News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by rrr_oh_man on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:07PM (#39955548)
Anecdote: I stayed in the Airbnb of an (obviously gay) couple in the South-Eastern very conservative Turkish city of Mersin many years ago.

The absolute joy they had when I showed them how to set up 1.1.1.1 on their Android TV, phones, and laptops… so they could watch unrestricted gay porn in their heavily censored and state-controlled slice of the World Wide Web…

I still get a virtual greeting card from them once in a while.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by godelski on Saturday April 06, 2024 @07:41PM (#39956733)
> how to set up 1.1.1.1

I just want to mention a few things: Fallback, other DNSs like 1.* and Mullvad's free DNS with more options

    # Standard
    1.1.1.1
    1.0.0.1
    2606:4700:4700::1111
    2606:4700:4700::1001

    # Block Malware 
    1.1.1.2
    1.0.0.2
    2606:4700:4700::1112
    2606:4700:4700::1002
    
    # Block Malware & Adult Content (not useful for this case)
    1.1.1.3
    1.0.0.3
    2606:4700:4700::1113
    2606:4700:4700::1003
You can find cloudflare information here[0], and remember to make sure you setup DNS over DoT (TLS) or DoH (HTTPS). Especially for them they will want to have encrypted DNS.

Mullvad also offers *free* DNS[1], which also supports encrypted DNS

    # DoH is port 443 and DoT is port 853
    # Standard
    dns.mullvad.net
    194.242.2.2
    2a07:e340::2

    # Block Trackers
    adblock.dns.mullvad.net
    194.242.2.3
    2a07:e340::3

    # Block Trackers + Malware
    base.dns.mullvad.net
    194.242.2.4
    2a07:e340::4
Mullvad also has block for Adult + gambling and social media (so there are 6 total configurations). You don't need the Mullvad VPN to use these.

I should also mention, as this frustrated me a bit, that your browser may implement its own DNS and so just setting these in your router (or pihole) may not completely resolve the issue. In Firefox, go to Settings > Privacy & Security > (scroll all the way down) Enable DNS over HTTPS using > then under either "Increased Protection" or "Max Protection" you can set a DNS resolver (or turn it off). They have defaults for Cloudflare (default!) and NextDNS. While you're there, also check your settings at the top of that page about "Enhanced Tracking Protection"

I am *NOT* a network/security person and would greatly appreciate replies to this comment with additional information. Especially about setting up things like piholes, TVs, browsers, encrypted DNS (especially this!), host files, and so on. Technical forum, so let's get technical and learn ^__^

[0] - https://developers.cloudflare.com/1.1.1.1/ip-addresses/ - https://developers.cloudflare.com/1.1.1.1/setup/#dns-over-ht...

[1] https://mullvad.net/en/help/dns-over-https-and-dns-over-tls

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Terretta on Saturday April 06, 2024 @11:30PM (#39957968)
And AdGuard ... which also blocks ads.

Plain DNS:

  # Default servers
  # AdGuard DNS will block ads and trackers.
  IPv4:
  94.140.14.14
  94.140.15.15
  IPv6:
  2a10:50c0::ad1:ff
  2a10:50c0::ad2:ff

  # Non-filtering servers
  # AdGuard DNS will not block ads, trackers, or any other DNS requests.
  IPv4:
  94.140.14.140
  94.140.14.141
  IPv6:
  2a10:50c0::1:ff
  2a10:50c0::2:ff

  # Family protection servers
  # AdGuard DNS will block ads, trackers, adult content,
  # and enable Safe Search and Safe Mode, where possible.
  IPv4:
  94.140.14.15
  94.140.15.16
  IPv6:
  2a10:50c0::bad1:ff
  2a10:50c0::bad2:ff
Adguard DNS-over-HTTPS (DoH)

  # Default server
  # AdGuard DNS will block ads and trackers.
  https://dns.adguard-dns.com/dns-query

  # Non-filtering server
  # AdGuard DNS will not block ads, trackers, or any other DNS requests.
  https://unfiltered.adguard-dns.com/dns-query

  # Family protection server
  # AdGuard DNS will block ads, trackers, adult content,
  # and enable Safe Search and Safe Mode, where possible.
  https://family.adguard-dns.com/dns-query
DNS-over-TLS

