Ban on VPN in India.

lockhrt999

lockhrt999

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Why is no one talking about it? There's hardly any news covering this matter.

If this goes through, India will be one more country to ban VPN after china, russia and north korea. Probably first democracy.

We already don't get top of the line freedom of speech, I know that but this is in a new league itself.

www.thehindubusinessline.com

Proposal to ban VPNs has India Inc worried

‘Strange and ill-judged’ idea that would have a serious impact on data security of MNCs and financial firms, say policy
www.thehindubusinessline.com www.thehindubusinessline.com
www.financialexpress.com

Don’t ban VPNs: The pros definitely outweigh the cons

The fact that VPNs provide secure networks which facilitate smooth and safe data transmission cannot be ignored.
www.financialexpress.com www.financialexpress.com
www.livemint.com

Why banning VPN is a bad idea

In August, a parliamentary committee in the country recommended that the home ministry should ban all uses of virtual private network (VPN) in the country. However, doing so could be a very bad idea. Mint takes a look at the possible consequences:
www.livemint.com www.livemint.com
 
lockhrt999 said:
Why is no one talking about it? There's hardly any news covering this matter.

If this goes through, India will be one more country to ban VPN after china, russia and north korea. Probably first democracy.

We already don't get top of the line freedom of speech, I know that but this is in a new league itself.

www.thehindubusinessline.com

Proposal to ban VPNs has India Inc worried

‘Strange and ill-judged’ idea that would have a serious impact on data security of MNCs and financial firms, say policy
www.thehindubusinessline.com www.thehindubusinessline.com
www.financialexpress.com

Don’t ban VPNs: The pros definitely outweigh the cons

The fact that VPNs provide secure networks which facilitate smooth and safe data transmission cannot be ignored.
www.financialexpress.com www.financialexpress.com
www.livemint.com

Why banning VPN is a bad idea

In August, a parliamentary committee in the country recommended that the home ministry should ban all uses of virtual private network (VPN) in the country. However, doing so could be a very bad idea. Mint takes a look at the possible consequences:
www.livemint.com www.livemint.com
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Because "Bhakti mai hi Shakti hai" ?:locktopic::locktopic::p:p On a serious note, this is to be expected from most media houses because they slant towards the ruling party's take on things. Apart from that India as a country is still young in terms of discovering the internet. Most users are happy using the Internet for very bare minimum stuff like watching videos, listening to music, or studying from few sites. The percentage of people using things such as a VPN or even understanding its use would be minuscule.
 
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nemo_online said:
The percentage of people using things such as a VPN or even understanding its use would be minuscule.
Click to expand...
It's not really about the number of people using VPN. It'll become a tool for govt to misuse and lock up anyone. Most of the internet users have actually used VPN knowingly or unknowingly. Many people who are working from home are actually using VPN to connect to company servers.
 
lockhrt999 said:
It's not really about the number of people using VPN. It'll become a tool for govt to misuse and lock up anyone. Most of the internet users have actually used VPN knowingly or unknowingly. Many people who are working from home are actually using VPN to connect to company servers.
Click to expand...
See.. that's what I meant. You know the above, I know the above but most people don't, or even if they know simply don't care. I know people who would say that FB & Google already know everything about us so privacy or rights for that matter are already given up by the people. People are too busy with their lives today. Until and unless an issue is repeatedly highlighted. nobody will pay attention to it. Who has the resources to continuously highlight it? Ans: The corporate media. Will they do it? Ans: No. Rest, this is in India - people are still figuring out how to earn roti, kapda & makaan.
P.S. Just my two cents of gyaan from my world view. Not necessary that everyone has to agree with it.
 
nemo_online said:
FB & Google already know everything about us
Click to expand...
we passed that phase long back... and entered into surveillance stage.
VPN ban in India is yet another Shit_BJP_Says and is not going to happen due to corporate pressure. Also majority of their IT cell minions are working behind a VPN.

lockhrt999 said:
more country to ban VPN after china, russia and north korea.
Click to expand...
see the economic state of those countries, in a recent survey its observed 30+ % of Russian cant afford daily meals now. Govt does that to hide their ****ups.
China is different thing, they never allowed anything like this , to promote their local business.. thats what made them number one country today. Also they take care of their citizens much better compared to india, russia, etc.
 
