Posts Comments

You are here: Home / Archives for NGR

Giganews FBI and CIA Hoax

September 15, 2014 by

This time around Giganews is an FBI operation (source: cryptome).  Last year the CEO of Giganews was running the company for the CIA (source: alt.usenet.kooks newsgroup).  Either story would be very disturbing if true.  If I believed for one second that either the FBI or CIA story was truthful I wouldn’t have any issue writing about it.  In 2009 I wrote about a Giganews employee who posted false reviews and comments to popular websites.  In short I’m not a Giganews supporter or affiliated with them in any way.  While you’ll probably find the FBI and CIA stories entertaining they just aren’t true.  Treat them as you would any other hoax.

Giganews FBI Hoax

Usenet is notorious for famous hoax like the April Fool’s Day Kremvax hoax.  On April 1, 1984 Piet Beertema posted that the Soviet Union was going to join Usenet.  The post was to have come from Soviet leader Konstantin Chernenko.  The Kremlin Usenet site was to be named Kremvax.  Year’s later Vadim Antonov had a subdomain placed on the first legitimate Soviet Usenet site – kremvax.demos.su showing that the April Fools’ Day prank had a lasting impact.

The Kremvax hoax was funny.  It didn’t hurt anyone.  It was a harmless April Fool’s hoax.  This isn’t the same.  The Giganews FBI hoax and last year’s CIA hoax are both potentially harmful to their company and Usenet as a whole.  Social media is starting to pick up the story which will likely drive it forward even more.  If you believe the information is true then by all means ignore my post.  Otherwise please share it so that others aren’t drawn in by the sensationalism of the stories.

Visit Newsgroup Reviews to learn more about Usenet.  Follow us @NewsgroupRevs for the latest deals.

Filed Under: Giganews, Usenet Providers

NewsDemon Account Cancellations

September 15, 2014 by

NewsDemon experienced a disk failure about a week ago.  According to their post the disk contained customer data for a small portion of members.  This isn’t a data breach.  No information has been stolen.  In this case the data was lost for good.  Apparently the backup was overwritten before they realized the issue.  If you have a NewsDemon account I suggest you log in and check it.  Contact NewsDemon support for further assistance.

It sounds like those affected will need to sign up for service again.  Depending on how much you were paying that could be a problem.  It looks like NewsDemon is currently offering unlimited Usenet for $12 to $13 a month.  That will likely be too high for some people.  Especially if you were on a $5 or $6 a month plan.  We can help lessen the blow a bit with our Demon Deal ($9.99 a month) but it’s still a bum wrap for those with lower priced plans.  Right now unlimited Usenet is running about $10 a month from several leading providers.

NewsDemon disk failure

There are a number of NewsDemon customers disscussing the issue on Reddit (here and here) and we’ve heard from several members who are now without accounts.  Many felt that NewsDemon used the disk failure reasoning to cut off low priced accounts.  Specifically those who were downloading a lot.  Regardless of the reason if I was on a $5 or $6 plan and had my account cancelled I’d be very unhappy.  Disk failure aside I think NewsDemon should have come up with a way to reinstate accounts with proof of previous payments.

Here’s a copy of the related NewsDemon blog post:

An unfortunate issue with one of NewsDemon.com Newsgroups payment processing servers occurred over the weekend. A severe disk failure lead to the loss of unrecoverable customer data for a small portion of our members.

After several attempts to recover the lost data, both NewsDemon.com Newsgroups and their payment processing partner are unable to retrieve the information. Although payment information has been lost, other data such as NewsDemon.com Newsgroups member’s username and passwords are unaffected and they will be able to login to the members area without issue.

Those users who have been affected by this breach will still have their remaining balance of their existing account available. However, affected users will need to create a new account once their balance has been exhausted.

We want to stress strongly that there is no evidence that any customer information was compromised. The situation is solely due to a disk failure and no attempt was made to breach or gain access to any of our user’s payment or personal member information.

We greatly apologize for the inconvenience this presents our affected customers. We’ve spent time and resources in attempting to recover the data. Unfortunately, we have been unable to do so despite our efforts.

If you have any questions or require further information, we urge you to contact our support team at support@newsdemon.com

We thank you in advance for your patience and understanding. We hope to better serve and provide you the best possible USENET experience.

Visit Newsgroup Reviews to learn more about Usenet.  Follow us @NewsgroupRevs for the latest deals.

Filed Under: NewsDemon, Usenet Providers

Usenet Traffic Shaping : Does Your ISP Throttle Newsgroups?

