwebmasterinfo.com/buttons/pillsmoney.gif - DIRECT/bbs.adultwebmasterinfo.com -

This says that voyeur.camrecord.com loaded http://bbs.adultwebmasterinfo.com/buttons/pillsmoney.gif at 29-Aug-2002 03:33:07 UTC, the request took 0.667 seconds to complete, 106 bytes were sent to the client, and the HTTP result was 304 not modified.

Cheers.

[manga]

Hi Rowan, is there a any way to protect yourself from this type of thing? Lets say you can't get encrypted access to an anonymous proxy, are there other ways to avoid being monitored?

[Freakster.net]

Originally posted by manga
Hi Rowan, is there a any way to protect yourself from this type of thing? Lets say you can't get encrypted access to an anonymous proxy, are there other ways to avoid being monitored?

anonymizer.com offers that service... ssh tuneling.. thats the only easy way out I found... but if it doesnt work with your local settings.... that could be harder :(

[manga]

Anonymizer looks good for surfing and email. Do you know if it can be used for things like ftp etc.?

[the dude]

Online porn buyers will be very encouraged by these measures... :cussing:

[Toxictoy]

Originally posted by Freak
anonymizer.com offers that service... ssh tuneling.. thats the only easy way out I found... but if it doesnt work with your local settings.... that could be harder :(

Anonymizer won't stop this as this is all being recorded at the ISP level - which is the level before you hit Anonymizer. If you tunnel the first point of the tunnel would be recorded indicating that a connection had been made. Your ISP is your first stop onto the internet - regardless of whether you've got a dialup, cable or DSL.

I'm just hoping our Canadian AW's write/call to their government and try to take action. This could have far reaching affects if people are scared to do their normal everyday activities online. Most of the reason online porn sells is the "anonymity" factor.

Also - if we have anyone from Canada even surfing our sites then our sites would also be cataloged - same with emails that we'd be sending to anyone in Canada.

[manga]

I'm not an ISP expert or anything like that, not even close, but from what I understood at the anonymizer site they can keep your ISP from logging your activity by encrypting everything as far as surfing and email are concerned. At least that's what they claim on their site. So I think that the only thing the ISP would be able to see is that you connected to the anonymizer server, and just encrypted jibberish after that. If they can do that and not slow down your connection then I'd say it's well worth the $29.95 they are asking. I'm still concerned about other Internet activities being logged, like ftp, icq, etc. I'd like to know if there's a way to block or encrypt everything we do online.

Here's something to think about. If a lot of countries start doing this sort of thing then anonymizer style services that can maintain a surfer's privacy will become very big business ;)