Internet Security with Mac

Seevee · Jan 12, 2016

All,

What are the best options for browsing the web with a secure server or service of some kind. So others cannot see my IP address or identify me in any way. Both for emails over the web and browsing.

I work in an extremely sensitive area and just need more protection. Thanks.

pigoo3 · Jan 12, 2016

Here's one solution:

http://www.hotspotshield.com/hide-ip-address/

If this is not satisfactory…do an internet search with the term "how to hide your ip address for free"…or a similar term (could omit the free part for example).

- Nick

Seevee · Jan 12, 2016

pigoo3 said:
Here's one solution:

http://www.hotspotshield.com/hide-ip-address/

If this is not satisfactory…do an internet search with the term "how to hide your ip address for free"…or a similar term (could omit the free part for example).

- Nick

Nick,

Tried it... horrible. It totally shut down my Macmail. Everything showed online, but could not send or receive. Once I uninstalled it, mail worked fine!

Need a better product.

RadDave · Jan 12, 2016

Seevee said:
All,

What are the best options for browsing the web with a secure server or service of some kind. So others cannot see my IP address or identify me in any way. Both for emails over the web and browsing.

I work in an extremely sensitive area and just need more protection. Thanks.

Hi Seevee - you've really not provided much information here to help understand your situation or make suggestions, e.g. is this a business and/or home/personal concern, what security issues are of most concern (mail, websites, cookies, etc.), and what else have your tried to avoid others from making recommendations that you have already rejected, as in Nick's suggestion?

For starters, have you considered a VPN (Virtual Private Network) - retired now but when I was working at a medical center, I used a VPN to contact my departmental servers for checking patient reports, dictations, etc. Which browser are you using and have you looked at ones w/ better security features, especially w/ the addition of extensions? Finally, have you visited the GRC Website - Steve Gibson's site w/ Shields Up which allows you to check ports and assess whether your IP is being broadcasted, your computer can be pinged, and which ports are closed or more importantly in stealth mode? Let me stop there to allow you to respond - Dave

pigoo3 · Jan 13, 2016

Seevee said:
Nick,

Tried it... horrible. It totally shut down my Macmail. Everything showed online, but could not send or receive. Once I uninstalled it, mail worked fine!

Need a better product.

The link was just a suggestion to get your search started. If the product is not acceptable...keep searching as suggested. You are the best judge of what you need.

- Nick

Seevee · Jan 13, 2016

pigoo3 said:
The link was just a suggestion to get your search started. If the product is not acceptable...keep searching as suggested. You are the best judge of what you need.

- Nick

Nick,
I appreciate your help. My comment was hoping that there would be a solution for that software. I've emailed them twice, without a response, so I'll continue for other solutions, but thanks regardless. Better try and fail than not try at all.

pigoo3 · Jan 13, 2016

Seevee said:
Better try and fail than not try at all.

That's the spirit!!!

- Nick

Seevee · Jan 13, 2016

RadDave said:
Hi Seevee - you've really not provided much information here to help understand your situation or make suggestions, e.g. is this a business and/or home/personal concern, what security issues are of most concern (mail, websites, cookies, etc.), and what else have your tried to avoid others from making recommendations that you have already rejected, as in Nick's suggestion?

For starters, have you considered a VPN (Virtual Private Network) - retired now but when I was working at a medical center, I used a VPN to contact my departmental servers for checking patient reports, dictations, etc. Which browser are you using and have you looked at ones w/ better security features, especially w/ the addition of extensions? Finally, have you visited the GRC Website - Steve Gibson's site w/ Shields Up which allows you to check ports and assess whether your IP is being broadcasted, your computer can be pinged, and which ports are closed or more importantly in stealth mode? Let me stop there to allow you to respond - Dave

RadDave,
This is a personal computer, but used for some business and financial activities where others are involved. I've tried TorBrowser, but find it confusing and just doesn't work well. That and HotSpot Shield is it. However have been doing some searching, but would like to get recommendations from others that have had success.

Security is important anyway someone can get to my computer, following my emails, web browsing and/or know my IP address, location, etc. I'm using Safari. Have Chrome and Firefox, but they lack a lot of features and are awkward to use (but could, if they solve the problem).

Will check out the sites you recommend. Thanks!

How does a VPN work?

chscag · Jan 13, 2016

Security is important anyway someone can get to my computer, following my emails, web browsing and/or know my IP address, location, etc. I'm using Safari. Have Chrome and Firefox, but they lack a lot of features and are awkward to use (but could, if they solve the problem).

How does a VPN work?

