Order of events...

Looked up IP

Connected to Tailscale, set exit node through Mullvad

Looked up IP again, was different

Started seeding in the background while working on other stuff

At one point I saw Tailscale icon flicker

Later I got an angry email from my ISP with a timestamp that lined up

Been seeding for years, and this was my first leak. Was for a recent popular film (Linux ISO) that I've been seeding for a year. I contacted Tailscale support to express my concern. This is what they said...

Though we have an open feature request for this (link), I don’t believe there are current plans to add a killswitch to the client for Mullvad.

If this is something that is important to you, the quickest solution to this would be to purchase a Mullvad subscription directly from them, since their client has a number of features more geared towards tightening users online privacy – including a killswitch.

So I suggest not using Tailscale with Mullvad for such purposes. I don't think this is a priority for them. For other uses it's been fine.

I imagine this could have been avoided with a restrictive torrent client configuration, as is typically recommended online. I've tried and failed to get that working in the past. I'll try again once I change out my VPN. If you've been putting that off, learn from my mistake and look into it!

OC by @bl4kers@lemmy.ml

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[–] CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 17 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

You shouldn't even be using Mullvad for torrenting as they had to get rid of their port forwarding feature some time ago. This means youll only be able to connect to individuals who do have port forwarding setup and no one else.

In any case the best solution is to link your torrent client to the VPN interface as it will cease operation if it loses connection and prevent leaks.

[–] witty_username@feddit.nl 3 points 14 hours ago (3 children)

What would you recommend in stead of mullvad?

[–] Duckling5746@lemmy.today 2 points 8 hours ago

+1 for AirVPN. They take crypto. Works nicely on headless servers with openvpn.

[–] CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 4 points 12 hours ago

Ive been using AirVPN since Mullvad dropped port forwarding and it has been decent and reasonably priced. The only issue I've had was with their "Eddie" client for Windows. I fixed this by using (I think, or something similarly named) WireSock with an AirVPN Wireguard config which also gave me the ability to do split tunneling easily but I only used this for a few months before building a new server running Proxmox

I think ProtonVPN also has the feature but costs a bit more. Private Internet Access is another cheap option but their owners are shady (I had them before Mullvad until they got sold to a company with ties to Israeli spyware makers IIRC)

[–] swab148@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 12 hours ago

I use Proton, I've also heard AirVPN is good.