Over the last couple of weeks I've joined in with discussions and plans for a group of friends to set up a VPN-mesh so (legal) data can be stored on each other's networks.
Once the VPN side of things is set up, we'll each be providing space for the other members to store data they wouldn't want to lose in an fire/jealous girlfriend deletion rage/whatever. The mechanism of distributing the data hasn't been decided, and would likely depend on the source OS – I, for instance, will likely use some kind of rsync solution.
Last night, the first two nodes were connected; on one end, a Draytek 2820n router and the other a pfSense box. We have chosen IPsec as the tunnel protocol, and will aim to use that throughout all the node interconnects.
This morning we've established forward and reverse DNS look-ups via the tunnel so name resolution of individual hosts on remote subnets is possible.
The main issue with using a mesh is there's a limit on the total number of members – a lot of routers can only maintain a limited number of tunnels, eg. the Draytek 2820n only supports 32. Also, as more members join, the additional work required to fully integrate them increases. However, as the idea here is to provide storage space for people who trust us with their prized data (photos, home videos etc), it won't ever extend beyond a handful of nodes. Because of this key point, we can safely ignore that limitation for this project.
It's going to be challenging, with a number of obstacles to overcome – not least the different routers people are running and operating systems in use – there's already Windows XP/7, Linux and Mac OS X – but it's rewarding seeing it come together, and I'm sure it'll prove its worth over time.