A VPN (Virtual Private Network) may be your best solution and is what I would recommend. But be sure to investigate the various VPNs that are available before committing to one. The good ones provide security and also anonymity during your browsing session. The con for using a VPN is that it may slow your on line browsing down somewhat. However, that will vary depending on which VPN you choose. Do your homework and read reviews before choosing. Also note that the good VPNs are not inexpensive.

RadDave · Jan 13, 2016

Seevee said:
RadDave,
This is a personal computer, but used for some business and financial activities where others are involved. I've tried TorBrowser, but find it confusing and just doesn't work well. That and HotSpot Shield is it. However have been doing some searching, but would like to get recommendations from others that have had success.

Security is important anyway someone can get to my computer, following my emails, web browsing and/or know my IP address, location, etc. I'm using Safari. Have Chrome and Firefox, but they lack a lot of features and are awkward to use (but could, if they solve the problem).

Will check out the sites you recommend. Thanks!

How does a VPN work?

Hi again Seevee - appears that Chscag has already given you some great information - there is a nice Wiki article on VPNs and likely plenty of other sources - here’s just one from PC Mag of probably many reviews available - Best VPN Services for 2015 - let us know your results. Dave

cwa107 · Jan 14, 2016

Just to clarify, the term "VPN" has a specific definition that has been stretched over time to include services other than what VPN is intended to do. VPN is simply a way to channel traffic through an encrypted tunnel when communicating across the public Internet. A good example is an employee trying to transact data with their company, while working remotely. They start a VPN client, connect to a VPN server at the company and from that point forward all of the data transacted travels across the VPN.

Now, there are services that are intended to provide a degree of anonymity for your computer by allowing you to establish a VPN connection directly to them, and then they act as your proxy, fetching data and/or sending it on your behalf over a VPN. It doesn't necessarily protect you from hacking. You also don't have any assurance that the VPN service isn't logging your transactions. The primary benefit is that it can provide a degree of anonymity... though it may not protect you from government agents of the state that the proxy resides in.

Tor can protect your transactions with web servers by channeling the traffic through MULTIPLE proxies around the world and is probably one of the better means of surfing the web anonymously - but that protection comes at a cost. Performance will be poor and certain websites that require a tracking cookies (think eCommerce sites) won't work at all. You'll also note that Tor is a web browser only, it will not secure your email transactions.

If you google "secure email", you'll find a ton of supposedly secure email servers that use different means to protect your data. But you will likely need to use a web-based mail client. You'll also have to trust that the email server they house is appropriately secured. Honestly, unless you own the mail server, you can never be certain that your mail is completely secure.

Not trying to point fingers, and I'm not sure what your motives are, but remember that the Internet is an inherently public place. If you are doing something that could have a negative financial, legal or moral consequence, there is no simple and bullet proof way to protect yourself, other than to abstain from doing the thing you're trying to hide in the first place.

Seevee · Jan 15, 2016

Questions:

Do some of the VPN providers offer email security, or do I need to shop elsewhere for that?

Can anyone recommend providers they have had good experience with?

Seevee · Jan 15, 2016

cwa107 said:
Just to clarify, the term "VPN" has a specific definition that has been stretched over time to include services other than what VPN is intended to do. VPN is simply a way to channel traffic through an encrypted tunnel when communicating across the public Internet. A good example is an employee trying to transact data with their company, while working remotely. They start a VPN client, connect to a VPN server at the company and from that point forward all of the data transacted travels across the VPN.

Now, there are services that are intended to provide a degree of anonymity for your computer by allowing you to establish a VPN connection directly to them, and then they act as your proxy, fetching data and/or sending it on your behalf over a VPN. It doesn't necessarily protect you from hacking. You also don't have any assurance that the VPN service isn't logging your transactions. The primary benefit is that it can provide a degree of anonymity... though it may not protect you from government agents of the state that the proxy resides in.

Tor can protect your transactions with web servers by channeling the traffic through MULTIPLE proxies around the world and is probably one of the better means of surfing the web anonymously - but that protection comes at a cost. Performance will be poor and certain websites that require a tracking cookies (think eCommerce sites) won't work at all. You'll also note that Tor is a web browser only, it will not secure your email transactions.

If you google "secure email", you'll find a ton of supposedly secure email servers that use different means to protect your data. But you will likely need to use a web-based mail client. You'll also have to trust that the email server they house is appropriately secured. Honestly, unless you own the mail server, you can never be certain that your mail is completely secure.

Not trying to point fingers, and I'm not sure what your motives are, but remember that the Internet is an inherently public place. If you are doing something that could have a negative financial, legal or moral consequence, there is no simple and bullet proof way to protect yourself, other than to abstain from doing the thing you're trying to hide in the first place.

Thx for the detailed explanation. I don't mind a reasonable cost in accomplishing this, but we are a small company. Tried Tor, and was awkward and very slow. Need something a bit better.

