2y ago

How to seed properly and safely?

I heard that in some countries you can get fined for using torrents or seeding beyond a certain limit (Das Deutschlandlied intensifies). How to seed so that no idiot government would get hands on the fact that you are downloading torrents? I am pretty sure I can do this using Tails OS but what else? Is there a safe way to SEED TILL YOU BLEED?

It would have been nice if we (someone but not me) could have created a website where we could read a particular country's law and how to torrent safely from there.

36 comments

i live in the US. seeding and torrenting in general is relatively safe here, although sometimes you'll get a nastygram from your ISP because a copyright industry plant on one of the torrents told on you. the easiest way by far to prevent that is by getting a VPN. go with something paid (free ones do shady stuff) and with a no-logging policy. i use NordVPN because i know someone who pays for it and is letting me use it, but another great option is Mullvad
- Mullvad and many other providers dont support port forwarding
  
  For those curious why it matters, torrent is built around downloading a file from multiple other people (called seeders) in little pieces, then you become a seeder yourself when you have the whole file and send pieces to other people that want the same file(s). Without port forwarding you become just a leech, you can download but can't send pieces of the file to other people which isn't in the spirit of torrenting (hence the term leechers)
- hmm... interesting. can you give me a screenshot of a nastygram? I mean, not yours, but I wonder how it looks.
  
  i don't have one on hand, but it's a physical letter sent through the mail which basically says "delete the copyrighted data we think you downloaded or we're shutting off your internet"
So, most people would recommend using a VPN, but at that price and with those limited speeds, you're better off using a seedbox instead. With a seedbox, the torrent is downloaded and seeded on a remote server, and once it's done you can then download the file normally, at full speed, via https. You could even use a download manager to speed up the download, and some sites even allow you to stream the content directly (if it's a video), so you don't even need to download the file first.
- Or you can save yourself a lot of time and hassle and use that money to get an account with a Usenet provider. You still end up downloading everything at full speed over HTTPS, but you don't have to bother with the extra step of waiting for your seedbox to download the torrent.
  
  Yeah it’s honestly ridiculous that people still torrent. Usenet is by far the better solution, faster, easier, more automated etc.
  
  For me using realdebrid to stream with Kodi, Streamio etc even better.
Use a VPN, and turn on "Anonymous mode" in your client settings. Also change the setting saying "allow encryption" to "require encryption".
- [Edit: The VPN bit is what protects your privacy. The other two options are mostly superflouos and shouldn't be used without an VPN either.]
  Both settings still send your IP and everything to other peers. It doesn't really make any difference regarding privacy.
  If you're trying to protect against law enforcement, they're going to join the swarm of peers. They get exactly the same info about you whether you turn these on or off.
  "anonymous mode" just doesn't send you're using qtorrent version xy. For law enforcement it doesn't make a difference whether you're using qtorrent. and idk if it makes any difference not to include your IP into tracker requests unless you have a badly configured vpn. Your packets originate from your IP anyways.
  And encryption protects you from your dad/tech savy mom or your boss snooping on your traffic. Main point is your ISP can't see those are bittorrent packages so they won't limit your bandwidth. Doesn't make you anonymous in the bittorrent network though.
  
  So, how do you hide your IP from the peers?
  
  The very first thing the person you're replying to said was "Use a VPN..."
Seeding is safe when you aren't using P2P discovery functions. If it is a private tracker, and everything is encrypted, you'll never have any issues. Stay away from public torrents that aren't explicitly controlled by a tracker unless it's freely available data (like a Linux distro).
- unless it's freely available data (like a Linux distro).
  Tell that to my university. Got a nasty email because I... downloaded Fedora Silverblue 38 😭
  
  Well, yeah. Private network sysadmins tend to act like a big hammer. Torrents can be terrible on a network, particularly Linux distro torrents, especially if the hardware itself was put together on a shoestring budget. That said, a lot of universities are mirrors and there isn't really a need to go outside the university network to obtain that stuff. Not all the time, though.
- Seeding is safe when you aren’t using P2P discovery functions.
  edit: didn't downvote you. btw, is it true that you can see who downvoted you on lemmy? I don't want to but yeah idk seems somewhat interesting.
  I am sorry, you would have to explain this to me :(
  Also, what do you mean by private tracker, I create a torrent which has encrypted files and then I share that torrent & encryption keys with my friend. That kinda torrent?
  
  is it true that you can see who downvoted you on lemmy?
  Out of the box no, but if you host a Lemmy server you can check in the SQL database who downvoted what, both locally and all posts that were synced using ActivityPub.
  
  Most people understand the word "private tracker" as a website like piratebay which you can only enter if someone else invites you. It often involves a requirement to seed some amount back into the network.
  There are some names of known private trackers out there, there are ways to get an invite, sometimes it even involves something as simple as a donation (that's how I got in, currently sitting on the leaderboard for amount of data seeded). Once you've entered one private tracker, there's also easy ways to enter others, since you show credibility and commitment.
  I think that sums it up nicely.
  
  Generally there is a centralized "tracker" that creates a torrent on the fly specifically for your user. I've you load the torrent and connect to the tracker via sometime like transmission or rtorrent or deluge, the tracker provides you with a list of peers (as far as I understand it). There's usually some settings you need to change on your torrent tool, like disarming different, DHT, etc - the sure usually has instructions for beginners. The communication between you and your peers is encrypted, so deep packet inspection at the ISP level is not possible. It also significantly reduces, but not eliminates, the risk a particular torrent is a honeypot.
  I've been doing this for 20 years and I've never received a notice about torrenting from my ISPs. However, people I know that got stuff from open places like Pirate Bay and the like did get notices. The difference being I always used private trackers.
  
  Also, government reach is infinite. If you're using them Internet, the government has your traffic. This isn't a conspiracy, it's a real thing. Go look up Room 641a.
Just use a proper (paid) VPN service that allows port forwarding like PIA
Iirc don't torrent or seed over tor, tor is too slow for p2p stuff (tails runs all it's traffic through tor)

36 comments