GeekFilter: Where can I get a *nix shell account in another country?

March 8, 2007 4:11 AM

Where can I get a *nix shell account in another country?

I'd like to aquire a shell account, preferably based in a country that is a little less...how shall we say...'strict' than the US.
Eastern Bloc/Russia seems like a good idea, but I can't seem to find what I need (even with liberal use of translation tools).

While you may not believe me, it's not for anything illegal - I just don't like the idea of having an account with a US company that might hand my details over or cut me off simply with a well-worded letter.
It'd be nice for privacy and anonymity puposes, too...

posted by nafrance to technology (10 comments total)

How much is you willing to pay and administer your self? A virtual private server could be an alternative, but it might cost more than it's worth. A quick google search found this company that seems to be located in Russia. $16/month for the cheapest FreeBSD server, which is quite typical for a VPS. I have no idea if the company is reliable or not...
posted by rpn at 4:47 AM on March 8, 2007

CSoft is located in Canada, and they have shell accounts for $5 (CAD) a month. The money finances their open source server admin tool project.
posted by mkb at 4:55 AM on March 8, 2007

Locally the US based Datahaven Project may offer what you are looking for. In the Netherlands XS4ALL is a good provider that has defended privacy in the past and offers a standard account (dial-up) with shell access. In the day they sponsered hacker conventions and such. I've no idea of what they are like now though.
posted by jwells at 4:59 AM on March 8, 2007

nafrance,

Moving your data to the Eastern Bloc/Russia won't necessarily mean that your data is any more secure from unreasonable search, it just means that the U.S. Government won't be the ones to do it. Russia and other countries in the area don't exactly have a great track record for respecting privacy unless you're rich and/or connected with criminals.

There are a few places, and jwells has linked to the main one I'm aware of, XS4ALL, that respect privacy and rights.
posted by substrate at 5:39 AM on March 8, 2007

This strikes me as unproductive paranoia. Aside from issues substrate raised about a hosting company's home government, how are you going to prove to yourself that whatever provider you're dealing with is not a front for the US government? Even if you could, how are you going to then prove to yourself that no employees of said provider have been compromised?
posted by backupjesus at 6:01 AM on March 8, 2007

I don't know exactly what you're looking for, but if you're really worried about the admins and not the Feds, you might look into Grex — it's a community-run UNIX system offering free shell accounts, and the community and BoD have traditionally been very concerned about privacy rights. (It is in the US, though.)
posted by nebulawindphone at 6:40 AM on March 8, 2007

I firmly believe that overseas is never a solution only heavy encryption is. The Russians are just as likely to seize something, if not more so. Encrypt your data well, use encryption with those you email. Math is universal, government goodwill isnt.

Learn how to use true crypt, its extremely simple. Create a virtual drive on your drive and drop all your sensitive documents onto it. Backup your keys somewhere offsite. Memorize a decent password. Soon this will become second nature.

In a pinch you can always use a zip file to encrypt something. Pick a strong password (caps, numbers, symbols, etc). Its universal and even your most technophobe friends can use it. Just call them over the telephone or some other 'secure' link to tell the password. Never the password in the email. You can send it as a hint if you must like "your cats name spelled backwards and your birth year" if you absoltely have to.

If you do go down the foreign server road, I really hope you use SSH to connect and use some form of encryption on all your files. Who knows who the admin there is who who is plugged into these big name 'secure' hosts. I do not trust them all all. It screams 'front' or 'run by kiddies' neither of which is good.

Also look into tor to anonymize your internet usage.
posted by damn dirty ape at 8:40 AM on March 8, 2007

Moving your data to the Eastern Bloc/Russia won't necessarily mean that your data is any more secure from unreasonable search, it just means that the U.S. Government won't be the ones to do it.

And if the fact that your data is on their territory is the only thing other government knows about you, that’s still a massive difference to the other case, where the government has access (if it wants to) to your passport details, you credit ratings, your phone records, your health records, and so on. Plus, as the questioner puts it, the mean company in other countries are actually less likely to cave to a well-worded letter; cf. that thepiratebay.org has run court cases.

Which is not to say it’s not un[der]productive paranoia.
posted by Aidan Kehoe at 8:47 AM on March 8, 2007

I second xs4all, they're good people.
posted by scalefree at 9:09 AM on March 8, 2007

Here's an idea, get a Linux host in the US and run another host in a virtual machine, with the drive the VM runs on encrypted. That way, if they pull your machine off line and try to examine the drive, they get nothing. Always use SSH and SSL and so they get nothing examining your traffic.

The only way they would be able to nab you would be to place a rootkit on your external machine, and try to extract your true crypt password.

Not impossible, but that would have to be the result of a pretty intensive sting operation, not something an ISP would give out on the basis of a "letter".
posted by delmoi at 10:33 AM on March 8, 2007