I was just reading through the interview process for RED, and they specifically forbid the use of VPN during the interview. I don’t understand this requirement, and it seems like it would just leak your IP address to the IRC host, which could potentially be used against you in a honeypot scenario. Once they have your IP, they could link that with the credentials used with the tracker while you are torrenting, regardless of if you used VPN while torrenting.
RED is so not a honeypot. Y’all paranoid. If your threat model includes hiding your IP from one of the most respected private trackers in the game, then you should probably stick to public where they don’t care if you use a different VPN every time you log in.
My point wasn’t so much that I think RED is shady but that exposing my IP seems like an unnecessary requirement to join. Why can I not have my membership tracked via an anonymous account? If they are concerned about account harvesting or something, then the interview already seems like a good enough measure, accompanied by seed ratio minimums.
People selling invites and ban avoidance is why they do this. I was sketched out when I first had to do this like 7 years ago and I can tell you I don’t regret it for a minute. RED has an invites forum that will get you invites to some of the best trackers out there.
In my experience, almost all of the private trackers worth joining require you to connect to the site with your home IP. But, you can use your torrent client through a VPN. So the other users don’t see your home address.
I understand the caution. But, if it scares you away from joining you will be missing out.
You know how in these kinds of discussions there’s always a bunch of nobodies who come crawling out of the woodwork to defend the person or group being accused or pointed out for doing shady shit. I don’t know it just seems weird and suspicious. Apparently I’m not the only one who noticed because they’re getting rather aggressively downvoted.
I’ve been on red for over 7 years now. It’s one of the best resources for music on the internet. Calling members “nobodies” for defending a community we care about is pretty lame.
I understand being skeptical about requiring the use of home internet to connect to the site. But, it’s kind of a requirement to keep people from avoiding bans, using accounts with stolen credentials, or selling invites (big problem).
Because FEDs and movie studio lawyers would use anonymous accounts. All of these requirements exist for one reason, to protect the site and it’s users. If you want anonymous then you should stick to public trackers.
I agree. But, I believe it’s more for ban avoidance and invite sellers than anything.
Agree. None of these lemmings must have interviewed for MaM either. FnP didn’t have that requirement, I don’t think, but it’s not out of the ordinary for private tracker interviews.
Make sure your users can read and actually internalize it. Should help with moderation lol