Deep Packet Inspection and Internet Privacy
When you send emails or go browsing on the web, there is more going on than just visiting sites or sending out messages. First, your Internet communications are full of information such as headers. Deep packet inspection is a process that captures and reads through your internet activities and collects details about the formatting, as well as reads the actual emails or web site you visit. In other words, deep packet inspection software can gather the information used by your computer without your knowledge or permission.
Your communications can contain financial information, log-ins, personal details and other information that makes it possible for your identity to be compromised by criminals and your accounts to be assessed. This is a major problem.
According to several periodicals, such as CIO magazine, the use of DPI or Deep Packet Inspection is being reviewed by Congress, and possibly will be rendered illegal. Although no one is champing at the bit to claim they are using this technology, your employer, your ISP and criminals all have the necessary tools to use this method to inspect your Internet activity.
Although they mean well, Congress is notoriously slow on passing legislation, and you don’t have time to wait for their findings. Waiting could have devastating results. But there is an immediate solution available, and that is to use an anonymous proxy for all your internet activity. It will encrypt your communications and that can defeat or delay any deep packet inspection activity.
This is one of those situations where depending on others to protect you is not the best approach. Digital thieves are everywhere. Protect yourself and use an anonymous internet proxy. Privacy is not a given on the internet. It’s usually what’s taken.
Dave Says:
It’ll be interesting to see what Congress comes up with. From my experience, a lot of customers may not support DPI, but they’re probably in favor of some of its outcomes — better network quality, etc. Obviously, DPI isn’t only used for snooping, but can be an effective tool at minimizing bandwidth abuse and maintaining the quality of an Internet network for the majority of users. But, it’s hard to say where the line is actually drawn. If an ISP can detect and block a certain type of file or application, then whose to say it won’t intentionally slow certain VoIP or video traffic in an effort to push business to their voice and video services. This dilemma has been one of the motivations driving our company to develop technology that provides the positive effects but doesn’t rely on DPI or snooping to do so. I think once people start to realize that it’s not a simple choice between deep packet inspection or crappy service, and that there are other options available, the backlash against DPI will get even stronger.