# Alternative/Self-Contained Networks **URL:** https://discuss.privacyguides.net/t/alternative-self-contained-networks/17792 **Category:** Tool Suggestions **Tags:** approved **Created:** 2024-04-10T04:02:50Z **Posts:** 4 ## Post 1 by @jonah — 2024-04-10T04:02:50Z (This is already a PR, but I had thoughts I wanted to share about it, and I don’t want to put them in the PR message and then have people start discussing them on GitHub instead of here.) * * * This new PR is going to cover all alt-networks, including anonymizing and non-anonymizing ones. A long time ago we removed the self-contained networks page because we hadn’t used anything besides Tor recently, and weren’t confident about I2P and Freenet. So I’ve tested out basically every “alternative network” out there now, and I’ve decided: - **I2P** : Definitely solid, very easy to use, performant. I’ve been doing a lot of research into how it works and everything seems to check out, there are a lot of benefits over Tor (although Tor is still preferable, but there’s details on that in the PR) - **Hyphanet (formerly Freenet)**: Absolutely terrible. Even ignoring the poor UX and horrendous publishing experience, everything about Freenet seems like a massive liability to me. Also they still haven’t bothered to rename any of the Freenet software to the new name. This basically feels like the crappy version of IPFS (which says a lot because IPFS already _isn’t_ spectacular). And then some ones we haven’t listed before: - **IPFS** : I’ve used IPFS _so_ many times, but I think my current setup is the only one which works the way I want it to. Seems to work well if you actually set it up right, pretty lackluster otherwise (in addition to poor performance generally, it is very complex to host anything but the most basic website, as I found out mirroring PG). I think it is worth bringing back for its censorship-resistant properties. Way better than Freenet. - **Tailscale** : [I like](https://discuss.privacyguides.net/t/private-networking-category-software-defined-networks/11766) - **ZeroNet** : is abandoned, and I don’t like the lack of activity on the two main forks. Not going to add it. - **LokiNet** : almost considered creating a PG mirror here, but it feels [abandoned](https://github.com/oxen-io/lokinet/commits/dev/) and I am probably biased against crypto. Not going to add it. - **Nebula** : feels too complex for what it is, not going to add it. Plus 2 I’m still uncertain about: - **ZeroTier** : I don’t have much against, except their _weird_ license instead of being FOSS, and it just generally not being quite as nice as Tailscale. Probably going to add this one anyways. - [**Yggdrasil** :](https://yggdrasil-network.github.io/) probably the most obscure one out here, I’m tempted because 1) it works well, 2) uses modern crypto, 3) been around a long time. It might also be useful in terms of censorship-resistance. I’m leaning _against_ adding it because it’s too reliant on the user setting it up properly: if you don’t then you’re basically exposing yourself to everyone on the network. * * * Related PR: > > > Changes proposed in this PR: > > - Add I2P > - https://discuss.privacyguides.net/t…/alternative-self-contained-networks/17792 > > > > > - [x] I have disclosed any relevant conflicts of interest in my post. > - [x] I agree to grant Privacy Guides a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, transferable, royalty-free, irrevocable license with the right to sublicense such rights through multiple tiers of sublicensees, to reproduce, modify, display, perform, relicense, and distribute my contribution as part of this project. > - [x] I am the sole author of this work. > - [x] I agree to the [Community Code of Conduct](https://www.privacyguides.org/coc). Existing related discussions: > [@Private Networking Category (Software-Defined Networks)](https://discuss.privacyguides.net/t/private-networking-category-software-defined-networks/11766): > > Would there be interest in a category for tools that create software-defined networks/private VPNs? This has clear utility for people self-hosting other tools we recommend on local devices without requiring they expose their self-hosted services to the internet via port forwarding. Tailscale Open source first-party clients: [Open source at Tailscale · Tailscale](https://tailscale.com/opensource/) GUI clients on proprietary systems (Windows, macOS, iOS) are not fully open-source Closed-source backend Officially endorsed third-p… > [@Making sense of all the other "anonymous network" beyond Tor, like I2P, Hyphanet etc](https://discuss.privacyguides.net/t/making-sense-of-all-the-other-anonymous-network-beyond-tor-like-i2p-hyphanet-etc/13451): > > I think the Privacyguides website only talks about Tor and VPNs. I would like to know more about other type of “Tor-like” networks and similar technologies. Some of this might be relevant for the website, but most probably not. I would like to know what the following technologies offer: Anonymously accessing the clearnet? Circumventing censorship (e.g. network blocks, national firewalls)? Access to darknet sites? (like .onion or.i2p) Hosting websites and files in a censorship-resistant way? P… > [@Mirroring/publishing Privacy Guides to decentralized networks](https://discuss.privacyguides.net/t/mirroring-publishing-privacy-guides-to-decentralized-networks/17565): > > I want to know what we think about decentralized networks basically, e.g. IPFS, Zeronet, …? I don’t know what the popular ones are. I saw a community member publishes the site to ZeronetX currently ([Decentralized Copy of Privacy Guides available on ZeroNetX](https://discuss.privacyguides.net/t/decentralized-copy-of-privacy-guides-available-on-zeronetx/17469)), but if we wanted to do that ourselves it’s something we could automate on our end with GitHub Actions for example, so that it is always up to date. Is that something we should pursue, or nah? --- ## Post 2 by @perguth — 2024-04-14T10:41:08Z > Yggdrasil… it’s too reliant on the user setting it up properly… Maybe look into the official [Yggdrasil as SOCKS proxy / port forwarder](https://github.com/yggdrasil-network/yggstack). That should resolve the security concern. --- ## Post 3 by @overdrawn98901 — 2024-04-14T23:53:39Z Out of curiosity, what about [GNUnet](https://www.gnunet.org/en/)? Not sure how active the project is, but having a FOSS option is attractive to some (if it’s viable). --- ## Post 4 by @bitsondatadev — 2025-01-15T02:42:40Z Was a little bummed Freenet/Hyphanet was a dead end. I looked at GNUnet and it seemed pretty cool.