  # Default server
  # AdGuard DNS will block ads and trackers.
  tls://dns.adguard-dns.com

  # Non-filtering server
  # AdGuard DNS will not block ads, trackers, or any other DNS requests.
  tls://unfiltered.adguard-dns.com

  # Family protection server
  # AdGuard DNS will block ads, trackers, adult content,
  # and enable Safe Search and Safe Mode, where possible.
  tls://family.adguard-dns.com
See more: https://adguard-dns.io/en/public-dns.html
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by kornhole on Saturday April 06, 2024 @06:54PM (#39956421)
Configuring 1.1.1.1 is a great option for people outside the US whose countries are unable to pressure Cloudflare for information. A better option for those of us in the US is to run our own DNS resolvers. My DNS resolver runs on a little PFSense box that also has DNS blocking and a ton of other features.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by envy2 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:02PM (#39956845)
Let's be realistic. Porn, the subject of this discussion, is not illegal in the US; this is about age verification laws that apply to the website operators, who then self-block users from particular states. No one is going after Cloudflare for this information as there is no crime committed by the user.

Given Cloudflare's logging policy (https://developers.cloudflare.com/1.1.1.1/privacy/public-dns...) and data disclosure practices, the only way US authorities would get anything worthwhile is if they had a specific individual target and a valid legal process. Cloudflare, like most of the big tech companies, is actually very good on this front; they have robust processes and are transparent (https://cf-assets.www.cloudflare.com/slt3lc6tev37/Q1INAiyBub...) about the limited cases in which they do hand over any user data.

(I don't work at Cloudflare, but do work on these issues for another big US tech company.)

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by thejazzman on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:42PM (#39957092)
The US is not the subject of this thread...

> [a] couple in the South-Eastern very conservative Turkish city of Mersin

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by outside1234 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:58PM (#39957176)
Let’s be realistic - this is not about age verification but about restricting people from their rights to view a particular type of content because of how one religion feels about it. The age verification is just the smoke screen the Republicans use to take away your freedoms.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by danShumway on Saturday April 06, 2024 @10:28PM (#39957656)
I don't think this subthread is about the US, but just as a sidenote on the US, Project 2025 directly calls for porn to be made illegal and for attacking Internet providers and companies like Cloudflare that enable its access (https://static.project2025.org/2025_MandateForLeadership_FOR...):

> Pornography, manifested today in the omnipresent propagation of transgender ideology and sexualization of children, for instance, is not a political Gordian knot inextricably binding up disparate claims about free speech, property rights, sexual liberation, and child welfare. It has no claim to First Amendment protection. Its purveyors are child predators and misogynistic exploiters of women. Their product is as addictive as any illicit drug and as psychologically destructive as any crime. Pornography should be outlawed. The people who produce and distribute it should be imprisoned. Educators and public librarians who purvey it should be classed as registered sex offenders. And telecommunications and technology firms that facilitate its spread should be shuttered.

Even in a Conservative-majority court this kind of ban would likely be ruled unconstitutional very quickly, but we should be clear when talking about this kind of thing where it is that a substantial number of Conservative foundations would like to go (https://www.project2025.org/about/advisory-board/). There is a non-trivial Conservative movement to to ban porn.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by kornhole on Monday April 08, 2024 @01:12AM (#39966402)
Agreed Cloudflare is a decent company, but some of us would rather not leave crumbs to pick up if/when things change for the worse.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by heavyset_go on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:27PM (#39955739)
Set them up with some form of DNS over TLS.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by jgalt212 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:16PM (#39956931)
isn't 1.1.1.1 of limited utility from this perspective? The ISP can still see the IP address, and I know more than one IP address can map to a single domain, but you're still leaking information that would allow one's adversaries to guess at one's intent.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by chpatrick on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:19PM (#39955670)
That way the ISP still sees what you're doing though.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by acchow on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:44PM (#39955865)
Only the DNS lookups. Not the content of what you’re viewing over https. Everything after domain name is encrypted
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by slt2021 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:28PM (#39956999)
SNI header from TLS handshake is unencrypted so service providers (and Government's packet inspection engines) absolutely do see what website you are visiting

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Server_Name_Indication

Server Name Indication payload is not encrypted, thus the hostname of the server the client tries to connect to is visible to a passive eavesdropper. This protocol weakness was exploited by security software for network filtering and monitoring[4][5][6] and governments to implement censorship.[7] Presently, there are multiple technologies attempting to hide Server Name Indication.

