Post #3991271

2026-07-21 17:13 UTC

It is incredibly important to be specific about what properties apply in situations to be able to make the correct trade offs. An in that respect, VPNs are incapable of providing privacy - under any specific definition of privacy. They can route around censorship, they can provide security, they can permit jurisdictional and trust flexibility. But they can only do those things under very specific assumptions which require sharing additional information (albeit changing who gets what data)

Replies (2)

@xdydx@mastodon.social 2026-07-21 18:10

@sarahjamielewis@mastodon.social As a general rule of thumb - there are obvious exceptions! - unless you own both endpoints of the VPN, one does not need a VPN.

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@gaditb@icosahedron.website 2026-07-21 19:05

@sarahjamielewis@mastodon.social (Not disagreeing with you in any broad-functional way beyond the narrow-detail specific absolute "incapable" and "any definition", but I had a friend whose parents monitored network traffic via capabilities on the router (iirc. it's been a bit.) in their attempt to surveil and control their gender/sexuality (and like, them in general).) (I also think I feel like in my own usage, I have found utility in distinguishing between "private" and "secret" in a way that locates them in mostly-distinct places on a spectrum of "control of information, often considered socially" of which "public" is a range at the other end, but you've done a LOT more work in related areas than me so I'll defer to you around it.)

Open ##4038743