Hello all,

I’m a huge amateur when it comes to this stuff (I had a guy hold my hand on the phone and walk me through this) but I use Newsgroupdirect and buy blocks when they go on sale.

Is there a better group to do this from (or cheaper). I’m happy here but I saw an article that had some different places listed and it got me thinking.

Which group do you use?

  • TCB13@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    C’mon you’ve plenty of private trackers you can join with an invite from someone else and nobody will easily track you like they can do in public torrents.

    • LoganNineFingers@lemmy.caOP
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      9 months ago

      I’m kinda over this conversation. I posted asking for input, not someone being argumentative. If you had a stronger argument, maybe I’d change my ways and look into what you’re saying. I politely tried to say I hear you, but I’m good with what I do and you keep digging. At no point have you said anything that makes a strong case, helpful to what I asked or isn’t dismissive. Have a good night

      • TCB13@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        I do have an argument: https://lemmy.world/comment/7648533

        Any free private tracker worth your time has DHT/PEX disabled thus making their torrents invisible for your typical govt / private entity searching for pirates. If those torrents aren’t public and can’t be searched indexed via DHT then the ISP or whatever knows you’re using the bittorrent protocol but they don’t know for what content. This particularly correct if you use sane settings in your torrent clients such as a blocklist + requiring encryption for all connections.

        If you do those simple things and a use a private tracker you trust then your ISP/Govt can’t point fingers at you, they’ve no way of knowing what you’re downloading.

        • MigratingtoLemmy@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          Are you saying that you haven’t heard of media company affiliates prowling in such groups from invites given to them?

      • TCB13@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        https://iknowwhatyoudownload.com/en/peer/ – Plug your IP into that. Private tracker torrents are still visible to the public.

        What you’re saying isn’t correct, at least for properly configured private trackers and clients.

        I did try that website and that’s the thing, the only torrents that show up are public ones. Torrents from private trackers like iptorrents are not showing on that list as expected. They don’t show, because they can’t access them, just read their about page and you’ll understand why:

        Our system collects torrent files in two ways: parsing torrent sites and listening DHT network

        Any private tracker worth your time has DHT/PEX disabled for their torrents because if they didn’t then the torrents were essentially public.

        • thantik@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          What you’re saying isn’t correct, at least for properly configured private trackers and clients.

          That’s exactly what I said it’s for “to check and make sure your configuration is correct”. (here: https://old.lemmy.world/comment/7654711) I used it in the past and found out my split tunnel was leaking info on the DHT. It can help others make sure they aren’t leaking data too.

          • TCB13@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            That’s exactly what I said it’s for “to check and make sure your configuration is correct”.

            What you said was: “Private tracker torrents are still visible to the public” and this isn’t true.

            • thantik@lemmy.world
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              9 months ago

              I provided the link - if you want to be disingenuous that is your prerogative.

              Private tracker torrents are still visible to the public. Just because it’s not on THAT particular website, doesn’t mean that someone isn’t on that private tracker leaking all the data. Bittorrent is not a private protocol.

              • TCB13@lemmy.world
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                9 months ago

                The thing is that private tracker aren’t visible on that link.

      • BaroqueInMind@kbin.social
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        9 months ago

        That is a shady sketchy as fuck Russian site. Please, if anyone is reading this, DO NOT access it or put your fucking IP in there.

        • thantik@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          You’re a fucking moron my man. It’s a site for checking if your IP can be seen by the public for torrenting. If you don’t torrent, or if you’re properly setup through your VPN, nothing shows up. If you are leaking torrenting data to the public, this guy catalogs it and if it sees any of that public data it’ll show you what you’ve been torrenting – this same data is available to hollywood and they use it to issue C&Ds, warnings through your ISP, etc.

          • thantik@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            It’s a site that simply catalogues every IP address seen on the DHT. If you’re torrenting, and you’re leaking that data publicly, this site simply compares it.

            https://www.godaddy.com/whois/results.aspx?domain=iknowwhatyoudownload.com

            The site is registered through godaddy, and claims of it being a Russian site is simply meant as a scare tactic. Any website you connect to without a VPN immediately knows your IP address anyways - it’s not some sacred thing you have to protect against people knowing.

            Hell, if you’re concerned with it - plug your VPNs IP into it; you’ll see the torrents that others on the VPN are seeding from the IP address you’re using.

            If you’re using it on mobile, it’s not likely that anyone is torrenting on mobile, so unless someone is really doing dumb shit - it’s not likely it’ll list anything. It’s a useful tool to have under your belt to see if your bittorrent client is leaking data.

            • LoganNineFingers@lemmy.caOP
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              9 months ago

              Thank you taking the time to respond with such a detailed response. I wasn’t too worried about it as I don’t do my shady stuff on mobile but figured it was worth the ask.

              Other than a couple of bad faith actors here and there, I’ve found this community to be super tolerant and helpful - thanks!