Also some countries may mandate users to install and trust government's CA certificate which is then used to MITM HTTPS traffic

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazakhstan_man-in-the-middle_a...

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by acchow on Monday April 08, 2024 @01:02AM (#39966356)
But the SNI hostname will only include everything left of the TLD. So that is the TLD, the domain name, and the subdomain. It excludes the rest of the URL.

If you have installed a root cert to allow the government to MITM, then there isn't really anything you can do...

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by slt2021 on Monday April 08, 2024 @12:04PM (#39971067)
SNI is enough to classify traffic for enforcement purposes.

dont forget that if certain SNI is detected, your ISP/government may try to force downgrade TLS or replace server-hello with their own cert - meaning you will need to install government certificate to browse certain websites and 99% of users will do that to get access

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by freedomben on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:47PM (#39955890)
The DNS lookup are often enough. You can try to claim you were shopping for new shoes on pornhub.com, but not many people will buy it
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by toast0 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:15PM (#39956927)
I was just shopping for cpu cooling at OnlyFans?
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by acchow on Saturday April 06, 2024 @07:29PM (#39956641)
Watching for the plot…
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by nurettin on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:58PM (#39955992)
There is no law against going to pornhub.com, the law is only concerned with dns blocking.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by godelski on Saturday April 06, 2024 @07:47PM (#39956757)
Supposing this was 100% accurate, I'm sure that you could understand that going to pornhub.com or definitelynotgayporn.net would arouse suspicion in a government that is banning such behavior and could cause a person to be under higher scrutiny. So even if you're right that the DNS bypass isn't what would technically get them in trouble, I think you can understand the motivation to encrypt your DNS traffic to ensure that you don't get a target painted on your back. And given this, I hope how you can understand that your comment does very little to contribute to the actual conversation and can even potentially mislead others. A lot of communication is implicit (otherwise it'd be incredibly cumbersome)
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by nurettin on Saturday April 06, 2024 @09:40PM (#39957394)
Misleading and disinformation also comes in the form of FUD, does it not?
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by godelski on Sunday April 07, 2024 @12:42AM (#39958232)
You're going to have to clarify what the misleading/disinformation/FUD is. Because I don't see it.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by nurettin on Sunday April 07, 2024 @02:31AM (#39958636)
Just read Every Single Suggestion in your reply.

> going to pornhub.com or definitelynotgayporn.net would arouse suspicion in a government that is banning such behavior

dns blocking doesn't mean adults are banned from visiting porn sites. You start by contradicting your initial concession of assuming this is 100% accurate.

> and could cause a person to be under higher scrutiny. So even if you're right that the DNS bypass isn't what would technically get them in trouble, I think you can understand the motivation to encrypt your DNS traffic to ensure that you don't get a target painted on your back.

This is a prime example of Fear and uncertainty.

> And given this, I hope how you can understand that your comment does very little to contribute to the actual conversation and can even potentially mislead others. A lot of communication is implicit (otherwise it'd be incredibly cumbersome)

And this is doubt. Never fails to accompany the other two.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by godelski on Sunday April 07, 2024 @12:25PM (#39961793)
One of us is very very VERY confused here
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by nurettin on Sunday April 07, 2024 @12:49PM (#39961979)
Yes, and they should stop patronizing.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by bawolff on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:52PM (#39957150)
I feel like the type of places with heavy handed censorship are also not the type of places you want to go "well, actually..." to the government.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by nurettin on Saturday April 06, 2024 @09:59PM (#39957488)
That approach is way too apprehensive.

Those idiots tried to block google docs once.

It didn't go well as you might imagine. ERs, research institutes and several government facilities responded with cordial letters about the court's mental state. Then it was unblocked.

The reason they get to keep the porn bans is because it isn't enforced upon adults, and it does serve as a thin layer of protection against minors.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by tawai on Sunday April 07, 2024 @04:00AM (#39959097)
Imagine lecturing people about their own countries, how arrogant can you be?
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by omoikane on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:52PM (#39957147)
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by akdev1l on Saturday April 06, 2024 @09:28PM (#39957334)
Yeah. An oppressive government will for sure take your excuse of “I was just learning math on PornHub”.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by wkat4242 on Monday April 08, 2024 @04:18AM (#39967407)
As if you will get a chance to explain in the dark hole they throw you in :(
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by baobabKoodaa on Saturday April 06, 2024 @09:36PM (#39957372)
Well, in some parts of the world the lie may be "I was watching 100% straight heterosexual porn, no homo". So a DNS lookup to pornhub.com does not reveal the lie.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by semi on Monday April 08, 2024 @11:46AM (#39970891)
or just claim ignorance. or the opposite and claim browser DNS prefetching when a blog spam comment linked to pornhub
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by samatman on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:34PM (#39955787)
Reminds me of a... peculiarity in Turkey. Men are required to serve a mandatory term in the military, but are exempt if they're homosexual. However, to prevent this being used as a loophole to evade service, the men in question must prove that they're gay.

