Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ

http://www.palined.com/search/ (just a google dorker)

What would you advise i do?

If you can afford to and if what you are looking for is even available (for non-DRM'd download) through legal channels, I advise purchasing the content legally. (Yes, I know what community I'm commenting in.. :D ) Doing so supports the artists that make the content.

Otherwise, I would check and see if what you are looking for is on Youtube or in Anna's Archive. You can download things from Youtube using either yt-dlp (give it a Youtube link) or spotdl (give it a Spotify link and it will download the song, album or playlist from Youtube and tag the songs using Spotify or Musicbrainz metadata). The current addresses to Anna's Archive can be found on their Wikipedia page.

I also like Usenet, currently, for a lot of the more esoteric, hard to find elsewhere things (like TV shows that don't have DVD releases and aren't on Youtube). Just a heads up if you go this route, the Usenet provider "Eternal September", while free, does not provide access to the groups where binaries (things like video, music, epubs, and pdfs) are posted. They only provide access to the discussion side of Usenet, which has been largely dead for the last 10-15 years. Generally, Usenet access is fairly cheap, as are the nzb trackers needed to download binaries from Usenet.

Torrents don't require a VPN, however, torrenting does broadcast your IP address for all the world to see if they decide to look. A VPN is used to obfuscate your IP address to minimize the odds of trouble with your ISP, the rightholders (who might sue) or depending on where your are, law enforcement. Just don't ever use the "free" VPNs that are out there. They tend to be honeypots or malware vectors.

People not seeding things has made bittorrent pretty much useless for anything not currently popular. The only thing I use bittorrent for nowadays is speeding up the download of larger downloads, like Linux install disks. Works well for that. But if there's not at least 15 seeders for the file your looking for, you may never actually be able to finish downloading the thing.

what did you do when starting out?

I'm getting to be an old fart. I was using Napster (early predecessor to bittorrent, now long dead), IRC and random ftp and gopher sites on a dialup modem in the late 90's and into the mid 2000's. Dial-up BBS's were fading out into obscurity, and I hadn't really heard of Usenet (even though that was during it's hayday) and Bittorrent hadn't been invented yet.

I concur with others that your question depends a lot on where you live.

In my country if I take a "seedbox" in a datacenters I'm pretty much safe to pirate. The copyright holders don't bother with that.

On the other hand I have received a threatening email from some government agency because I downloaded a blockbuster movie on torrent without a VPN.

Your first step should be to check if there is any precedent of people having legal troubles or ISP threats after pirating where you live.

Then you can decide on the available avenues to go around that.

In many countries, anti piracy laws can be very dumb (mostly because they are the result of technically illiterate lawmakers).

Again I could pirate everything online if the IP that does it for me is in a datacenter. But the second I would do that directly at home and I could get in trouble.

For example I could have a seedbox download for me some content on torrents and then upload it to a file hoster like mega or something. And then I download that file without triggering any copyright holder scanners. It's stupid but if the torrenting is done by a business for me, it's off radar. But it's quite risky if I do it myself...

It depends where you live if you need a VPN or not.

You could utilize Tor's oniux and run your torrent client/regular browser through that. Depending on your base internet and area, though, connection speeds through it will vary wildly.

edit: I thought there was a Windows version, but I guess it's only for Linux. Not sure what you're running

Never used a VPN. Never got a letter. Hardly heard of anyone being actually sued over downloading one movie out of the millions that do it daily...probably more likely for die driving to work.

Torrent. Install Qbittorrent and just use any Prate bay clone site.

Or SlSk (soul seek) search and download directly from a user. They may expect to see that your sharing files. It's OK to have nothing when your starting out.

Or Stremio installed on almost any TV or device and stream the content without downloading first. Kodi can do it too but it's a bit of a setup and I've found Stremio to be easier.

The first two install without issie, the last needs a guide to get the good stuff DM me and I'll send a recommended link.

I've done all three for free with no issues - beyond sometimes finding content. That said. The caviets.

The first two can get you a virus if you don't know what your doing and clicking random things. For torrenting I hear private trackers are better but I've never used one.

And the last one does, unfortunately, work better with a paid service (premoumize or real debrid). Cheapest is during black friday and pay for two years. It's the same as yearly Prime Subscription.

Why do you need a VPN? If authorities want to go after you they can figure out what you are doing from traffic pattern analysis, they don't need to read the information being transmitted. If it's about the letters provierss send sometimes, if they send you one, find a new provider, or worry about a VPN then.

All VPNs do is give you the illusion of being protected while taking your money. They will not deter a determined attacker or the authorities, not that torrenting would be a big deal anyways.