September 3, 2014 by

Most of us have had speed issues while downloading from newsgroups at one time or another.  At times it can be issues with the Usenet provider. Other times it’s something completely different.  With Internet Service Providers (ISP’s) throttling newsgroup traffic.  Why would your ISP use traffic shaping?  To save on network resources.  How can you find out if your being throttled?  The Glasnot Test can help you see if your ISP is throttling Usenet (NNTP) traffic.  If they are you can try alternate ports or a VPN to help speed things up.

If you find that your ISP is throttling Usenet traffic there are steps you can take to increase download speeds.  The first being to check with your newsgroup service.  The support area of their website is a good place to start.  As a lot of Usenet providers will offer alternate ports.  The reason being that ISP’s will throttle traffic based on port.  In the case of newsgroups (NNTP) traffic the default ports are 119 (non-secure) and 563 (SSL).  Changing port numbers can help you get around the issue.  See our alternate ports table for more details.

The other option to help avoid ISP throttling is to use a VPN.  When you connect to a VPN server it will encrypt all your data.  You’re ISP won’t know what you’re doing on the VPN network.  They can’t see that you’re connecting to a news server.  So they have no way to throttle the NNTP traffic.  While they could technically throttle VPN traffic that wouldn’t be in their best interest since so many customers use VPN’s for work purposes.  Their are a number of options out there.  Two of our favorites are IPVanish and Private Internet Access.

Filed Under: Usenet Tutorials Tagged With: , , ,

NewsgroupDirect Back to School Sale

August 27, 2014 by

It’s that time of year again.  The summer is coming to an end and the Fall semester starting.  NewsgroupDirect is offering a back to school special.  During the promotion you can save $65 off their popular 1000 GB block accounts.  That’s 65% off the regular $100 cost of the block.  All NewsgroupDirect blocks are non-expiring so you can enjoy the terabyte until it’s all used up.  Remember to sign up by Sept. 8th to take advantage of the deal.

The 1 TB block special for $35 is a great price.  That’s just 3.5 cents a gig for Usenet access with over 2,200 days of binary retention.  Block accounts include access to servers in the US and Europe along with up to 50 connections.  The best part is that blocks are shareable.  Since you are prepaying for a specific block size of data NGD doesn’t mind you sharing the account.  That can really come in handy sometimes.

For most Usenet fans 1000 GB will last for awhile.  If you plan to hit it hard though an unlimited plan might be your preference.  NGD has you covered there as well.  They offer unlimited Usenet with a free newsreader and 30 GB of online storage for $20 a month.  You can also save 20% off by using our NGD coupon code.

Visit Newsgroup Reviews to learn more about Usenet and follow us @NewsgroupRevs for the latest deals.

Filed Under: NewsgroupDirect, Usenet Providers Tagged With:

UseNetServer Free VPN Deal

August 13, 2014 by

UseNetServer just took their service to a whole new level.  Adding VPN access to their popular Usenet offering.  New members can add VPN to any UNS plan for $4.99 a month.  Better yet UseNetServer is currently offering free VPN access for new users who sign up for our NewgroupReviews annual UNS High-Speed Plus special.  Enjoy a full year of unlimited Usenet and VPN access for just $95.40.  That works out to just $7.95 a month.

UseNetServer VPN Deal

If you haven’t had a chance to try UseNetServer I strongly suggest you sign up for an account to see how much UNS has to offer.  Even before the free VPN promotion UNS was one of the best values in Usenet.  Now it’s without a doubt the best deal for those who go with their annual promotion.  The VPN access alone is worth more than the price you’ll pay for Usenet and VPN combined.  Connect on two devices at a time for VPN.

Here’s a quick breakdown of the UNS High-Speed special with VPN:

  • UNS High-Speed Plus (unlimited Usenet) – $10 a month, add VPN for $4.99 a month
  • UNS High-Speed Plus (unlimited Usenet + free VPN) – $95.40 a year (no additional cost for VPN)

As you can see the price of the monthly special is $10 which is well below the retail price.  Those who sign up for monthly access can add VPN for $4.99 a month.  Where things start getting even more exciting is with the annual plan.  Pay just $95.40 for a year of unlimited Usenet access and receive full access to their network of 70 VPN servers across 17 countries free of charge.  That’s an outstanding deal from UNS.

On the Usenet side UNS has been listed at or near the top of our rankings for years now.  They are currently only second to Newshosting.  For those seeking VPN access UNS would easily be our top pick.  UseNetServer offers nearly 2,200 days of binary retention and growing.  Along with NNTP servers in the United States and Europe.  You can use up to 20 connections but you won’t need that many.  All members have access to UNS global search.  The search engine will help you find newsgroup content.

Read our UseNetServer review to learn more or sign up for the UNS High-Speed Plus Deal and enjoy!

