VPN to Tor- a good idea or not?

Evening all,

Is it more secure to connect to a VPN and then to Tor, or to connect directly to Tor?

I've read that it is potentially a bad idea as you are putting a lot of trust in the VPN provider. What I don't understand is that if you just connected directly to Tor then you would be placing a lot of trust in your ISP. I live in the UK where ISP's log, and the VPN service I use (Private Internet Access) is adament that they don't log (although they are located in the US which is a concern). Assuming the VPN doesn't log, and the ISP does, surely the better choice is to go through the VPN?

I would appreciate if someone more knowledgable could clarfiy. Thanks

When you connect to a vpn your isp just see's the ip address the vpn assigned to you. The traffic is encrypted so they cant see what websites you are visiting. Now if you vpn to tor and give out any personal information by using any accounts that have any of it then you just wasted your own time and money. gl to you.

thank you for your reply, although it doesnt really answer my question. I understand what a VPN does. 

my point is that whether i connect directly to Tor, or to Tor via a VPN, either the VPN provider or my ISP is going to be able to see that I am using Tor (although they cannot see what I am doing). As my ISP logs and my VPN doesn't is it not safer to use the VPN before connecting? or am i missing something. 

thanks

Provided your VPN Doesn't keep any logs, Including Your ip Address, And you can Trust they really don't. Then yes technically it is safer. Because The Exit Nodes of Tor will see your VPN's Ip address And not yours. And When useing Tor Its best to keep flash disabled. Along with java. And do not accept cookies.

 

When you connect to a vpn your isp just see's the ip address the vpn assigned to you

Dude, no! NO!

The ISP sees that you connect to a VPN but the connection is encrypted so the ISP doesn't know what you're using the VPN for.

And you can Trust they really don't

Which is a really really bad idea. So better don't do it.

Then yes technically it is safer

The ISP sees that you either use TOR or a VPN. In both cases they don't know what you use it for and the "security" is the same.

Because The Exit Nodes of Tor will see your VPN's Ip address And not yours.

No! Wrong. The conecpt of TOR is to use a proxy cascade. Every node only knows the IP of the node the data is from. It doesn't know even know if a node is the first node (you, as a user).

Using a VPN when using TOR is useless because a VPN basically works like a proxy and TOR is a proxy cascade. Everything you do is add another fixed proxy node at the beginning of proxy cascade.

Thanks Wickedwig. I agree, but surely the ISP seeing a VPN connection is less suspicious than it seeing a TOR connection? a VPN is commonly used in businesses so would arouse less suspicion would it not? therefor making it "safer"?

I don't see why it's more suspicious to use TOR than VPN. I'd go further and say that it makes more sense to run TOR because every additional user makes it harder for an attacker to crack the sytem and if everyone uses TOR it is not suspicious at all.