Why Dread isn't always the place to go to for Opsec advice
Yes, i don't think that forums are the ideal place to go to for those that want to seriously learn Opsec.
Disclaimer: I don't mean to say that dread should be avoided altogether, as i still think it's a valuable resource, I still go there because I know where/how to find the quality Opsec feedback whenever i need to have some, but let's be honest, you have to swim through an ocean of bullshit to find it. There's a cruel lack of education, objectivity, and seriousness in there most of the time, not to blame anyone, we all start somewhere after all, but this place could be managed way better than its current state.
That's partly the main reason i am maintaining the Opsec bible, because i got sick of people on /d/opsec asking the same question 9000 times and having to re-explain everything every time. Or having to re-dismantle the same fud/fallacies being spread over and over again, going there has made me realize that there's a real need to have a legit resource that can be referred back to, to actively dismantles everyone's bullshit Opsec advice with logic and actual exploration.
Forums are anyway not ideal to actually dig deep into an entire field of study as far as i'm concerned. Especially when anyone can register multiple anonymous accounts for free to argue with themselves and derail all the serious discussions that may happen there. That could just be a forum moderation issue, there might just need to have proper moderation in place to filter the crap, but there's so much of it that i understand that it may be hard to keep up with.
What worries me however, is how this subdread is being managed as of July 2025, as you'll see in the below examples, it's not just a problem within the userbase, but most importantly in the moderators themselves.
/d/opsec moderator pinning offtopic shitposts (2025-07-02)
Link to the pinned shitpost thread
That's frankly a new low i didnt expect. not only did they approve that post in the first place, but they (i guess it's beelzebub) also decided to pin it. Sad to see.
I might continue posting more of what i find in here if they continue going downhill. Frankly i'm not interested in becoming a mod there anymore, we're anyway charting our own path going forward.
My thoughts on /d/opsec
I understand that it may be hard to keep up with the moderation of a very active forum that may see alot of dishonest debates in it, so i definitely understand that fud and fallacies may end up in there over time.
However moderators being shitposters and tolerating shitposters is another matter. That's not normal at all. I only tolerate adult-like behavior in the nowhere community personally, with the exception being our offtopic simplex chatroom where our rules are more lax. I don't want anyone to ruin the quality discussions that we may end up having regarding our serious topics like Opsec, sysadmin, hacking, darknet, etc.
Now in a way, I think it's also a matter of providing the adequate format to effectively deliver Opsec advice. A forum is anyway not suitable to allow a community to explore a vast field of study, such as operational security. So i really forgive /d/opsec, it's just that forums are anyway not the right place for serious Opsec exploration that's all. Use the right tools for the right purpose, a forum may be ok for general discussions, but a forum is not suitable for exploratory work of a field of study.
For that actual exploration and truth seeking you need an actual knowledge base that explains everything from A to Z, for all noobs, to all nerds out there, that is actively being challenged and improved over the years.
Having the same questions being asked every week for years and years, and not even bothering to build a proper knowledge base to answer all of them easily, is NOT an effective way of transmitting knowledge to an audience. With a Forum you have to re-explain everything every time, rather than just sending them a link to the relevant article in the knowledge base to let them look up what they were looking for.
I bet you can guess where I'm going at. The Opsec bible, aims to provide just that. We intend it to be a complete knowledge base to learn Opsec, from A to Z, explaining why each technology and concept is important, what each of those are, and how to implement them, step by step, to ultimately achieve perfect operational security.
TLDR: stop clinging to forums if you want quality Opsec advice and tutorials, you need an actual knowledge base that is regularly kept up to date, with proper quality control
Suggest changes
Nihilist 2025-07-02
Donate XMR to the author:
8AUYjhQeG3D5aodJDtqG499N5jXXM71gYKD8LgSsFB9BUV1o7muLv3DXHoydRTK4SZaaUBq4EAUqpZHLrX2VZLH71Jrd9k8