Filed Under: Usenet Providers, UseNetServer

Eweka 10th Anniversary Special

August 4, 2014 by

Have you been looking for a good European Usenet service?  If so Eweka is a dutch newsgroup provider that offers high retention and download speeds up to 100 Mbit.  Eweka is currently celebrating their 10th anniversary.  As part of their anniversary promotion Eweka is offering a free month of VPN access and 10 days extra when you buy a subscription.  Visit the Eweka Anniversary Special page to take advantage of the offer.

Eweka Anniversary Promotion

Eweka is our top rated European Usenet provider.  They have the best mix of high retention and performance.  To sign up for Eweka you’ll need to connect to their site from an IP address outside the United States.  So if you’re in the US and want to sign up for Eweka then use a VPN or proxy.  Connect to a VPN server or proxy outside the US and visit their site.  Once it sees your IP address is correct the sign up process is a breeze.

What should you expect from Eweka?

First and foremost you can expect fast, reliable Usenet access.  You’ll connect to their servers in the Netherlands and have full access to the service.  Without any download caps and with speeds up to 100 Mbps.  Eweka offers over 2,175 days of binary retention and growing.  Along with free SSL encryption.  The only thing you aren’t allowed to do is share the account which is typical for unlimited plans.

To take advantage of the offer simply visit the Eweka Anniversary Special page and sign up.  You can read our review to learn more about the service but the best way to test it out is to try Eweka for yourself.  I think you’ll be impressed by the quality of the service.  They are our favorite European provider.

Visit Newsgroup Reviews to learn about Usenet.  Follow us @NewsgroupRevs for more summer deals.

Filed Under: Eweka, Usenet Providers

Newsbin Improves Spam Filtering

July 19, 2014 by

Last month we wrote about how Newsbin was hard at work finding better ways to deal with the issue of Usenet spam.  While spam has always been a problem it’s gotten worse so the team at Newsbin has come up with a way to filter and flag posts that are password protected along with potential spam files.  I’m excited to share that they just released Newsbin version 6.52 final with the new spam filter as part of their Usenet search engine.  Visit the Newsbin downloads page to upgrade to version 6.52 final.  New users can grab a 15 day free trial.

Newsbin 6.52

Here’s a quick look at the spam filter settings page in Newsbin where you can set the level of filtering to “Aggressive”, Casual” or “Disabled”.  You can also manually set each spam filter to on or off by checking the boxes in the Options – Spam Filter Settings screen as shown below.

Newsbin spam filter settings

You have the ability to set the following spam filters:

  • Fail spam files
  • Fail RAR files that need passwords
  • Fail when ZIP files are inside RARs
  • Fail EXE files and RAR files that contain EXE files
  • Hide posts with invalid email addresses (no @)
  • Hide spam search results
  • Hide encrypted search results

Doing so will filter out those results.  Otherwise you’ll see icons in the search results marking encrypted (password protected) RAR files and potential spam posts.

Here’s a quick look at the new features and updates in Newsbin 6.52:

  • Internet Search results now have special icons showing password protected files and potential spam files.
  • Improved spam filters allow you to hide password protected and spam files from your search results list.
  • Performance enhancements and upgrade to latest version of sqlite for the working databases.
  • New icon on toolbar to toggle automatic shutdown mode on/off
  • Compaction scheme now pulls in .nfo, .sfv, .srr files into the set.
  • Shows a special icon when a .nfo file exists in the set. Look for a small “i” in a circle, like an information icon.
  • Read Post Body (ctrl-r) on a set now reads first chunks of one rar, one par, and any .nfo or .sfv files.
  • If an NZB file includes password information for the rar file, Newsbin can now extract and use it.
  • Improved speed when downloading from servers with the “Typical Retention” setting being used.

At a time when some Usenet projects have gone quiet it’s nice to see Newsbin continue to innovate and improve their Usenet client.  It’s no wonder why they have such a loyal following of Usenet fans.  Remember that all Newsbin customers receive lifetime upgrades so you can grab the latest 6.52 version upgrade free from their site.  New users can download a 15 day free trial.  That’s plenty of time to test the new client features.

Visit Newsgroup Reviews to learn more about Usenet. Follow us @NewsgroupRevs for the latest deals.

Filed Under: Newsbin Pro, Newsreaders

Tweaknews Down : Find Alternatives

July 18, 2014 by

We’ve heard from several Tweaknews customers who are having issues.  It appears both the tweaknews.eu site and their Usenet service are down for some.  I just tested the site from a hotel wi-fi network in the United States and it’s currently accessible.  Yet a friend on Comcast is unable to reach the site or connect to their news server.  This is very likely an ISP or upstream issue.  I don’t think it’s anything on Tweaknews end.

