warfacegod wrote:

Okay, update time. In short:

Had to leave the room because the guy I was splitting it with found out he has cancer, freaked out and quit his job. I ran out of money pretty damned quick. Slept in my old spot (don't remember if I mentioned it earlier but it's an unlocked State car in the Hartford Superior Court underground parking garage. Ballsy as shit, right?) for a week or two. Then I met this guy on the street and we became fast friends. Stayed with him for most of December. Thorsday, I'm out on my ass again. Landlady showed up with a box truck and a Marshall. Apparently the laws dealing with eviction and veterans actually just streamline the process. So now I'm back to "living" in the parking garage.

Yes we treat Vets very well here. Should be a warning to the rest of us but we seem to be able to ignore it most of the time.

Really hope you can find something better. Or at least more permanent. At least somewhere you can stash some stuff in a somewhat secure way.

audiomick wrote:

Hope things have picked up a bit.

Some what.

audiomick wrote:

ranchhand wrote:

Seemed a strange question to me somehow.

That's the pattern. Seen it, as I said, four of five times here. It starts with an innocent post like that one was, the first post from a new user. They have all been slightly odd questions, but not odd enough to say that it is definitely a bot.

Nothing happens for a day or two, maybe someone will answer. Then a new post from the user turns up. It is simply a quote of the first one (so you didn't miss anything there...), maybe with something like "thanks for the help" or "I've solved my issue" or something on the end.

The trick is, in the quoted text, there have been links inserted that weren't there in the first post that was quoted. I reckon the theory is, if the thread survives the first look from a mod, it might not get looked at again, and the links might survive longer in the forum. Maybe they are even sophisticated enough to only put in the second post when there has been action in the thread. Anyway, it is spam, and they get deleted and banned here. 😁

I actually understand quite well. I actually did a lot of that stuff for the old Stoner Edition forum. Small outfit but good traffic. But got at least 7 or 8 of those creeps weekly sometimes it seemed like a whole herd of the buggers would run through the place.

Got so we would see how good a track we could get on the IP address. Sometimes we got several that were in the same city block as a half dozen we had already blocked. Just about had to be the same people.

Links in text. Links in signatures. Links in PMs.

But with a name like that you can hardly be surprised either.

warfacegod wrote:

My understanding is that Tor along with most, if not all, of the VPN's is now completely compromised.

I don't know about completely compromised but for most of us the only way onto any other network is first through our ISP. So your first connection is known. That is a pretty big deal and as any old hunter or farm/ranch hand that has to track animals in tough country will tell you that one true track is the one you have to find. Find that and you are better than half way to the next track.

I think if you live in a well populated area with unsecured wifi available, and several devices to connect with, you could probably be pretty secure on about any VPN if you used a rotating bunch of hardware to connect with and wifi spots widely spaced and not repeated. Expensive and very shaky due to any tracked animals tendency to, with enough tracks (evidence) to form patterns.

And all the tracker really has to do is be lucky once and you have to be lucky every time. Good luck with that.

So it doesn't really matter if they are totally compromised or not. All they have to be is accessible to a tracker once at the right time and you are screwed.

I have always thought that an independent, long haul truck driver may have the best chance of getting away with that sort of thing the longest. As long as they were actually independent and worked different odd hauling jobs through different brokers all the time. Would make for a long search for a pattern. Also have the risk of someone, sometime actually noticing the number of devices in your rig. That happens you are busted. But it could take years. And cost you several years because each devise would be a separate batch of charges.

This country is not the place to play that sort of games. Almost anywhere else is better. All are really not a good idea.

Mirknight wrote:

Piracy is a very grey area legally. In most of the US (some specific locations have local laws that differ, but lack the means to find and prosecute offenders) only uploaders of pirated media (this is why torrenting pirated media is a big risk) can face any legal penalties.

