First it was no water bottles,so we sucked it up and spend $4 on some lame a*s airport water that is worth 1/8 of that at best. Then no shoes,more pat downs,etc. Now,full body scans and you can opt out and get full pat down instead. And the introduction of the ‘idea’ of mind reading technology has been advertised on yahoo and google in the after-math.

If people do not see what is ocurring here,I am not sure I can spell it out for you any better. It is SO obviously a mental war we are in here. Gradually,you accept ‘just this little infringement’,and in time,you will find yourself in a fish bowl. Frankly,to the people that are ‘I’m so patriotic’-perhaps it will always be a duality that cannot be bridged (ie,if I disagree with invasive technology,then I must be anti-US; but this mindset is a product of brainwashing for generations via schools not teaching us to think,and media instilling blind trust in govmt entities)…but for the rest of us:

It’s simple. Using fasttmail or other devices,allows us to invest in companies that are providing an alternative network to the one I jsut described. When enough people are invested in this alternative,the comapnies thrive and continue to offer such services,and new companies proliferate. As well,new services for privacy will be born b/c the ‘demand’ for such services in the market will be seen. It’s a healthy balance to just blindly accepting what’s out there and given to us. Because what is given to us is given in small doses,designed to create a large scale denial of rights in the future. You can see it unfolding.

So while I dont really care if the gvmt sees what I order on Amazon,and I don’t have but $20 in my Chase checking account as we speak,and coudl care less if anyone knows it,I know that supporting the momentum of these privacy alternatives IS key to my own life and future,or my child’s future,for we may one day want such safeguards; if they already exist,all the better.

You might say it’s investing in ’sovereign patriotism’.lol
I want to defend and protect rights,and that includes my own rights,both now and in the future. It’s why it’s so key to support homeschooling,charter schools,private schools,even religious schools-
the more choice,the better for all of us. Monopolies are never good for the long-haul. More choice allows for de-centralized states.

So,I bring up the schools point to say that even if I am not personally interested or think a topic relates to me,it actually does. We should all care,but not in an emotionally reactive way. It’s more like voting for your own privacy by electing to support these companies (after researching them,of course.)

So,yea,ppl seem used to thinking linear and also looking for a set solution to a one time problem.

Rather,this is more like a journey or a game,with changes occuring all the time,and ever changing variables,too. And each individual is in fact a variable in her/her own game.

Privacy Policy of Lavabit below

“Lavabit adamantly protects the privacy of its users. Lavabit will only release private information if legally compelled by the courts in accordance with the United States Constitution.”

Love your informative letters & wholeheartedly agree; Orwell may have got the date wrong & could not have known the media involved but otherwise was spot on. I do believe that soon enough the mental stresses generated in Joe Public by Big Government’s snooping will be recognised as a valid mental condition!

Somewhat off-topic; a local doctor’s Lamborghini was taken for a spin at 70kph over the speed limit by his service mechanic. Police nicked him an impounded the car, fair enough. However, the lunatic law says the innocent doctor must wait 28 days & pay $500 to get it back.

Australia’s police minister responded by stating “I will not make an exception for somebody who owns a Lamborghini”…. quite revealing of a small minded, envious excuse for a human being, I think. I repeat this story only to illustrate what use our elected officials choose to make of patently unfair laws and how we trust these b#*$*@s at our peril….

Article includes this interesting tidbit: “authorities” requested whereabouts of Sprint customers 8 million times in one year.

And I wouldn’t recommend using fake info, because that is considered justification for cancelling the domain.

Most if not all hosting companies and domain registrars will happily accept an anonymous bearer share corp as the client. That solves your problem and still gives you full control.

FastMail writes:
- – - – -
Although our servers are based in the US in a co-location facility, the
actual servers are owned by the FastMail company, which is itself
incorporated and based in Australia. None of the people at the
co-location facility in the US have any login access to the servers, and
thus cannot get any data off the servers. They just hold the servers,
provide network connectivity and power to them.

The net result of this is that a US subpoena is not enough to get data
of a customer off one of the machines. Instead a warrant has to come
from the appropriate legal authorities in Australia (based on the
requirements in the Australian Telecommunications Act) to us before we
can provide any information. The requirements for that are fairly
strict.

There is a mutual assistance treaty between Australia and the US, and an official channel for US requests to go via Australian authorities to
come to us, but it’s long and convoluted (via the FBI, the Australian
Attorney General, the Australian Federal Police, and then us). This has
been used in a few very rare cases, and I can tell you that in each case
I’ve seen, not only is it legally justifiable, but I’ve felt it’s
personally justifiable as well (eg child porn issues).