Tweaknews

Regardless of the reason I understand that if you can’t access the service it’s frustrating and you may need an alternative.  Especially given the popularity of using Tweaknews for fills.  I highly recommend their block accounts for that very reason.  In cases like this one you might want a backup for your backup.  Tweaknew is still my favorite for fills but if they’re not accessible I would recommend other European providers that offer low cost plans.  Two of my favorites are Pure Usenet and XLned.  Both offer speed capped plans.

My first recommended European alternative to Tweaknews is Pure Usenet.  They offer plans ranging from 4 Mbit to unlimited speeds.  For those who plan to use the account for fills I recommend their 4 Mbit plan which costs € 2,29 a month.  Pure Usenet supports 900 days of retention.  If you want more binary retention then I suggest XLned as an alternative.  XLned offers 1,100 days of retention.  They have accounts ranging from 2.5 Mbit to 120 Mbit speed caps.  For fills I recommend their 2.5 Mbit plan which costs € 2,99 a month.

Visit Newsgroup Reviews to learn more about Usenet. Follow us @NewsgroupRevs for the latest deals.

Filed Under: TweakNews, Usenet Providers

Binsearch.info Site Down : What Caused the Outage

July 14, 2014 by

July 14, 2014 update – we’ve heard from a number of Binsearch users who are unable to reach the site.  We are able to confirm that Binsearch.info is down using multiple DNS servers.  Their sister site, Nzb.cc, is still up so hopefully it’s just a short outage.  Nzb.cc might serve as an alternative if 1,000 days of retention is enough.

January, 2012 – Earlier this week we had several readers question what had happened to Binsearch.info.  As the site was down for a time on Tuesday.  We didn’t try to hit Binsearch during the outage but saw the results as the data was rebuilt.  Binsearch had hard drive failures that led to the site being down followed by some time to rebuild the index after an older restore point.  Now users are once again enjoying the full benefits of Binsearch.

Those familiar with Binsearch know that it’s one of the best Usenet search engines.  A clear favorite among NGR editors and highly recommended for the quality and performance of the site.  Covering some 1,100+ days of retention with a very simple interface.  The site is very easy to use and best of all free to all Usenet fans.

In the past we’ve recommended temporary alternatives when sites like Binsearch go down.  It appears the site is 100% but just in case you can always visit our Usenet search area for recommendations.  Binsearch is our top pick along with their sister site NZB.cc and other leaders like Nzbmatrix, Newzbin, Nznindex, etc.

Head over to Binsearch to find the latest Usenet content along with posts from 3+ years ago.  Visit Newsgroup Reviews to learn more about Usenet. Follow us @NewsgroupRevs for the latest news and offers.

Filed Under: Binsearch, NZB Sites Tagged With: ,

NewsgroupDirect Security Breach

July 11, 2014 by

This is a critical post for those who use NewsgroupDirect.  Especially if you signed up for for their Usenet service between May 1st and July 8th.  If you fall into that category please visit the NewsgroupDirect blog for more details.  I’ll share their post in a moment but you’ll want to check your credit card for fraudulent charges.  If you find any charges contact your credit card company to have them revoke your card and issue a new one.

NewsgroupDirect security breach

Here’s a direct copy of the blog post NewsgroupDirect released on their site:

There has been a recent data breach at NewsgroupDirect. This is an ongoing investigation and things may change, but as of now we believe that someone unauthorized was able to gain access to our systems between May 1, 2014 and July 8, 2014 (tentative dates). We believe that only new accounts created during this time period are affected. If you paid with Worldpay then you are unaffected.

I am extremely sorry that this happened. Our mission at NewsgroupDirect is to provide the best customer service in the usenet industry, and we’ve let you down.

What You Need To Do

1. Check your credit card statement and look for any unauthorized charges. If you see anything out of the ordinary then please email us with your NewsgroupDirect username and the date that you registered for our service. This is an important part of the investigation. Remember, you are not liable for fraudulent charges on your credit card.
2. Contact your credit card company and have them revoke your existing card and issue a new one.
3. Login and change your password. We don’t have any reason to believe that passwords were compromised in any way, but it’s best to be safe.

What We Are Doing in Response

1. Most importantly, we want to make sure that our customers’ needs are met. If you need help with anything as a result of this data breach then please let me know.
2. Increased Security Measures. We believe that we have identified and fixed the vulnerability that allowed someone to gain access to our system. That’s the first step. Beyond that we will be working to strengthen all of the security measures that we have in place and implement new ones.
3. We will continue with our forensic investigation into this issue and will post a more detailed incident report here when the investigation is completed.

I deeply regret this incident and look forward to earning your trust again.

Jim Lastinger
CEO / NewsgroupDirect

p.s. My personal email is jim@newsgroupdirect.com. Feel free to reach out to me there with any concerns or questions.

Filed Under: NewsgroupDirect, Usenet Providers
« Previous Page
Next Page »