Criminals have gotten more and more clever when it comes to their ability to track and hack.
But it isn’t just criminals you have to worry about. Sure, they can use cookies and pixels and other tools to track your online movements looking for a weakness or for you to make a mistake and expose yourself (like clicking a phishing link), but what about marketers, governments, and even your own internet service provider? How do you hide your information and online presence from your own internet company?
Let’s look at a few ways that you can protect your identity and secure your online transactions.
Tor Browser
Tor is one of the easiest ways to protect yourself online. Just like you can use Google to download Mozilla Firefox or Opera, you can search ‘download Tor’ and safely add the browser to your desktop.
But what is Tor?
The Tor project, originally called The Onion Router, is open-source software that enables anonymous online communication. If you’re reading this and thinking some slightly nefarious thoughts about hacking your school’s computers to change your grades or hacking your office to play a prank … it is not that secure—at least not in its basic stock form. That said, you can adjust your Tor settings, run it off a segmented virtual machine, and then couple it with VPNs, and you’ll be safe against marketers, criminals, and even your own ISP!
How does it work?
It’s like an onion. Hence, The Onion Router. It has nested application layers that are encrypted (like an onion). Basically, Tor encrypts your data and the IP address multiple times and sends it through a series of random Tor relays. The relays each decipher a piece of the encryption before passing it on to the next relay for further decoding. This makes it extremely difficult for any network surveillance to determine the source and destination.
BitCoin
You may be wondering why Bitcoin will secure your transactions and protect your identity. Well, just as we stated above, marketers sometimes sell info. But often, it’s not even them. Even though they have taken steps to secure your information against criminals, the internet service provider may be looking over their shoulders. If you are using Tor browser and handle your purchases in BTC, it’s nearly impossible for an opportunistic hack or identity theft to occur.
Bitcoin is not nearly as anonymous as people once thought; you have to purchase it after all. But you can look at it similarly to replacing all of that information you fill out when making an online purchase, bank card number, billing address, name, etc. with just an email address. With BTC, the blockchain verifies the transaction, so you don’t need to go through the normal, archaic process of verifying your identity with banks talking back and forth to one another. If the website you are purchasing from does end up getting scraped for information, the most potential criminals will get your BTC address. They can’t do much with it … it’s like someone having your email address, but much more secure. The most they can do is send funds to your address, which wouldn’t be too bad!
Bitcoin is used by many online outlets due to Standard wire transfers and foreign purchases typically involve fees and exchange costs. Since bitcoin transactions have no intermediary institutions or government involvement, in terms of the costs of transacting are kept very low. This can be a major advantage for travelers, also in terms of accessibility users are able to send and receive bitcoins with only a smartphone or computer, making it very attractive to many types of industries like Microsoft, AT&T, Fast Food chain restaurants, Airlines, the gambling industry, Gift card online retailers even Amazon (though not directly).
Orchid
Orchid is a great way to secure your online activities while on your mobile devices. It’s a crypto-powered VPN that operates on the Ethereum network. You can use ETH to buy a few Orchid, which is used to purchase affordable prepaid VPN services throughout the Orchid VPN app. The coolest part is that you have complete control, and there is no singular VPN provider—like when you buy a monthly service subscription—that could in turn and sell your information.
Essentially, you log on to Orchid, and it searches for the most viable bandwidth and rents it for you so that your sessions are split between different providers. You can even choose multiple VPNs so that Orchid periodically jumps from one provider to the next, so no singular service has the entire picture of your online activities.
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