This has resulted in the Turkish military having a very large collection of amateur gay porn.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by archon1410 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @06:01PM (#39956029)
Apparently it doesn't happen anymore.

> The system has been undergoing change for the past few years: Lambda Istanbul's lawyer Fırat Söyle stated in 2012 that the rectal examinations, and the photographic evidence of anal intercourse have been dismissed as requirements when they gained worldwide and national media attention.

— https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pink_certificate

But from when it did happen, it sounds... bad.

> "With the picture it was a bit difficult. The face had to be recognizable as well as the penis and the ass. To put all this into a square was a bit complicated. Twice I got cramps because of the position. […] I also got humiliated at the selection, before they announce it [the final diagnosis]. There are about 12 military people, big ones, with uniforms and everything. […] They all looked one by one at the pictures and I had to bring ten pictures, ten different positions there. This is the difficulty of course, but I managed to do it. And at every single picture they looked and compared it with me. I was standing in the middle. And then they asked me questions. For example which positions I like and if I use this position they see regularly. Questions like that." — Irlenkauser, Julian. "Gender Identities and the Turkish Military." Thesis. European University Viadrina / Istanbul Bilgi University, 2012.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by wkat4242 on Monday April 08, 2024 @04:19AM (#39967417)
It's weird anyway. I know gay people that never do anal. That seems a weird "proof" despite it being completely out of line to expect that anyway.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by kilroy123 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:02PM (#39956850)
I've never once heard of this, and I've spent years living in Turkey.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by superb_dev on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:53PM (#39955949)
So they’re forced to choose between military service or having sex on camera? I’m not sure I’d call that “amateur porn” if it’s not consensual
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Dylan16807 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:59PM (#39956011)
Wanting to get out of a pre-existing obligation that every man has, and most don't get out of, should not qualify as lack of consent.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by noman-land on Saturday April 06, 2024 @06:03PM (#39956050)
The obligation itself already lacks consent so anything you feel forced to do to get out of it is similarly non-consentual.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Dylan16807 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @06:10PM (#39956095)
If by "similarly" you mean "equally bad at most", then I can agree with that.

But I think most people would rate non-consensual sex as significantly worse than a non-consensual day job.

So if you say the sex on camera is not consensual, you're implying a very different kind of consent violation than is actually happening.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by eastbound on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:40PM (#39957074)
> most people would rate non-consensual sex as significantly worse than a non-consensual day job

The argument here is non-consensual. No work is totally consensual, since you need to survive. You accept a life-long inconvenience in exchange for a beautiful house. Can we make sex consensual in exchange for a large enough inconvenience? The response lies in an experiment: Propose a menial job to prostitutes. Even at the same rate, most prefer their occupation. Therefore it’s consensual.

A funny quirk about non-consensual work is that the 1930’s ILO convention against slavery and forced work… excluded able-bodied men in age of working (article 11). Which kind of defeats the purpose of the convention.

This article was only abolished in 1957.

But compulsory military service still exists in probably half of the world countries.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by superb_dev on Wednesday April 10, 2024 @03:35AM (#39987976)
What part of that isn't a lack of consent? Forced consent is not consent, their only other option was forced military service.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by basil-rash on Saturday April 06, 2024 @07:43PM (#39956742)
The Overton window has shifted such that two adults agreeing to engage in sexual activity in front of a camera can be in any way considered “non-consensual”? Wild.

Do you think adult actors agreeing to engage in sexual activity in front of a camera, but only because they have chosen to do that for a living when other viable employment alternatives were available, is also “non-consensual”?

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by godelski on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:00PM (#39956833)
> in any way considered “non-consensual”? Wild.

Consensual means without coercion and being of sound mind.

