#Use retroshare to buy things install
#Use retroshare to buy things software

You can create your own forum, or subscribe to somebody else’s forum, to exchange messages with other users in your network with shared interests. In keeping with the ‘social network’ feel of the software, there is also a secure forum space which essentially behaves in a similar way to the old USENET. Of course, mail only works within your network, but it creates a space for private and secure messaging for when users are offline, and allows you to send attachments to other people in the network, even if the files that you want to attach don’t belong to your usual shared directories. The client side of things here looks sufficiently similar to an older version of Thunderbird for most users to feel at home. There’s also something equivalent to email, for less immediate communications between friends within your network. That also includes ‘Group Chat’ where you can communicate with everybody in your network (or with groups of friends) in a secure space. To begin with, it includes an Instant Messenger that allows you to chat to friends privately and securely, without any third-party looking in on your conversation or storing a log of it for future reference.

#Use retroshare to buy things software

RetroShare includes a number of useful features that give the software a ‘social networking’ spin that is actually very enticing to the average end-user. You have complete control over who belongs to your network and what they can see.īut filesharing isn’t the be-all and end-all of F2F or P2P software. This is the fundamental difference that makes this software different to your average P2P filesharing software.

It also allows you to share things like photos of your latest drunken escapade with your friends (and ONLY your friends). To begin with, RetroShare opens up the possibility of sharing work files with home computers within a secure framework, much like a VPN but with a lot less hassle. But you needn’t have criminal intention to see the advantages of this. Once that is done, you have your very own DarkNet.įor pirates, and other criminals, the obvious appeal is the ability to share data within a trusted network that nobody else can monitor.

#Use retroshare to buy things install

The hard part is getting at least 5 of your friends to also install the software and to share their public keys with you. All you need to do is install the software and generate a PGP/GPG key, which will be used to encrypt and decrypt your network traffic. That’s because unlike most P2P networks where your computer will connect to the network and share information with a huge number of unknown peers, RetroShare will only connect to other peers that you have explicitly allowed into your network, and all communications are private. RetroShare shys away from being called a P2P network, and prefers the term F2F (Friend-to-Friend). That means that most of the time, DarkNets only get media mention when a child-pornography ring gets busted… or something like that.īut DarkNets actually have a lot to offer, and RetroShare is a great example of how this sort of software could easily gain ground among more legitimate users. DarkNets have always offered a safe-haven for criminals, because their entire architecture is designed to hide activity from watching eyes.

No wonder then that software like RetroShare, which allows you to privately share files inside your own network of trust, is suddenly gaining momentum among pirates. While there were many legitimate users, it is clear that an awful lot of piracy is carried out using online file-sharing services. With the recent shutdown of MegaUpload, numerous online file-sharing sites simply shut up shop.

For most people, a DarkNet sounds a little like it belongs firmly in the realm of all criminal activity, and in some cases that’s not an entirely wrong perception.