Saki

joined 11 months ago
MODERATOR OF
[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 weeks ago

For those who are still on Win 7: Firefox (and so Tor Browser) will stop supporting Win 7 soon. Seriously, you better plan to migrate to Linux. Not-so-good privacy issues aside, everyone knows Windows is not very secure/safe/convenient anyway.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

Generally, votes are overrated. Especially if you’re not mainstream, by definition most people won’t support you, won’t agree with you, won’t understand you.

Some things may be downvoted because they’re too stupid. But occasionally, you might be downvoted simply because you’re a bit too early. Like, if you’d said “being gay is not crime” or something 50 years ago, you might have got downvoted… Just a thought.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Maybe what you’re thinking is like an XMR version of Bisq's “Get your first BTC” room?

https://bisq.wiki/Getting_your_first_BTC This dilemma is real and understandable, while it’s not clear what would be the best solution:

For new users, Bisq requires between 0.002 and 0.007 BTC for traders to make their first trade: [...] It can be difficult for new bitcoiners to acquire their first coins, so this requirement is often a barrier for new Bisq users. The Get your first BTC room offers one possible way to get this initial bitcoin without signing up for a centralized exchange.

Basically the same thing for Haveno, I guess.

 

“It is completely absurd to inflict mass surveillance on the general public under the premise of fighting theft.”

It comes at a cost to the privacy and civil liberties of the people of Britain.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Feliĉan naskiĝtagon, Moenrochan! 🎂
Mi amas vin 💌

Happy birthday!
I love you 🤟

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Another bad experience related to Mastercard: https://monero.town/post/1791576

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago (3 children)

Cake Pay should be fine for most gift cards, I don’t think they usually ask for KYC for those.

So perhaps your recent bad experience with Mastercard EUR cards are rather exceptional?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago (5 children)

Thanks for warning. Saw https://monero.town/post/872283 too. Guess Cake Pay may be convenient for those who are fine with KYC. Another option, that Stealths thing is more expensive (higher fees), so basically if you want to buy a gift card here or there, you’ll have to choose between (possible) KYC and higher fees. Or so it seems…

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago (1 children)

According to @[email protected], Cake Pay works fine if you’re fine with KYC, and otherwise you may just lose your money: https://monero.town/post/872283

If you’re a privacy advocate not fully supporting KYC but want to try this anyway, then try a small amount, because you may lose all your money. Another recent option is more privacy-friendly and KYC-free, but the fees are higher with them.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago

We know the ability to get Monero will not be essentially affected—after all, this is not the first time, nor the second time, when Monero is delisted. It seems reasonable to admit, though, that ultimately the ability/freedom to spend Monero might be limited if legit (e.g. hosting) companies can’t accept it in the future—directly or indirectly because of MiCA etc. Although, what will happen in such a situation may be seen as an interesting experiment.


Since the posted link is not very Tor-friendly behind CF, similar random links just in case…

Following the announcement, privacy tokens such as Dash (DASH), Monero (XMR), and Zcash (ZEC) witnessed a notable decline of up to 10%

The prices of some of these tokens have headed south shortly after the announcement. XMR is down nearly 3% in the past 24 hours, while ZEC has plunged by 10%

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

Maybe you can check this yourself now: a power user like someone who is already a mod got some additional menu items in "More…" under each post, which includes “Appoint as moderator”. So basically, they can appoint a random poster as a mod if they want to.

A similar thing has happened to me and I too was wondered when, why and from where this status came 😕
but practically it’s mostly like just an honorary title. So far the only time when being a mod ever actually mattered was, when someone cross-posted an ad massively and several users sent reports, saying it was spam and should be removed. Such a problem is very rare in a small community so maybe you don’t need to worry about it… It simply means, someone somehow judged, reasonably or otherwise, that you were a trustworthy user.
Technically, if you’d like to, you can use your new power to appoint another mod so you may not be alone :)

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago (2 children)

The concept may be lovely, but the fact is, many people nowadays have been Pavlov’ed to immediately ignore anything weird that says, "Congratulations! You got some money. Visit this URL and input something." As they say, the Cake is a lie…

Monero could be a wonderful gift to a friend of yours if they’re especially interested in privacy (in that case, you might want to talk to them privately, and perhaps recommend a better wallet). Otherwise, it may be kind of like casting pearls before swine…

 

The right time to start protecting your digital privacy is before your trip […] The simplest and most reliable precaution against border searches is to reduce the amount of information that you carry across the border.

image


Sometimes law enforcement officials achieve so-called “consent” by being vague […] You can try to dispel this ambiguity by inquiring whether border agents are asking you or ordering you […] If an agent says it is a request only, you might politely but firmly decline to comply with the request.

If you are a U.S. citizen, border agents cannot stop you from entering the country, even if you refuse to unlock your device, provide your device password, or disclose your social media information. However, agents may escalate the encounter if you refuse.

If you elect to comply with a border agent’s order to unlock your device, provide your password, or disclose your social media information, you can inform the agent that you are complying under protest and that you do not consent.


It is possible that if you unlock your device, and agents then search your device, a court will rule that you consented to the search. […] As noted in Part 1, the best way to avoid an inadvertent “consent” to search is to decline to unlock your device, provide the device password, or provide any social media information.

Technically, you don’t even need to admit that you know the password.

If you believe that border agents violated your digital rights at the border, please contact EFF at [email protected].


See also:

 

The fact that the issue was discovered by Google TAG suggests it was exploited by a nation-state actor or by a surveillance firm.

As usual, Google did not publish details about the attacks exploiting the flaw in the wild.