Let's put it this way, do you consider a quid-pro-quo scenario where a boss will promote or give a raise to a female employee if she has sex with him "consensual?" Obviously this is arguable in both directions (as we could say that this is a contract between two adults, but then again, prostitution is illegal). What about if we change this to "Have sex with your boss or be fired?" The latter case is less ambiguous, but both cases would generally be considered non-consensual in Western legal systems and has been that way for quite some time. This is nothing new...

If you understand the above but fail to think "You *must* enter the military service, for 3 years, and are likely to go to combat and have a high risk of being killed or seriously injured (physically or even more likely mentally), or you can go to jail, OR put your dick in some guy's ass" I think you can understand how that constitutes significant cohesion. If you are unable to understand this, I am here to inform you that you are overfit and not robust to general problems.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Dylan16807 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:18PM (#39956942)
> hat about if we change this to "Have sex with your boss or be fired?"

Definite coercion as stated.

But if the boss is already set on firing everyone in the department, but lets one or two people stay on if they have sex with him, I consider that to be a roundabout method of quid-pro-quo prostitution. Plus embezzlement. There's no retaliation if they say no, they go home like everyone else.

And the military example is similar, there's no retaliation, most men are doing the service. The offer of an alternate option, one that very few take, is not the problem here.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by godelski on Sunday April 07, 2024 @12:17AM (#39958159)
> But if the boss is already set on firing everyone in the department, but lets one or two people stay on if they have sex with him

But we'd still call this coercion. The "dual" of this is "have sex with me or be fired." Just because not everyone gets to have that opportunity does not mean it is not the same question stated differently.

> And the military example is similar, there's no retaliation, most men are doing the service.

There is retaliation, it's called jail.

Just because others are doing it doesn't make it any less of a coercion. This scales too.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Dylan16807 on Sunday April 07, 2024 @02:45AM (#39958713)
> Just because not everyone gets to have that opportunity does not mean it is not the same question stated differently.

To me, it matters significantly if refusing is retaliated against or is neutral.

If having sex with the boss is the difference between 0 firings and 1 firing, that's retaliation. If it's the difference between 95% fired and 100% fired, that's not retaliation.

Also we can say everyone gets the offer if that matters.

-

The other "dual" of this is a version where some employees have already been offered money for sex, but by a completely unrelated party. So if they want they can go take that offer now that they have more free time and only so much severance pay. (Also I am assuming they can get a new job easily enough; there are no destitution-based consent problems in this hypothetical.)

Does consent hinge on who is making the offer?

> There is retaliation, it's called jail.

You misunderstand me. There is no retaliation for not doing the gay sex thing. The default expectation is that you won't do it.

Retaliation for refusing to serve in the military is a different matter. And also why I think the mandatory service is where the actual consent issues are.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by valicord on Sunday April 07, 2024 @12:38AM (#39958222)
Am I understanding your position right? If you have 10 employees and say to 1 of them "have sex with me or you're fired" - that's coercion. If you have 10 employees and say to each of them (separately) "have sex with me or you're fired" - also coercion. If you have 10 employees and say to 5 "have sex with me or you're fired" and to the other 5 just "you're fired" - suddenly no longer coercion?
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Dylan16807 on Sunday April 07, 2024 @03:15AM (#39958856)
No, that's not it.

At its core, it's about whether you're trying to pressure them into sex with you.

I should have specifically said everyone gets the offer, to keep it simple. If the expectation is that basically everyone refuses, then it's not very different from walking around town and telling random people you'll hire them if they have sex with you. Which is just prostitution, not coercion.

Whether someone feels pressured is a difficult communication problem. It's hard to reduce to a simple thought experiment.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by eastbound on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:47PM (#39957117)
Another aspect is the prevalence of bullying against gays, once pictures are taken. If gays are sometimes killed even in France (Lyon, 2015), it’s worth wondering whether you want photos of yourself at 18, in a country that could evolve both ways for the rest of your life.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by willcipriano on Saturday April 06, 2024 @07:47PM (#39956756)
"Hey I made this guy really mad go fight him for me"

"No he will kill me!"

"Alternatively you could have sex and let me film it"

Consent.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Dylan16807 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:00PM (#39956836)
The problem is in line 1, not line 3.

There would be some serious issues with 3 if 1 was a fake threat meant to push you into 3, but it's not. The vast majority go along with 1.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by willcipriano on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:06PM (#39956873)
I see it as rape with a implied third party threat of violence instead of a first party one.

