Russian Media Scores Own Goal

Media companies throughout the world are beginning to learn that some of the dubious practices they have taken part in over the years, don't really work in the modern, digital age.   The days where a newspaper or a TV station can effectively control the news feed are virtually gone.

There is the odd exception, places like North Korea are still living in the 20th century thanks to a digital lock down and a paranoid dictatorship.   They also seem slightly insane, just recently announcing to the population that the North Korean Football team had reached the World Cup Final (despite not being there or even qualifying).

Here's the mocked up shot from the Youtube video with Kim Jong-Un receiving the plaudits in Rio.  We're not quite sure if it's really been released by the North Korean state media or if it's just a spoof.  Either eventuality is equally likely and indeed North Korea have done this before.

But for the rest of us, the truth is out there and tends to be fairly accessible despite the best efforts of certain world Governments.  This is what the Russian State media have just found out, and are left looking even more guilty than when they started.

The allegations refer to the ill advised edit of a Wikipedia page recording the Malaysian Airlines (MH17) disaster which took the lives of 298 innocent people. The page described the disaster as being caused by

"by terrorists of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic with Buk system missiles, which the terrorists received from the Russian Federation."

However about an hour later the Wiki page was changed to

"the plane was shot down by Ukrainian soldiers."

Nice little subtle change which completely shifts the blame from Russian State supported rebels to Ukranian soldiers. The problem was that whoever did it, rather amateurishly did it from a computer owned by the All-Russia State television and Radio Broadcasting Company. Like the vast majority of websites, all IP addresses are logged and recorded and indeed on Wikipedia they are even publicly displayed which is how a Twitter Bot picked up the edits.

Your IP address is linked to the computer you are using and unless you take steps to hide it and stay anonymous, such as using Identity Cloaker then it could potentially become public knowledge.  Wikipedia edits are always being highlighted in these situations from technically naive individuals trying to make sneaky changes.  Politicians, celebrities and media employees in all sorts of areas are always being caught, indeed I've seen a local footballer once being caught modifying the 'goals scored' stats on his own page!

Stormy - Deep Web Publisher Scheduled for September Release

TOR the privacy tool has always been one of the easiest ways to access the Deep Web.  It's not very hard to set up, and pretty soon you can be browsing through some of the murkiest stuff to exist on the digital highways.  Couple of minutes install and you can be flicking through adverts for assassins, drugs, firearms and assorted illegal stuff.

However although it's simple enough to do, actually publishing anything and more importantly ensuring your anonymity whilst doing it - is a little trickier.  But before anyone get's a bit upset about this, please remember that although it's true there are a lot of lowlifes on the Deep Web, it's also used by thousands of activists and people with a genuine concern about their privacy and safety.

Remember you might be perfectly safe, to sit at your Wordpress blog and proceed to slate your government perfectly safely.  That however is not possible in many, many places in the world, this site is full of examples of people imprisoned, tortured and even killed for daring to speak out against their particular Government. One of the saddest tales I always think is of Uncle SMS - which you can find here, who died in custody for allegedly send 'insulting texts' about the Thai Royal family.

It's difficult sometimes to maintain your privacy and anonymity, but when your liberty and your life are involved then it becomes an important issue.  So many people do the need the safety of the Deep (or Dark) Web, and the demand has slowly grown for a simple way to publish content on the anonymous network.

The Developers of the Tor Project have almost completed a tool to do just this, it's called Stormy 1.0 and we're getting pretty close to it's release in September 2014.  It's basically a point and click program which will allow you to publish content directly to the deep web network easily.  Although of course it's perfectly possible to publish directly to the Deep web, there are quite a few steps and messing up any of them could seriously affect your privacy - here's the How To if you're interested.

It's likely to become the preferred method of publishing for people like activists, whistle blowers and bloggers who want to remain anonymous.  It's certainly going to open up this powerful anonymity tool to those people with a need for privacy but perhaps without the technical skills required to accomplish it.

No download link yet, but the release date is the 15th September, it might be bundled with the standard TOR or perhaps with other VPN software, for all we know.  One thing is for sure it is sure to be very welcome for many across the world who value their privacy.

Having Trouble Watching the BBC Outside the UK ?

I travel a lot and when away there are two main Internet sites that cheer me up without fail - BBC IPlayer and Pandora. Unfortunately using the BBC outside the UK and Pandora outside the US are actually quite tricky because they will only work with a UK or US workstation respectively.

Fortunately because I always surf through a secure proxy on the Identity Cloaker network, this doesn't really matter to me as my location is defined by whichever proxy I am surfing through. So I simply select a UK server for watching BBC IPlayer abroad.