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You need to look at the bigger picture. This is just one of the small baby steps towards a surveillance state or building the 'great firewall'.

With mobile internet soon to be dictated by duopoly and your home internet heading towards the same. This appears to be a blessing for the govt.

Enterprise users to 50-paisa army (IT cells) will have some sort of exceptions if they are unable to figure how to make it work. Just ask the neighbor across the mountains.

BTW, ministers will bring the real deal home than watching it online.
 
The problem with this ban thing is that they can only enforce VPN companies to not sell in India or have listings on Indian websites or Play Store or the App Store. We can still use VPNs, until the ISPs start to ban them specifically or if they start reporting users with VPNs. Otherwise, this ban won't work. It sometimes baffles me how the government thinks that illegal things happen because of VPNs. Most cyber criminals use multiple proxies and Tor for criminal activities. VPNs are generally used by general populace for accessing websites like Netflix lol. If they want to ban VPNs, they should bring out a Government sponsored VPN which logs some data(not private stuff) and let people use it, because some people don't like showing their public IPs to websites they are accessing as that network traffic can be accessed by RATs.
 
EvenOdd said:
If they want to ban VPNs, they should bring out a Government sponsored VPN which logs some data(not private stuff) and let people use it,
Click to expand...
This will exactly what the govt will try to do. But who will guarantee that personal data is not abused. There have been many cases of data breaches and the govt won't do zilch about it. Their larger objective is a surveillance state and we are slowly progressing towards it, while emulating China, Russia.
If anyone is following the latest happenings, they can draw parallels with this incident.

 
Why would anyone assume that only VPN companies are selling your data?

That local cable mafia gangs who play turf wars with each other and nowadays biggest player in Internet distribution, aren't saint either. Otherwise etna sasta internet me paisa kaisa banega baba? I always assume that your data is already being sold online by your ISPs and their backbones providers like airtel, tata communications and jio etc.

Also mind you, those warnings you see like 'This site is blocked on order of honorable court' are actually provided by special dns blocking servers hosted by airtel/tata. They probably also kept record that you tried visiting promhub.

And let's not forget, some time ago airtel injected every website you visited with script which tracked users. It was in the news but yeah it didn't look shady back then.
I remember Reliance communications blocking microsoft and antivirus websites (probably because of updates causing traffic). You had no option but to use VPN to stay secure. :p

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TLDR, you are always being tracked.
Given the option, I'd still prefer getting tracked by foreign entity instead of domestic entities. I'm a nobody to foreign entity. But for domestic entities you are a potential criminal by the laws of 2040. Laws are like fashion, they change with politicians/judges moods. Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan were pretty liberal until 1960-70s. Texas now has anti-abortion law. How long before their officials make a list of people who googled 'abortion clinic' in the last 20 years? They already have hooks into tech companies. Something that is normal today can make you criminal by arbitrary laws of 2050. Internet doesn't forget anything.
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There's this scary thought experiment called, Roko's Basilisk, where, AI from the future kills those humans who didn't help build the AI today. Now simply replace AI with political party or some religious ideology and it still works.
 
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Everyone is stealing your data - your phone, your VPN, your ISP, your neighbour, your dog.

You pay for privacy. Only buy well-known VPN services - one for which the risk of losing reputation by stealing customer data is greater than any potential profits.

The govt. won't ban VPNs.
After all, how else will the MPs jerk-off during parliament meetings?
 
I dont think banning VPNs as a whole is something India can do as it will have a HUGE IMPACT on the entire IT industry considering that they depend entirely on VPN services for working.

Any decision like this going live is going to have a huge bullwhip effect impacting markets too.

I seriously doubt this will actually take effect.
 
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