Hey all.
First of all, this is a great sub with great posts and advice.
I’ve used the search bar and I have to say now I’m more confused than before.
I want to start torrenting. I know that I have to use a VPN and then bittorrent (or something similar) and then find torrents.
I want to do it in a safe way. Many posts here advice against Nord VPN which is the one I’m using . I’ve also seen posts advising against bitcommet (which I used in the past).
Some other posts mentioned port forwarding (which I have no idea what it is) and many other tips.
For a newbie, that lives in the Netherlands (i don’t know how strict they are ; but I know our neighbours- Germany are very strict. And I know personally cases where they received letters for pirating), what’s your best advice to stay safe and anonymous?
I’m willing to pay for a new VPN if you think that would be best.
Thanks!
Refer to the pinned guide on the sub on how to bind your VPN interface
You should also be using qBittorrent
Do not use uTorrent or BitTorrent
You can try torrenting with Nord but your speeds may not be great
If they’re not, consider another provider
Mullvad is highly rated by most people on this sub
Port forwarding is essentially opening a door in your network to allow different services to communicate over the internet. Ports are represented as xx.xx.xx.xx:xxxx, or ip:port
Setting up a port for your torrent client will allow you to connect to more peers, and generally get faster speeds.
Port forwarding (opening ports and pointing them at your machine) is typically done from your router control panel, and the steps are different depending on your model. Some routers and ISPs will not allow you to forward ports.
This is why VPNs such as mullvad are really handy, as they allow you to bypass your router, and in mullvad’s case, have up to 5 ports forwarded at a time. This is less ideal than forwarding on your router, as you can’t control the port number. You can however control what port your torrent client uses to connect, and change it to the one afforded to you by the vpn provider.
If you’re Dutch, you don’t need a VPN to torrent. It’s legal for us.
Thanks for the summary! Really appreciate it.
Sometimes, I know we newbies can be annoying, but I’m very thankful for your comment!
Hey. I live in the Netherlands!
Didn’t know that thanks. Just to clarify things: is it legal or you mean that they don’t check and chase cases like Germany ?
No problem, you’re welcome
People are always willing to help out noobs who have demonstrated that they have read the basics first
I have send you a pm, because I don’t know the English word for ‘gedoogd’ 
But I believe it’s not illegal, but at the very least you won’t get fined for torrenting. And indeed, in Germany for instance the laws are pretty strict for torrenting. There you should always use a VPN!
I may be mistaken, but many of the paid torrenting servers (seedboxes) are located in the netherlands. I get all my best download connections from dutch IPs at least.
Exactly, the Netherlands and (North) Ireland I believe? Maybe also Switzerland, but that’s about it. The ultimate proof you don’t need a VPN over here 