You may feel differently if you feel that men's bodies belong to the state to be used in wars.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Dylan16807 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:21PM (#39956955)
The violence was already there. It's not a threat to say and honestly mean "otherwise nothing changes (99% of people pick this option)".

The consent issues are all in the forced service itself, and apply to every man equally, whether or not they take the gay proof exemption.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by godelski on Sunday April 07, 2024 @12:32AM (#39958202)
The violence was not "already there." The violence is generated by the men who are not at risk of going to war.

There's an old saying about two people of different nationalities:

  The difference between you and me is smaller than the difference between us and our respective leaders.
Leaders must convince the public that some person in a far away land hates them and is coming to kill them, because otherwise no one gives a fuck. Because frankly, no one is going to come into contact with another. Normal people are not the ones going to invade other countries and claim territory.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Dylan16807 on Sunday April 07, 2024 @03:19AM (#39958877)
I meant that the violence is a combination of "already caused by the leaders" and "foregone conclusion".

If you opt not to take the gay sex exemption, your fate is the same as if you had never been asked.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by godelski on Sunday April 07, 2024 @12:18PM (#39961744)
> and "foregone conclusion"

I'm unconvinced and be hard pressed to be.

> your fate is the same as if you had never been asked.

This is absolutely not true and is literally the entire reason people go to great lengths to do it. Not understanding this is probably why you're not understanding the rest. I'm not sure how you don't get it because if you're gay you're not going to military service and you're not going to jail. If you're not gay (or not faking) your choice is military service or jail. That's not "the same" no matter how you put it.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Dylan16807 on Sunday April 07, 2024 @03:04PM (#39962927)
> I'm unconvinced and be hard pressed to be.

The leaders do bad things whether or not a few gay people join or get exemptions. Why are you not convinced of that?

> This is absolutely not true and is literally the entire reason people go to great lengths to do it.

I said if you don't take the gay option, your fate is the same as if you had never been asked. You do military service or go to jail, like everyone else.

You're talking about taking it. Of course it's different if you take it.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by godelski on Sunday April 07, 2024 @04:54PM (#39963819)
> The leaders do bad things whether or not a few gay people join or get exemptions.

I'm convinced of this. But this is not what you said.

In fact, that's kinda the theme of this conversation and the one you're having with others

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Dylan16807 on Sunday April 07, 2024 @07:27PM (#39964832)
When I said "otherwise nothing changes", what did you think I meant?

I thought it was reasonably clear I was talking about how this gay exemption plays out, not the entire world of possibilities.

And for the line that says "your fate is the same", I made that very direct and explicit and you somehow skipped half of the sentence to interpret it in an entirely different way. That one is definitely not my fault.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by superb_dev on Wednesday April 10, 2024 @03:32AM (#39987957)
Two adults agreeing to engage in sexual activity in front of a camera, because their only other option is forced military service.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by samatman on Sunday April 07, 2024 @11:11AM (#39961286)
My position is that the requirement was humiliating (a sibling comment says this has been discontinued, which is all to the good) and there's nothing consensual about mandatory military service. This was all explained to me in a verbal conversation, so I could be wrong about this part, but homosexuals didn't have to skip their military service, however many wanted to because they would be punished if caught in the act, so to speak. That makes deciding whether or not to submit photographic evidence into a pretty hard decision, but again, the nonconsensual part is being forced to serve in the military in the first place.

I would also guess that the number of men who submitted to anal intercourse on camera with someone they wouldn't normally have sex with is approximately zero, so it qualifies as consensual in the ordinary sense. I'm not sure calling the result "amateur gay porn" is the ideal way to put it, but it is in fact all of amateur, pornographic, and gay.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by leeoniya on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:39PM (#39955829)
this is basically that family guy episode where Quagmire tries to get out of his marriage to a hooker.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by noman-land on Saturday April 06, 2024 @06:01PM (#39956030)
This story is oddly wholesome.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by rrr_oh_man on Sunday April 07, 2024 @05:23PM (#39964058)
Thanks haha
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by not_a_dane on Saturday April 06, 2024 @05:17PM (#39955652)
UK is also censoring porn sites...
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by sph on Saturday April 06, 2024 @06:25PM (#39956213)
Only with crappy ISPs like Virgin, which has court-mandated DNS bans for many websites (like ThePirateBay)

I use Zen which has no such restriction. Though for safety all my illegal activity is done via VPN because this is still a Five Eyes country.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by PaulDavisThe1st on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:00PM (#39956838)
EE also does this by default (you can turn it off, but you have to contact them)
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by sph on Sunday April 07, 2024 @01:31AM (#39958382)
It's Three that asks for credit card numbers before watching the nudes.

