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UK ISPs Consider VPN To Avoid Piracy Crackdown

Posted by timothy on from the privacy-piracy-eh-what's-the-difference dept.

Mark.JUK writes "Broadband internet providers in the UK are considering whether or not to follow the example of a Swedish ISP, Bahnhof, which recently put all of its customers behind a secure Virtual Private Network (VPN) in order to circumvent new European Data Retention and Internet Copyright Infringement laws. By doing this, it makes their logs less useful to outside forces (e.g. rights holders) and allows customers to use the internet anonymously. However, several UK ISPs, including business provider AAISP (Andrews and Arnold), have suggested that there may be better solutions than sticking everybody behind a costly VPN. AAISP's boss, Adrian Kennard, claims, 'something ISPs will be doing anyway, carrier grade NAT, will create a similar anonymity as there is no requirement to log NAT sessions.' Meanwhile, Timico's CTO, Trefor Davies, warns, 'It would be a pretty costly project for all ISPs to implement such a system. It would also bring with it risks – suddenly it becomes a lot easier for governments to start monitoring all your traffic because it all goes through a single point (or at least a few points) on the network.'"

11 of 133 comments (clear)

  1. Interesting by Haedrian · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So the public don't like the law because they can get ratted out.
    The ISPs don't like the law either

    Why is there this law again?

    1. Re:Interesting by Gordonjcp · · Score: 4, Informative

      We don't have "jaywalking" laws in the UK. The whole idea that you can be arrested for crossing the street in the wrong place is as laughable as it is Kafka-esque.

    2. Re:Interesting by Eskarel · · Score: 4, Insightful

      There's a law because intellectual property is the only major export most Western nations still have. However unpopular this sort of thing is they're all far too afraid to risk losing that economic base, so they don't want to change the equation too much. Hence laws to preserve the status quo.

    3. Re:Interesting by FuckingNickName · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Well, sort of. See Highway Code rule 18. It is an offence to loiter on a crossing.

      Which means you can potentially enjoy criminal sanctions for crossing where you should be crossing, but not for crossing where you shouldn't. And this, m'lud, is why I never cross at crossings.

      (It's like those stupid pavement railings close to crossings. It just means you have to make the extra effort of jumping the railing or hugging the kerb on the road side until the railing ends, which is far more dangerous than if they weren't there.)

    4. Re:Interesting by rrossman2 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The funny this to me is:

      Sean Hannity (can't stand him, but listen sometimes on my way home from work just to get mad lol) had Joe Lieberman on and had they talked about this and that. Two days later Hannity has two foreign people on talking about what's going on in Egypt, with each person having different views. He then asked the one if the current President of Egypt (or whatever that position is called) is a Dictator, and kept hounding the point. After the lady wouldn't agree or say, Sean said something along the lines of "well look, he had the internet shut off, which makes him a dictator".

      Well if that's true, then Lieberman is a dictator for having come up with the internet kill switch for the US, as well as anyone else who agreed on the bill.

      It's funny how one action someone else is evil and "makes someone a dictator", yet the same or similar actions else where are just fine.

      It really makes me sick

  2. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  3. Why workarounds ? by cdp0 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Instead of searching for technical workarounds, we should try to block such laws. Workarounds are just that, and sooner or later the law will workaround workarounds.

    What will happen if encryption will become illegal for the general public ? Today this might seem far-fetched, but we are slowly giving in, and it might be a tad too late when we'll realize what we lost (and I'm not talking about the regular /. guy, but about the general public).

    1. Re:Why workarounds ? by Haedrian · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The people who want these laws are the kind of people who have enough money and influence to ensure that these laws stay the same way.

      I mean, you saw the whole Net Neutrality debate in the US. It had misdirection on one side which triggered the American Native "I DON'T WANT NO GUBBERMENT" reaction.

      When we're talking about media - you can expect to see commercials detailing how 'favourite artist' supports this law because it protects their music, how the world would be horrible without them. Then you have government lobbying (also known as bribes) and stuff like that.

      If we had an infinite pool of politicians, enough floating voters and a way of determining who supports these crap laws, you'd see the world change pretty quickly. Not the case either.

      At least you can rest on the fact that laws usually take ages to fix. So this 'workaround' is great until they patch the law up in a few years' time.

  4. Also, two-tier internet by Arancaytar · · Score: 4, Insightful

    With a simple DSL access, possibly using a push-based dynamic DNS service, you can become a server right now. You can even serve out of a local NAT by forwarding a few ports in your router. Without renting a server, you can host a small website, provide an FTP share, seed a torrent, and host a tor node. Particularly in the last case, many small users with their own computers are what tor thrives on.

    If your computer has to share its global address with hundreds behind a NAT at the ISP level, this becomes basically impossible (just try asking your ISP to forward a port for you!). The internet will be split into two halves made up by the content providers who can afford a globally accessible address, and the content consumers who sit behind a glorified television.

  5. Re:Any side effects of NAT? by Arancaytar · · Score: 4, Informative

    The side effects of a NAT (not all NATs, but the IP masqerading one which has become synonymous with it) are that you lose the ability to accept incoming traffic. Pretty much all Peer-to-peer protocols depend on that in some measure.

    Some can cope (I believe Skype has some server-based way of negotiating a direct connection between two firewalled computers, though I don't know the details), while others like BitTorrent keep some limited functionality (you're limited to connections you initiate), and still others (tor, probably - as a node, not a client) will stop working entirely.

  6. Re:question about summary by Casandro · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's no problem for you at home, as your small router surely can cope with a few megabits of data. However on the ISP side you will suddenly have multiple gigabits of encrypted data you need to decrypt. You need fast and therefore expensive computers for that.