Downloading pirated media is surprisingly still legal, though I have no idea why. I agree that using Kodi to do that is highly problematic, especially if laws related to receiving pirated media become a reality in countries which currently permit it. Another reason using Kodi is problematic is unless properly isolated [sandboxed] from the rest of the system, you're trusting a tool with dubious legality. Any site or app with dubious legality is always coming with some sort of risk, as displayed in pirateBay's use of browser-based bitcoin mining to mention one of the least problematic effects from one of the largest sites associated with piracy.

If you actually study IP law you will find that the US is one of the most repressive countries when it comes to laws that effect their citizens behavior.

I use Debian. They are, actually like most distros, a bit reluctant to put out software that in illegal in ANY country. If you look in the deb-multimedia repo you will find some fine open source applications that are no in servers controlled by Debian because they don't want banned from those countries that have outlawed those applications. Like handbrake.

If you sort through all those applications and then list them under repressive governments you will find that the US actually outlaws more applications than say Iran. Or the Saudis.

A number of them are illegal to posses in the US. And are definitely illegal to distribute.

Remember that this is the country that gave MS the legal authority to actually be in charge of and plan physical raids on servers suspected of distribution of IP using US Marshals as MS deputies basically and lead by MS lawyers.

Watch your butt.

nubimax wrote:

The problem as I see it is that devuan will not let you upgrade from firefox esr. the only work around that I have found calls for you to change your sources list, add a key ring, then find a deb pkg to allow a newer version of firefox. my trouble with that is the fonts in the root terminal are so small I can see them even with my magnifying glass. maybe after the eye surgery I will be able to see things that small. Thinking now of putting debian on the main computer and going with that till after the surgery.
@GB ublock will not download to firefox esr. but thanks for the info

dinga

I have been using
http://winhelp2002.mvps.org/hosts.txt

Actually using the same address but with .html instead of .txt since Win98. I have never used an addblocker.

They are a scam. They make money by NOT BLOCKING sites that pay them. This guy looks for where the adds come from and doesn't "block" at all like an addblocker.

Add blockers block the domain name in your browser. This is not the ip address.

This text file goes in your /etc/hosts file and just adds a few thousand lines to it. Each line is like the ones in this sample
0.0.0.0 banners.adnetmedia.lt
0.0.0.0 delivery.adnetwork.vn
0.0.0.0 img.adnet.com.tr
0.0.0.0 www.ad-net.co.uk
0.0.0.0 adnext.fr
0.0.0.0 srv.adngin.com
0.0.0.0 ad.adnow.com
0.0.0.0 acdn.adnxs.com
0.0.0.0 speednetwork14.adk2.co
0.0.0.0 cdn.oas-c17.adnxs.com
0.0.0.0 tt11.adobe.com

When you try to connect to any domain, most people know that the domain name needs to be translated to an actual ip address and the request is therefore sent to a dns (domain name server) and there is a list, pretty much like these lines and it goes through until it finds the right domain name and then sends it to the assigned correct Ipv4 address.

What people don't know generally is that isn't the first place that the request goes. The DEFAULT FIRST place to look up a domain name, no matter what OS you are using, is the /*/hosts file (I don't remember where that is in Windows and don't, frankly care).

As you can see in the first column is a very simple Ipv4 address. 0.0.0.0 which is another way of expressing 127.0.0.1 which is the address of your current OS. If you have 45 installs on your drives they all have that same address and use it when you are booted into them.

So when you open a site and it sends, through your browser, a request for
refer.ccbill.com

your system goes to work and checks the hosts file and finds
0.0.0.0 refer.ccbill.com #[Tracking.Cookie][Google.Diagnostic]

and connects it to
0.0.0.0

And you get all the stuff that "site" has that belongs to that domain name. Not a damned thing. And neither do they.

Blocklist is updated about every 2 months.

You may find that some sites don't work. I have run into maybe a dozen or so in the last 21 years of using this. They aren't worth accessing generally but if you really want to all you need do is use the search function in your favorite text editor and plug in the domain name of the failed site. Hit enter. Will take you to it if, indeed it actually exists, and all you need to do is (as root or editing with sudo) comment out that line. Save file. Go try the site again. It will now work because it is no longer being directed to a safe and empty address. Will still check the hosts file, will not find the domain name, will send the request on to your ISP which probably has a dns server. If it can't find it the request goes on to a bigger dns.

