Bitcoin Forum

Straight forward question: If bitcoining in the US or NSA allied country (UK/Sweden), you encrypt/VPN/Tor???

If using Bitcoin in the US or allied country? Always encrypt. Not necessary to VPN / Tor unless you got reasons to. I don't.

I do not live on any of the countries that you just said but even if I would ... I wouldn't use VPN , Tor or whatever
I mean why would I , I'am free to do whatever I want I believe and if they got informations about me using BTC etc then they got them by spying and can't be used against me , no ? :o or I'am making it too easy ?

Why wouldn't you always encrypt everything?

I guess Canada counts as NSA allied, unfortunately. I always use Tor and encrypt whenever I have someone's key.

To me it's like using a condom. If you don't use it, don't be surprised when you find yourself with some problems.

It's also like using a condom in the sense that since most people don't use Tor/encrypt/etc., the police state disease continues to spread. It's not just about protecting yourself. It's about whether you're part of stopping the spread or helping it spread.

You could for example be target of a sting operation if you trade on localbitcoins. And your emails, instant messaging, etc are logged.

It's bordering to illegal in some juristictions and if the police ask you to decrypt and you lost the password you can go to jail. So there's some incentives to NOT encrypt  ::)

Actually I meant allied to the NSA and with access to their XKeyscore tool (all your internet traffic logs)

I doubt it you could 100% obfuscate what you are doing online plus your phone isn't encrypted either and if you are using mobile wallets you can be traced everywhere you go.

You can use a VPN on your phone and all they have is the IP of the VPN you're using and the amount of traffic...

Mobile phones are owned to the hardware (https://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/replicant-developers-find-and-close-samsung-galaxy-backdoor). You shouldn't use them for anything encryption-worthy.

If what you are doing is not something that you would care if a random stranger knew about and the same applies to everything else you do (eg you do not value your privacy).

Additionally it is theoretically possible for the NSA to break various encryption systems and they may look closer at people who are encrypting their various items and could end up breaking whatever encryption you are using.

I always switch to Linux and use a TrueCrypt file container for my wallet - version left at 7.1a before all the "is not secure" stuff, plus the bitcoin-qt wallet encryption password. I know there are more robust solutions out there but I have a small BTC balance and I rarely transact. If someone is determined I'm sure they could get at it but I can't be bothered to take the paper/full cold wallet route just yet. I'm a programmer and the fact that I can't be bothered running through some of the hoops is saying something about the viability of public uptake of bitcoin. The sooner an all-in-one security and blockchain setup comes along which makes it simple for non-technical people, the better.

Re: Tor - To be honest - even though I love the Tor Project (ran relays on an Amazon instance for a while) - I'm not doing anything illegal or noteworthy in my country that makes me think I should be using it. I've transferred from my local bank accounts to a couple of exchanges already so it would be trivial for whomever to figure out I'm in the bitcoin space regardless.

I chose not to, but I may do so in the future, depending on how BTC will evolve.

I do for the most part, limited to transactions from one particular wallet I use.

I live in Canada. Any of the companies on this slide. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_%28surveillance_program%29#mediaviewer/File:Prism_slide_5.jpg (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_%28surveillance_program%29#mediaviewer/File:Prism_slide_5.jpg) Starting of course with Microsoft and Apple.

Whatsapp is encrypted :) .