And, sorry for being annoying, but some things were pointed out to me
in #code4lib, so I'm issuing yet another followup.

1) the technique freenode uses for cloaks isn't as strong as it used
to be.  Also, it's possible to accidentally log in without a cloak,
etc. Don't expect them to be very secure.

2) There's ways to get a cloak without financial contribution.  How
exactly to do this I leave as an exercise to the reader.  I never
really worried about it too much, the cloak was just a perk when I
made the donation.

3) Apparently most web clients will pass on the browser ip, not the
server ip address.  So don't count on that to make you anonymous.

So the general thrust is, if you really, really need anonymous
communication, be wary of irc.  However, in general people usually
respect the nicks from my experience and won't press people for their
actual identities.

Also, as mentioned before, most irc servers/channels are not encrypted
and pretty easy to log.

Jon Gorman



On Mon, Dec 10, 2012 at 1:38 PM, Jon Gorman <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Oh, forgot to mention. If you use a web client or use tor, that will
> obscure the connection info by the nature of that connection ;).
>
> Jon Gorman
>
> On Mon, Dec 10, 2012 at 1:37 PM, Jon Gorman <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>> You can also choose to anonymize yourself by choosing a nick that best represents something you're interested
>>> in or identify with that is not used on other social spheres. It really is completely up to you on what you feel most
>>> comfortable with and there is typically no hard/fast rules.
>>
>> One thing to keep in mind is that your nick might be anonymous, but
>> irc in general is done "in the clear"  and some connection information
>> will be published by default. I think that's partially a legacy of how
>> long IRC has been around.
>>
>> When someone logs into a channel you'll see something like
>> [log in to unmask]  There's ways to "cloak" that id by
>> registering that nick and donating some money to the organization that
>> runs freenode, pdpc.  That's a bit trickier to setup.  The user
>> registration faq of freenode can be useful:
>> http://freenode.net/faq.shtml#userregistration.
>>
>> So when someone who is registered and "cloaked" logs in, the
>> connection will display something like [log in to unmask] has
>> joined the channel.  - I can't remember the exactg string).
>>
>> So just know that if someone is logging the channel (which is
>> possible, there's plenty of clients and ways to do it) and you come in
>> several times with different nicks but the same network address
>> they'll know it's likely the same person.
>>
>> Jon Gorman