Identity Cloaker is the most sophisticated security software on the internet, it allows you to surf completely protected via a network of private proxies across the planet. These are fast, secure properly run proxy servers not the free slow ones infested with viruses that people normally try to use !! You might have also seen the dedicated VPN and proxy servers promoted to watch the BBC or other online TV stations - they are very often simply a single server set up quickly.  Why? Simply because when the BBC legal department threaten them (which they usually do), they end up disappearing suddenly.

So when I am in Turkey and want to watch  - I simply connect via a UK proxy and watch BBC Iplayer, if I want to listen to Pandora outside the US I just select one of the US proxies. It doesn't matter where I am as long as I have a working internet connection, because it's encrypted I can watch from anywhere.  The same goes for a TV channels in lots of other countries as they have Australian, Canadian, German, French, Irish and a host of other proxies in addition to the huge number of UK servers.

Anyway I have made this rather bad video to illustrate how I access the BBC Iplayer abroad. I'm afraid I don't do the ease of this any justice with my video though, the best thing about the Identity Cloaker to access these programs is the huge choice of proxies and their speed. If you've ever tried using Iplayer through a free proxy you'll realise how painful it can be.

Using BBC Iplayer Anywhere

I've never used the video software before so apologies for the amateurish video editing. I just wanted to make sure people were able to see how easy it is to use this security software. There are dedicated services for just watching BBC Iplayer that cost well over twice the price of Identity Cloaker, they offer just a single proxy server to do this - Identity cloaker has proxies all over the planet and dedicated software to control and protect your connection, from an icon in your taskbar.

It takes a minute or so to install and then you just point and click.

*** You can actually watch BBC Iplayer on your TV through most gaming consoles now, the Wii works great with Identity Cloaker straight onto your TV, read my post here Wii Iplayer ***

*** Identity Cloaker now has a facility to turn off encryption, you can use this to speed up video streaming such BBC Iplayer from the UK Proxies ***

It is actually a fundamental point of using a proxy abroad, your IP address defines who you are and what you can see. So if you surf via a UK proxy this is how any web server you visit will see you also exactly the same as a UK Internet surfer. Because Identity Cloaker has fast proxies in lots of other countries you can use it to access similar restricted broadcasts in Sweden, Germany, France, Canada, US and many others. If you like music try Pandora for an awesome US only radio station - just select the right countries proxy and you'll be away.

Of course you can use this method by using a free proxy but most are unsuitable for watching videos from BBC Iplayer outside the UK as they are so slow, but PLEASE remove the proxy before you start doing any other surfing remember free proxies are mostly hacked servers and your details are not safe being passed through them !

So can you use BBC Iplayer anywhere?

Pretty much, as long as you pick one the UK proxies, it manages your connection in the background and encrypts you connection. You can even run it from a USB stick if you remember to take your login details with you, watch it through firewalls and when countries try to censor what you watch.

If you travel a lot it also means you can access lots of other sites which have country restrictions stopping you watching the BBC IPlayer abroad. For instance I can access UK poker and casino sites from the States who would normally block an American IP address, Turkey often block Youtube and social networking sites but Identity Cloaker users just bypass this.

Anyway I'm off to Turkey in a few weeks and I'll be keeping up with all the latest BBC programs watching BBC IPlayer abroad via Identity Cloaker.

In a few minutes you can be watching your favourite BBC shows through a safe, fast and secure proxy

If you like to watch or listen to any UK TV shows and you spend any amount of time abroad, you'll find it a fantastic investment. The software is simple to work and you just pick a proxy to connect to and off you go, remember free proxies are very slow and many are full of viruses. If you do manage to find a safe, fast free proxy server to watch the BBC Iplayer on, chances are it will be gone in a day or so.

The ability to watch media is not advertised on the web site but drop them a line if you want to check, the support staff are very responsive and will check out problems with any channels - BBC is pretty straight forward but ITV, Channel 4 and some US channels need to use the Open VPN settings in the program. Be very careful of companies who do advertise this TV facility openly, they frequently disappear overnight, after legal threats from the media companies themselves i.e.  BBC, Hulu and ITV etc.

Why not treat yourself here to 10 days of the BBC Iplayer with the Identity Cloaker trial to check it works - for the price of a coffee and sandwich you'll be impressed I'm sure!

For those who want to use Identity Cloaker with an Ipad, Iphone or Ipod outside the UK then here are the instructions - Using Iplayer on an Ipad abroad