I know that my ISP cumcoast has free newsbins so I wonder are they being as closely watched as other P2P programs?
I mean there is a load of warez on those alt.bins.

Just wondering.

The newsgroups itself aren't illegal. It's the content on most of them , that makes it illegal. (alt.binaries.etc..)

But are they being as closely watched as P2P programs like e-mule and Kaza? I mean newsbins have been around since the good old days of gopher. It was how all the net started.

Probably not.

IMHO the problem with P2P programs is that so many people use it it just got out of hand. Nobody cares if just a hand full of people download illegal stuff.

But I don't know the answer

Downloading illegal material is a crime and there are no guareentees that you will not be caught.

downloading legal stuff:

Premium newservers like easynews.com, newscene, etc do not log downloads, thus there is no log of what you download or even what group you downloaded from. they track how much you downloaded and how many times you request a group (but not the group itself). If fact newscene.com has told me their software does not even allow them to log anything more they would have to rewrite to provide those features. Also they provide SSL if you want to encrypt the data tansfereded between you and them. They do keep complete logs on posters, but some only for a limited time

Alot of ISPs do log more things some log what groups you entered, some even the article numbers you request, and burn these to CD.

Downloading from usenet is one of the few areas where there is still some degree of privacy, as long as you pick a good premuim service

May i burst your bubble a little ? If they (mpaa , riaa , fbi) suspect your ip or isp of something illegal.. your privacy means nothing.

Better get an isp who doesn't keep his logs any second longer than is mandatory by the law. I'm sure newscene.com is obliged by law to at least log something to trace you.

SLL only protects the transaction , not the content on the server or clients.

It all depends on how much they want to get you of course. One simple visa transaction to newsscene.com's premium membership is enough info for the feds to knock on your door.

** May i burst your bubble a little ? If they (mpaa , riaa , **fbi) suspect your ip or isp of something illegal.. your **privacy means nothing.


True enough to a point. The issue is with P2P your IP is visible to the computer you are getting your file from, you connect directly. Your IP is known without any effort, i.e. they can put a file if you get it they have you IP, time you got it etc.

With Usenet, since premium servers (PS) are not required to log downloaders (and in fact not required to log posts either, they do so mainly to deal with spammers), if the mpaa or riaa wanted to see who d/led a file, the PS would not be able to tell them that. They simply do not have that information. Also keep in mind that Usenet is composed of 1000s of Usenet servers large and small. Even if PS service X logged, others do not, so at most they would have who downloaded from X but no idea of anywhere else.

Granted if the matter is very serious, say involving national security, they can get an order and sniff everything coming in and out of a PS, but again that would be only one not all the rest of them.

**Better get an ISP who doesn't keep his logs any second longer than is mandatory by the law. I'm sure newscene.com is obliged by law to at least log something to **trace you.

They have your credit card transaction, however they also accept money orders. They know you accessed them using a specific username/password and the IP address and that you d/led x amount of data and y number of group requests, but that is it.

Also look at the spam on Usenet. The reason for it is that there are 10000s of pcs all over the world that have insecure setups that have Usenet posting access. Their nntp ports are open to anybody. Spammers will route their posts thru several of them so that all the ISP sees when they log a post is that it came from IP address xxx.xxx.xxx. but the trail stops there.

****SLL only protects the transaction , not the content on the server or clients.

That is the idea, someone sniffing your traffic, such as your ISP, sees you made a connection to the PS and that data was transferred, the amount of it and that it was via SLL but that is it, they have no idea what is was.


****It all depends on how much they want to get you of course. One simple visa transaction to newsscene.com's premium membership is enough info for the feds to ****knock on your door.

Having an account with newscene or easynews is completely totally legal. I use them to go to Oracle, JAVA, and DVD authoring, etc groups everyday and regularly post there. Google groups is just a view of the text side of what Easynews and newscene carry.

If the feds are already looking at you odds are they have install keylogging software on your pc etc,. d/ling from Usenet is the least of your worries.

Will the day come when PS will be required to log downloaders and make those available? Maybe, but I doubt it will be a secret thing. Word would get out pretty quick that PS are now required to log stuff. An again keep in mind that there are 1000s of Usenet servers out there all over the world.

I sure hope that day never comes Everyone should be entitled to have a least a little dignity and privacy.

Well ,there were zillions of Kazaa users as well , yet somehow they got some of them to their knees and the rest of them got a little scared.

The fun thing is , as long nothing happens , everyone is happy.

But the moment someone in the happy trustworthy community gets arrested ; wether that is IRC , Usenet or a Tupperware party at your neighbour ; everyone gets a little scared and nobody will help you , besides the people who already sold their souls to the highest bidders. Otherwise known as laywers. (Please don't sue me Phil ! )

Sure.. they don't surprise me when someone i have never heard of and is thousands of mile away from me gets arrested for illegally downloading the hillbilly themesong on mp3.

But if my neighbour gets caught and spents a couple of days in jail.. damn right that i'm going to be paranoid and not download mp3's anymore.

And all those trusted "friends" in your happy community have suddenly dissapeared. Easy come .. Easy go.

Luckily FUD works both ways , so some people really have the authority to step up and fight for " the cause " (dangerous words in these times of terrorism .. i know) , but unfortunately most of the accused ones have very little money.

I suspect two reasons on why usenet hasn't been raided by the feds yet :

1 - They have no idea what usenet is or how to use it to their advantage.
2 - It's way too costly to track a user down , sue him and get money from him. Subreasons being that the one being sued has no money to get

It took them some time to get used to Kazaa. They can do the same with Usenet all over the world.

But i pray they're raiding Tupperware sellers first

How is Giganews in termsof security and privacy? Is it as good as easynews? The prices for Giganews are lot better than easynews i.e.12.00 for 10 Gb and 1 month retention min.

easynews has more groups than giganews. Both are very good about privacy and security.

Easynews has an advantage IMHO due to

- web interface. They have a beta search engine that allows you to search all newsgroups based on file name, author, file type, size, etc. it has a par viewer. it ids par files, clicking on them shows all parts on server. on web results selecting multiple files allows you to zip them into a single zip file

nntp - they have a SSL interface too.

support is excellant too.