I actually switched to EE and they have no such restriction.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by gambiting on Saturday April 06, 2024 @06:38PM (#39956303)
Friendly reminder that all ISPs in the UK are required to store your entire browsing history for a full year, and 17 government agencies, including the Department of Agriculture, can access it without a warrant. Snoopers Act has been passed and lives on for years now, and I'm yet to meet a person who is even slightly bothered by it.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by chgs on Saturday April 06, 2024 @06:46PM (#39956363)
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by Footkerchief on Saturday April 06, 2024 @07:38PM (#39956708)
> Don’t all ISPs have retention notices? Probably not (for the reasons above), but this is not public information, and ISPs and others subject to retention notices face statutory prohibitions on disclosure.

> If all Internet access providers were subject to retention notices, wouldn’t it be easier to say that? There would be no need to dance around issues of secrecy, or explain why the list of notice recipients cannot be published. The fact that the Home Office chooses to take this approach undermines the claim that all providers have notices.

This source appears to be engaging in wishful thinking.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by chgs on Sunday April 07, 2024 @06:28AM (#39959810)
The people at my isp insist they don’t store anything other than bandwidth use (which is exposed to me so I know that already)

I don’t keep much data at work for that long

If it is a thing it’s either a massive conspiracy across thousands of network engineers or you could point to some technical details on how it’s implemented.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by gambiting on Sunday April 07, 2024 @07:23AM (#39960055)
It's not a conspiracy, they just can't say by law. Did you expect them to tell you if they have an order from the Home Office telling them to not divuldge this information under the threat of massive fines and jail time?
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by chgs on Tuesday April 09, 2024 @03:07PM (#39983011)
Thousands of people, including a few friends and dozens of acquaintances, including those who have retired, emigrated, and changed citizenship, are all successfully keeping silent about this.

That’s by definition a conspiracy

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by 77pt77 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @06:04PM (#39956056)
At this point Turkey is probably more free than the UK.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by levidos on Saturday April 06, 2024 @06:58PM (#39956444)
Can you elaborate please? The UK isn't blocking gay porn sites for example.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by imwillofficial on Saturday April 06, 2024 @07:06PM (#39956488)
I think freedom of speech is an obvious example.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by rsynnott on Saturday April 06, 2024 @07:31PM (#39956660)
… You think freedom of speech is worse in the UK than in Erdogan’s Turkey? Just what do you think is going on in the UK?
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by fullspectrumdev on Saturday April 06, 2024 @11:15PM (#39957884)
I’ve noticed Americans get some… extremely weird and biased reporting about free speech in the UK. Extreme outlier cases like that Count Dankula guy get reported as the norm.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by fullspectrumdev on Saturday April 06, 2024 @11:14PM (#39957876)
I think you are smoking crack if you think Turkey has more freedom of speech than the UK.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by imwillofficial on Sunday April 07, 2024 @11:00AM (#39961211)
Do you have any data to support your assertion or are you just making things up?
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by fullspectrumdev on Monday April 08, 2024 @04:25AM (#39967456)
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by imwillofficial on Tuesday April 09, 2024 @01:10PM (#39981558)
Thanks!
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by BiteCode_dev on Saturday April 06, 2024 @07:33PM (#39956673)
Hopefully their country doesn't outlow watching porn itself, because in that case they are just accumulating evidences against them.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by wolverine876 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:38PM (#39957065)
> The absolute joy they had when I showed them how to set up 1.1.1.1 on their Android TV, phones, and laptops… so they could watch unrestricted gay porn in their heavily censored and state-controlled slice of the World Wide Web…

I'd be very careful giving security advice to someone in that situation - in fact, I probably wouldn't do it, even though I am an experienced professional who knows more than most people in IT.

Think about accuracy, which is correctness, completeness, and consistency:

Giving security advice to buddies trying to watch out-of-country sporting events has a much different accuracy requirement than advice for someone whose liberty, life, or pursuit of happiness (assets) are at stake. If your advice is incorrect, incomplete (you don't know or account for the entire picture), or inconsistent (different pieces of your advice don't line up) - these people don't miss their favorite team, the might go to jail, get tortured, lose their children, their careers, etc.