Don't block adds. Block toxic servers. Most of the servers on that list are used to serve up malware, scams and watering hole attacks. That is a major business for them and they know it. And their well meaning attempts at blocking it are just as well meaning and effective as those of FB and Guggle.

Just gets worse by the year.

There are sites that still sell adds themselves. Click on those adds. Those sites don't use the more lucrative malware add providers. They put their personal name on the line but offering you adds. Adds they have approved. They can't go to court and say well we get adds from Guggle and that is their responsibility. Click on them and give them a few pennies for that hit without a large chunk of it going to Guggle or the other sleazy companies in that racket.

If you use Windows use that same address above with the .html instead of .txt. Will get the main page and there is a link for the actual .exe file you need for Win JerryLewis Pro or whatever version of Win you use and just download it and execute it to have it put itself in your hosts file.

In Linux you need to add it to your /etc/hosts manually. Which is faster. Just put it below the current stuff in that file. Some will be duplicated - this is not a problem.

audiomick wrote:

@ Ranchhand: Nice to see you writing again from me too. 😀

@ Dinga: hope the OP works out. ☺️

Life has been a bit tough lately and just haven't felt all that sociable. More than my normal Grumpy Geezer self.

Felt it was better to just be quiet.

nubimax wrote:

Hey ranchhand I have not seen you here for a while. Not that I see much but I am told by the eye quick that she can now fix that she says that the retina specialist gave her the go ahead to take out the cataracts and replace the lens in my with artificial lens. I go tomorrow for measurement of the lens.
Hope all of yours are doing good.
dinga

trying to type without contacts and classes is a bitch. I can put the contacts back in after the measurement tomorrow.

Have fun with that. Really does help. I had both eyes worked on a few years back. Hurt like hell for a while afterwards. But I didn't realize that they put in corrective lenses. I just thought it would be standard lenses and that my vision would remain the same.

I don't require glasses now to drive. Have all my life. Near sighted is putting it mildly. Someone gets a 1.5" medicine bottle and can't read the fine print they didn't need a magnifying glass at all - just hand it to me. No problem. But really couldn't see much past the end of my arm.

Now I still have slight astigmatism. And actually require mild reading glasses. Can't read the ultra fine print any more. But being able to actually see detail from a long ways is actually pretty damned nice.

So I hope it goes great for you.

Mirknight wrote:

So Android Kodi is still safe?
I know this is late as hell but feel this needs said.

Kodi, not an application that I actually like all that much, has always been save to use. All the repos that offer "improvements" for Kodi are not trustworthy in the least.

I can't say I personally have anything against "piracy" of stuff on the web but it is a criminal offense. But being stupid enough to use Kodi as a tool for such is just that. Stupid.

While it doesn't appeal to me, I keep trying it about once a year and removing it a day or a week later, the project has my admiration. They do a good job of what they are doing. People misusing it with those "improvements" are giving it a bad name and could, possibly, destroy the project. Don't do that.

If you feel you need to - at least use your head. First get those "improvements" is a safe manner. Download them with a live session to a stick and then - very carefully and completely check them for malware.

And then if you use them use them with at least a good vpn and preferably the tor network. Being prosecuted (or persecuted if you prefer that term) is expensive and causes long term harm to yourself. This needs taken into consideration as a cost in your calculations.

In my opinion there is very little out there that is worth the risk but people do it all the time. They need to think on it a bit. May come up with an answer that is very different than mine. Fine with me. But think about it.

audiomick wrote:

Turns out, the User who started the thread was most likey a Bot. I deleted a post here that was a quote of the first post with a bunch of links added to it. I've seen that a couple of times here. The user has been banned. Thanks for trying to help. ☺️

Thanks for your good work. Seemed a strange question to me somehow.

Kind of sorry I missed the second post. I can live without it. Particularly the links.