See also: https://www.cert.europa.eu/publications/security-advisories/2023-100/

This vulnerability also affects Chromium-based web browser such as Microsoft Edge [3], Brave, Opera, and Vivaldi.

 

“Some Hackers have figured out there is no quick and easy way for a company that receives one of these EDRs (emergency data request) to know whether it is legitimate,” he said.

“The hackers will send a fake emergency data request along with an attestation that innocent people will likely suffer greatly or die unless the requested data is provided immediately.”

 

privacy has nothing to do with having something to hide. Instead, privacy means protecting the human being that you are, all the personal details that make you, you. What you care about, what you love, what you hate, what you are curious about, what makes you laugh, what you fear. And most importantly, choosing when you decide to share that information and who you share it with.

it is possible to build technology used by millions of people with privacy at the heart. We build technology to advance that right in order to help users reclaim their agency in digital spaces.

(But by default, Tor Browser is not shipped with uBlock Origin.)

PS: ONION LINK http://pzhdfe7jraknpj2qgu5cz2u3i4deuyfwmonvzu5i3nyw4t4bmg7o5pad.onion/tor-in-2023/index.html

 

NOTE: This is about the Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination after a search warrant for someone’s cell phone is procured; not about digital privacy in general at the U.S. Border (a warrantless search).

See also: https://monero.town/post/1134494 EFF to Supreme Court: Fifth Amendment Protects People from Being Forced to Enter or Hand Over Cell Phone Passcodes to the Police

 

Now before the House, HR 6570 proposes to reauthorize Section 702 for three years — but with reforms including requiring all US intelligence agencies to obtain a warrant before conducting a US person query.

a competing bill, the FISA Reform and Reauthorization Act of 2023 (HR 6611), doesn't include a warrant requirement — and, in fact, includes language that many worry could be used to force private US companies into assisting in government-directed surveillance

 

House Intelligence Committee bill would also expand the definition of an electronic communication service provider include a broader range of providers, including those who “provide hardware through which people communicate on the Internet.”

See also: Tell Congress: They Must Defeat HPSCI’s Horrific Surveillance Bill | EFF Action Center

 

How FinCEN May Be Violating Your Rights
A call to action against FINCEN proposal 2023-0016A
Written By Preston Pysh

Eroding Anonymity Through Additional Verification: The mandate for “Additional Customer Identity Verification Measures for Transactions Involving Unhosted Wallets” is a direct affront to privacy and anonymity. This requirement transgresses on the First Amendment’s sanctuary for anonymous speech

A Direct Assault on Anonymity-Enhanced Currencies: The “Prohibition on the Use of Anonymity-Enhanced Convertible Virtual Currencies (AECVC)” is nothing short of a legislative bulldozer through the edifice of privacy.

See also: Preston Pysh says proposed FinCEN crypto rules violate US Constitution

 

Bis zum Jahr 2030 will die EU allen Bürger:innen eine „European Digital Identity Wallet“ (ID-Wallet) zur Verfügung stellen. Sie soll on- wie offline bei Verwaltungsgängen und Bankgeschäften, aber auch bei Arztbesuchen, Alterskontrollen oder beim Internetshopping zum Einsatz kommen.

(By 2030, the EU wants to provide all citizens with a “European Digital Identity Wallet” (ID wallet). It is intended to be used online and offline for administrative procedures and banking as well as medical visits, age verification, and internet shopping.)

The article (in German) is mostly about eIDAS 45
Cf. https://monero.town/post/1018961 Last Chance to fix eIDAS: Secret EU law threatens Internet security

(There are many English articles about it; see e.g.
https://mullvad.net/en/blog/eu-digital-identity-framework-eidas-another-kind-of-chat-control )

Though not the main topic of the article, this “ID wallet” thing sounds disturbing. (EU politicians calls a normal wallet “unhosted wallet” and don’t like it very much.)

 

On the front page of monero.town, sm.ms and catbox.moe are recommended as image hosting services. Unfortunately both are not Tor-friendly, esp. Catbox blocks Tor.

The Cock.li guy comes up with a solution.

  1. Solution about Catbox: Just change cat in the URL to fat and the image is viewable for Tor users!

Example https://monero.town/post/1025717 where
https://files.catbox.moe/6z3p3z.jpg is not viewable via Tor
https://files.fatbox.moe/6z3p3z.jpg would be viewable via Tor

  1. How to use an inline image (in general, not only Catbox)

The syntax is ![](URL) so…
![](https://files.fatbox.moe/6z3p3z.jpg)

Result:

  1. How to make it a Clickable thumbnail

Text link would be [Text](URL) you can replace Text with an inline image, URL with the image URL, i.e.
[![](URL)](URL) so…
[![](https://files.fatbox.moe/6z3p3z.jpg)](https://files.fatbox.moe/6z3p3z.jpg)
Result


Note: Optionally you can put Alt text in ![] as in
![Monero-chan is happy](https://sample.net/happy-monerochan.png)


Another hosting service imagebam.com is iffy but Tor friendly, easy to upload images there from Tor Browser & you can direct-link to the uploaded full image.

Using 3rd party image hosting services has privacy implications, but it will save the server resource of monero.town.

 

Many countries use censorship systems to block access to human rights resources

.onion sites are particularly useful at maximizing internet users' privacy and anonymity because they never leave the Tor network.

While technically I2P might be better, it’s good news that a recognized human rights organization has adopted an onion, because that will improve the “shady” image of Tor, esp. hidden services (aka darknet), as in “privacy technology is good, not for criminals, but for you, for everyone. Using Tor is normal, and Monero is a great tool.”

view more: next ›