I know it isn’t specific to just Linux but I use Linux anyway so my question is,

Is there a way you could use a VPN without them knowing that? Or if they outlaw them is it really just game over?

If they made VPNs illegal I suppose stuff like TOR would follow except TOR is partly funded by the US state department and the US is one of my countries closest allies (one of the five eyes). So surely they wouldn’t shut down something the US funds directly… Would they?

I’ve read very very little about Gemini and other protocols like Gopher, would this be the way forward if they do this? And is that even remotely close to the security and potential anonymity you would receive from a VPN?

  • zippyEnjoyer@lemmy.zipEnglish
    7·
    22 hours ago

    Until the “whitelist” principle is implemented for the network—you’re fine. You’ll be able to use stealth protocols, whose traffic is practically indistinguishable from regular HTTPS traffic to any website.

    You might ask:

    But won’t the internet censor notice that suspiciously large amounts of traffic are going to a single IP and block it?

    you’d be right, but only in the case where your server is configured incorrectly. nothing stops you from finding a hosting provider whose subnet contains YouTube caching servers and disguise your traffic as coming from there. then, to the censor, everything will look natural, since traffic is indeed going to YouTube.

    Once you have your own proxy server, you can create proxy chains to well-known services like Mullvad, IVPN, Proton, etc. Your intermediate server won’t see the traffic, so your privacy will be just as strong as when using these popular services directly—except with slightly higher ping.

    You might say: what if they introduce those very whitelists, allowing access only to IPs within your country of residence? Like in North Korea?

    I’ll answer: first, it’s unlikely to happen overnight, as it would be a fatal blow to the country’s economy. Second, even with whitelists, there are ways around them. In Russia, many people rent Russian CDNs (content delivery networks that reduce ping to services) and use them as an intermediate layer between a foreign server and themselves.

    Why can’t the censor block them? Because large companies use them—so blocking these CDNs would also break taxi services, banks, and many other services included in the whitelist.

    So it’s not that bad. The main thing is to have the will to fight for your rights, for your freedom. And methods, one way or another, will remain even under the strictest regimes :)