When I give professional security advice, I spend a lot of time on it. I make sure I know the whole picture, my advice is correct - rechecking old understandings, testing and retesting, etc. - and it's consistent. These people are trusting me. And then if I'm not sure of those things, I find someone who knows better than I do. I don't have time to do that at the Airbnb.

In this case, it seems to risk incorrectness and incompleteness: It may be incorrect because setting up DNS lookups so there are no leaks is tricky - I'm not even sure how to do it reliably. For example, some apps and OSes have DNS servers hardcoded; IME some just bypass your configuration (maybe the dev just didn't care to integrate with the system DNS settings); IIRC some have hardcoded fallbacks; sometimes the client overrides your config with the local gateway or the servers it supplies; also, DNS has a complex federated infrastructure. (My first stab at secure DNS is a secure VPN that doesn't leak - that seems much easier).

It's incomplete: the authorities might not see the DNS lookups but they will clearly see the IPs that the user accesses, including those of the porn websites.

These people are trusting you and you told them they could safely look at porn. Yikes, I would not want that responsibility without some serious work.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by m3kw9 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @08:52PM (#39957151)
If they aren’t technical enough to know your setup, they won’t know their current setup either. No big deal, keep it relaxed.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by tawai on Sunday April 07, 2024 @03:59AM (#39959087)
No shit they can safely watch gay porn, it isn’t Russia/Iran
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by wkat4242 on Monday April 08, 2024 @04:15AM (#39967388)
Well, by blocking it they're already well on the way there of course.

Blocking is step 1. Monitoring step 2. After that it starts getting into physical danger territory.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by bgnn on Sunday April 07, 2024 @11:22AM (#39961356)
You clearly have no idea about Turkey and the situation. Watching porn isn't persecuted. The conservetive government just forced ISPs to ban them from their DNS. It was always available by using Google DNS and the whole country does this for like 15-20 years now.
Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by wolverine876 on Sunday April 07, 2024 @03:59PM (#39963369)
I specifically said I don't know; that's one reason I would be very careful. Notice that your response is to assume complete and correct knowledge of your own.

I do know that being LGBTQ+ is persecuted in many places, even in the US; I know what is overlooked now can be persecuted later, even many years later; I know that in most places Internet usage is recorded and is used to build detailed profiles of users, and that those records are retained indefinitely.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by akdev1l on Saturday April 06, 2024 @09:25PM (#39957318)
I wouldn’t be breaking the law under a repressive government without at least a VPN in the middle.

DNS queries still leak the domain unless the client is using DoH.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by tawai on Sunday April 07, 2024 @03:54AM (#39959061)
Some people are reaching to really wrong conclusions from this post, so a couple of pointers

1. Gay porn is not specifically blocked in Turkey, porn is; so gay porn watchers would be mostly indistinguishable from any porn watchers via their evasion techniques

2. Not that it matters as you are free to be gay in Turkey

3. Not that it matters again, because access to blocked content is never prosecuted. No one ever receives letters from their ISP even for pirating

4. Calling the internet state controlled is a bit far imo, smaller ISPs don’t even apply some blocks and comparatively USDoJ can do domain seizures which is not too different from what happens there (websites being blocked via court orders and “administrative preventative measures”). Although I’d agree that the line for blocking is drawn too close.

5. I also wouldn’t call Mersin very conservative, the left CHP just won the municipal election with ~60% of the votes

One last thing, ISPs have moved on to using DPI to block websites so you might wanna suggest something like green-tunnel so they can up their game.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by rrr_oh_man on Sunday April 07, 2024 @04:39AM (#39959313)
Have you registered just to say that everything is a-ok in Turkey?

Not to be overly suspicious, but it sounds very much like government-sponsored astroturfing.

Re:Porn restrictions are leading to a VPN boom by tawaii2 on Sunday April 07, 2024 @07:56AM (#39960156)
I had just contacted hn support to de-associate my posts from my username so I’d feel guilty about posting with my regular account again. Now it’s only posting with throwaways that I don’t even keep track of the passwords of (hence a new username now).

Everything is not ok in Turkey, there’s lots and lots of stuff that needs to be fixed re: gay rights and acceptance in general public plus millions more of other things which led me to leave the country; but having to hide gay porn habits from the government/my isp was not one of them. Again, it’s not Iran or Russia.