Motive is to protect sensitive areas (as mentioned before), which would include any business activity, financial, shopping surfing, emails, etc. There are many of us that just want more security. I've had a few things stolen, and it's a pain, but would rather just eliminate the witch hunters, competitors, intrusion of any kind.

Still shopping.

Cr00zng · Jan 17, 2016

Seevee said:
Thx for the detailed explanation. I don't mind a reasonable cost in accomplishing this, but we are a small company. Tried Tor, and was awkward and very slow. Need something a bit better.

Motive is to protect sensitive areas (as mentioned before), which would include any business activity, financial, shopping surfing, emails, etc. There are many of us that just want more security. I've had a few things stolen, and it's a pain, but would rather just eliminate the witch hunters, competitors, intrusion of any kind.

Still shopping.

There's no single solution that would address your concerns, as the matter of fact pretty much you'd need to address each items separately.

For example it would be hard to conduct business and financial activities anonymously, you'd probably don't want to do that. These activities do protect transactions between workstation and the destination by encrypting the connection between endpoints.

Shopping online is pretty much the same, since it is a financial transaction, where SSL will protect the information transferred between your workstation and the web server for the most part. You have control of the security, or should have, of your workstation, but not the destination if it's on the web. It's pretty much a leap of faith for the destination's security.

Email can be secured between your workstation and email server, either by web based email's SSL connection or setup your email client's SSL/TLS connection to you email server, if supported. While doing so you've done your part of securing connection to your email server, the sender may not do the same and email may not be secured from/to your email server. The alternative is both the sender and recipient use the same email encryption client, in which case the email is protected from the sender to the recipient's workstations, regardless what the email server does.

Browsing mostly anonymously can be done, but not without issues. In my view, using VPN connection for this purpose has just as much issues as the Tor browser, if not more. I do most of my browsing in Tor browser and switch to other browser, if need to connect to business/finance related activities. It's npot a perfect solution, but there's no such thing anyway...

PS: This post had been created in the Tor browser, just as fast as other browsers on my system...

Cr00zng · Jan 17, 2016

Interesting...

After my post, browsing this forum resulted in "The administrator banned your IP address...." error message. Closing/reopening the Tor browser got rid of the error message, presumably since the new session has a different IP address.

Seevee · Jan 20, 2016

Cr00zng said:
Interesting...

After my post, browsing this forum resulted in "The administrator banned your IP address...." error message. Closing/reopening the Tor browser got rid of the error message, presumably since the new session has a different IP address.

Thx for the info, very helpful. Perhaps I should try Tor again. Question... where can I get help with Tor? Can't figure how to download Bookmarks, or set a new page opens to current page, etc? Also, when I click on help, it gives Firefox help... assume they are related? Can I use bookmarks from Firefox?

Also, is there a way to be sure Tor is working?

Thanks much.

Cr00zng · Jan 21, 2016

Seevee said:
Thx for the info, very helpful. Perhaps I should try Tor again. Question... where can I get help with Tor? Can't figure how to download Bookmarks, or set a new page opens to current page, etc? Also, when I click on help, it gives Firefox help... assume they are related? Can I use bookmarks from Firefox?

Also, is there a way to be sure Tor is working?

Thanks much.

You can find some help with Tor at the same site, you've downloaded Tor from. It's a lot of reading, I know...

Tor browser will establish a circuit that you can view by clicking on the onion icon in the top left side of the browser:

If you don't see the circuits, Tor doesn't work.

Managing Tor Firefox isn't much different from the "regular" Firefox, for example, managing bookmarks...

Click on the hamburger menu in the top right corner that brings up this menu:

Click on "Bookmarks":

Then click on "show all bookmarks" in the bottom:

You can import/export bookmarks in this window.

The start up page can be change by "Menu\Option\General" tab. By default, clicking on Option menu item will bring up the general tab where you can change the home page:

hagios1972 · Jan 22, 2016

chscag, as per your explanation of vpn, is Citrix a vpn?

dtravis7 · Jan 22, 2016

hagios1972 said:
chscag, as per your explanation of vpn, is Citrix a vpn?

See if this helps.

http://www.differencebetween.net/technology/internet/difference-between-citrix-and-vpn/

Seevee · Jan 23, 2016

Cr00zng ,

Thanks MUCH for the detailed explanation, really helps.

Question: Is there a way to have a new window come up as the same as the current window?

Internet Security with Mac

Seevee

pigoo3

Well-known member

Seevee

RadDave

pigoo3

Well-known member

Seevee

pigoo3

Well-known member

Seevee

chscag

Well-known member

RadDave

cwa107

Seevee

Seevee

Cr00zng

Cr00zng

Seevee

Cr00zng

hagios1972

dtravis7

Seevee

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