As a US consumer, I can’t use a lot of these VPNs. When you dig into how local governments are trying to break encryption in many countries overseas it makes you slow to sign up for services. The worst case would be you use a service, get invested and a few weeks later new legislation you’re not following/in the know about gets passed and some of your data is now in some foreign governments jurisdiction more so than it was before.
It’s not that Germany or Sweden in particular do that today but I also haven’t quite looked into its bounds, if five-eyes alliance reaches them, etc. There is a lot you have to be cognizant of.
Also I like Bitwarden but Vaultwarden is the way to go; just make sure to donate/pay somehow for bitwarden if you use its clients.
Why do steering wheel locks seem so much less popular now? Same with the reflectors. Nothing’s changed about the best way to keep the car cool while you’re not in it but I almost never see them anymore and I’m in Australia of all places. Those things and to a lesser extent the steering wheel locks were everywhere in the 90s.
In my area the wheel locks have come back a little. Not as ubiquitous as I remember in the 90s, but they are back here and there. The reflectors are quite common in Colorado though. See those constantly.
Because engine immobilisers are a thing, that’s also why car keys are so expensive. The engine won’t start without the correct key so no need to worry about the wheel.
As for reflectors, the people that use them might just opt for ceramic window tints.
Tinting your windshield is illegal, but I guess you could just use a super clear ceramic film… Except it’s still super expensive and not as effective compared to a simple reflector.
Actually, in most places there’s a maximum opacity for safety reasons rather than an outright ban. Granted, some jurisdictions set the limit so low that it makes the whole thing pretty much pointless 🤷
I still see reflectors a lot. But I guess they might not be so popular anymore because with today’s ACs you can cool down your car in seconds, while with only ventilation cooling it took way more time.
This seems like the most satisfactory explanation. I totally forgot that not every car had AC when I grew up in the 90s and I’m pretty sure my mum’s old car that she used to lock with a steering wheel lock and try to keep cool with a reflector didn’t have AC now that you mention it.
Many EVs also have ways to either keep the cabin temp for extrended periods of time or precondition the car a few minutes before getting into the car (at the expense of a little energy).
Your steering wheel probably already has a lock built in from the factory, give it a tug without the key and it’ll lock in place, to unlock it you need the key
Deterrent for when someone jams a flathead screwdriver in your ignition and starts the car you still can’t really drive anywhere because you can’t turn. Remember this was before expensive NFC or radio car keys.
The thing is, ownership of any of these can change at any time. Bitwarden, Mullvad, and Tutanota could be sold to very different owners.
That is up to and including something like uBlock Origin, which only has one developer, and would suddenly be very different if that developer died and the project had to be forked.
You can never trust that the person who takes on the reigns has the same ideals as the people running them now.
Hell, Mullvad was abused to the point they removed access to Port Forwarding on their VPN service, which has led to many people needing to switch to crummier, shadier VPNs that still offer port forwarding access. That’s not Mullvad’s fault, but it is an example of them having to change their philosophy and what they offer because of abuse.
Trust should only go so far, and loss of trust should be very easy. There’s not a good reason to keep “trusting” something when it has fundamentally changed from its initial ideals.
Hell, Mullvad was abused to the point they removed access to Port Forwarding on their VPN service, which has led to many people needing to switch to crummier, shadier VPNs that still offer port forwarding access. That’s not Mullvad’s fault, but it is an example of them having to change their philosophy and what they offer because of abuse.
Hell, Mullvad was abused to the point they removed access to Port Forwarding on their VPN service, which has led to many people needing to switch to crummier, shadier VPNs that still offer port forwarding access.
Unfortunately port forwarding also allows avenues for abuse, which in some cases can result in a far worse experience for the majority of our users. Regrettably individuals have frequently used this feature to host undesirable content and malicious services from ports that are forwarded from our VPN servers. This has led to law enforcement contacting us, our IPs getting blacklisted, and hosting providers cancelling us.
The result is that it affects the majority of our users negatively, because they cannot use our service without having services being blocked.
The abuse vector of port forwarding has caught up with us, and today we announce the discontinuation of support for port forwarding. This means that if you are a user of forwarded ports, you will not be able to add or modify the ports you have in use.
They made a smart call that has probably increased the long term privacy of their users.
People were using port forwarding to host illegal shit, and governments were getting pissed off about it. Mullvad has been able to prove in court that they don’t keep logs, but that’s not a perfect deterrent; a properly motivated government, perhaps if somebody is using Mullvad to host CSAM, might attempt to legally force Mullvad to put logging in and add anti-canary clauses.
Preventing port forwarding keeps customers as consumers rather than hosters, and avoids this issue.
I used to use proton until I saw them give info for a warrant. After that I gave up on the VPN thing. If I lived in a country with limited streaming options I might use them but shrug-outta-hecks
This is true and people should always be mindful of this. Additionally you should consider not just the ownership of the companies but also the infrastructure they rely on such as their rented servers, payment processors, on-site staff etc. However commercial VPNs remain a convenient compromise for many use cases. These services are probably fine for your shitposing needs but should not be relied upon for activism for instance.
My ex works for our state’s revenue department and they don’t give a fuck. The cases she would handle were honestly baffling how these people “made these mistakes”. They were either incredibly stupid or it was intentional tax fraud (it was intentional tax fraud). If you get tagged for an innocent mistake it seemed like an easy process to get out.
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