As a company, we’re very concerned about privacy, and we are careful not to reveal any information from any accounts without the appropriate
legal documentation. The fact that we’re an Australian company in most
cases introduces cross jurisdictional issues, which adds an extra level
of safety because at least two countries are then involved. More checks
and balances!

I hope this information is useful and helps you feel more at ease with
the safety of your data.

Regards

Rob

If you want to peddle grass, do it from an electronic flag in the Netherlands, where it is perfectly legal.

The quintessence is: Offshore is where you are not! And nosiness depends on your goals.

Adminus

Several have written me privately, asking about the VPN service and privacy-oriented search engine I use. Although no one has come out and asked, I want to be clear that I am neither employed by nor have any financial (or other) interest whatsoever in the recommendations I offer. I make them because I use them myself, finding that they accomplish for me what it is I want, and so I can (and do) heartily recommend them to my friends and family.

Thank you.

https://www.ixquick.com/uk/

Its secure.

Its free.

and its private (they don’t log yout IP).

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/6818010/Australia-plans-Chinese-style-internet-filtering.html

My service has expired and I am searching for a site offshore that will allow me to sell space and manage it.

Do you have any suggestions?

Hey, either way, anything sensitive should either be crypted (like you’re PGP article last month) or not emailed at all. I like FM becasue it’s much faster than gMail and the ozzies can’t shut you down when some judge in Delaware wants to freeze your account.

i like the fact too that they have email aliases, and you can outright reject certaine mails.

i think w the ‘distress password,’ you mean the one-time use password on the site: http://fastmail.fm/help/features_alternative_logins.html

“One-time passwords

Generates a list of passwords for you to print out, where each password on the list can only be used to login once “

Thank you for a wonderful article. If I may, I’d like to toot my own horn, as it were, and share with others what things I do to help minimize my “electronic footprint.”

I should mention at the outset that I do computer repair on the side and am constantly amazed at how folks click here and there with (apparently) nary a thought as to the epaper trail they’re leaving in addition to the obvious electronic elements that sites such as Google cull and share. So I USED to advise people about the importance of at least considering personal privacy when going to this and that site (it seemed to me that few if any people really were concerned..so I stopped). Certainly Google has (sadly) done an excellent job at bringing so many users to their various sites (mail, docs, etc.) without those folks giving much more than a second of thought as to what it means to have the biggest and most popular search engine maintaining their various pieces of information. And let’s not even talk about where “cloud computing” will take us AND what role Google, Microsoft, Facebook and other major computer/internet players will have. Suffice it to say that I work hard to ensure I’m not one of those participants.

To that end I use a VPN the vast majority of the time online. My connections come from all over: Hong Kong, Seattle, London, Dallas, etc. I love the service I use and highly recommend it to others. (If someone wants specifics, please feel free to contact me at ukskeeter@fastmail.co.uk.) Also, I use a search engine that (purportedly) does not archive searches, do geo-location and the rest that Google does. It does none of that while using Google as the search engine. (Once more, others are free to contact me if they’re interested in what site I use.) Again, I’m doing my little part to spit in the face of the all-seeing Google and “Big Brother” by denying them as much of my personal information as I reasonably can. After all, it’s none of their business AND not because I have something to hide.

In addition to the e-mail service provided by Fastmail (which, as you can see, is the e-mail provider I’m using here), I also use the following: Lavabit.com and VFEmail.net (users can select their “domain name”; pretty cool).

All in all there are numerous options for those of us who try to “fly under the radar,” as it were.

Thanks again for your newsletter, Simon, and I hope my comments may have been helpful to others. I look forward to other postings and future issues of your newsletter.

Don

P.S. I would list my website, but that would defeat the purpose of staying anonymous here. But I am wondering if others who do have websites would comment on who they use that will allow the registrar information to not point to the actual bill payer. In my case I use BlueHost (with whom I’m very happy). And when I first signed up they had this privacy thing going for them so that my name and contact information was hidden. That’s no longer the case. It’s not really an issue with this one website, but I’d like to keep the registrar information hidden if and when I get another website. Thanks.

Do you know of a way to have your mail box located in one of their “non main” servers?

Thanks.

I really appreciate your blog posts. VERY interesting. I was wondering if you could do an article on how North Americans (USA & Canada) could properly set up a offshore corporation for asset protection or privacy? Maybe just use your experiance? Since we must (I am Canadian) report our worldy earnings and declare if we control or own a foreign corporation, how do we go about it safetly and intelligently? I have heard a lot of stories and have done research myself but I would like to get the details from someone who has actually done it.

Have a good day!

Hans