cramert

Last week Florian Cramer came by to tell us a bit more about the internet. Actually, one of the first things Florian talked about was about our current perception when we hear the word 'internet'.

In general, most people will think of a web browser when they hear the word 'internet'. This is only a part of the internet however. WWW is not the same as the internet. A quick example for this is email. Both email and browsing are part of the internet, but they are 2 different protocols. In the end all this information has to be converted to 1's and 0's to reach the other side of a cable anyway. They're just different ways of translating it back and forth over the internet.

Florian made a remark about how he liked memes because of the way they spread throughout the internet as an unstoppable force.

During his lecture, Florian showed the website Monitis (shown above). It explains where your query for a website passes through before it finally gets to the website and back. The query went to the US, China and Australia. He told us that every time it passes through one of these places the information could be checked. There are ways to try and protect/hide your information but for the most of us we can just assume it is possible to read our information. This is what I found the most interesting bit about the lecture. I always assumed my web behaviour was being checked by my ISP or government (not focused on me as a person but like an overall scan) but never really thought much about it. Maybe I didn't want to know, I guess. Seeing that graph just woke me up some more about how unprivate the internet is at this moment.

traceroute.monitis.com shows that my query for Rotterdam.nl passes through the US and UK for whatever reason.

Since I can't be the first person to feel watched and have the need for privacy I decided to check the web to see what other people have been doing for hiding their presence on the internet. Here are some quick examples of 'hiding'.

Private browsing is the first that comes to mind. Though this clearly states your ISP will be able to check your history. It is a start to hiding yourself, even if it is from your significant other or housemates.

Proxies act as a 'between'. Every data you send goes through a server that changes your IP(so, location/ID for sites etc.) to something else. There are a lot of proxies out there. They can be used to hide yourself or fake being from a different country (to get American Netflix for instance.) These services usually ask for a certain amount of money.

Tor is a relay network that encrypts your data relay by relay. It's one of the bigger known networks, but it is new to me.

These are just 3 small examples. There are many more out there, as more people try and hide their presence. For know I'm personally fine with just knowing (and accepting) that I leave an online footprint and my use of the internet can be traced back if needed. But maybe next time if I have to tell something really personal I'll go and have a cup of coffee instead ;)