[aes256]

> The ISP might not have any idea, but your usenet provider does. I'm curious if it's common practice for them to log user activity.

Most providers do not log downloads. To cite the policies of two of the biggest providers, Giganews and Astraweb:

> Giganews does not track the specific articles you download; however, we will track the volume of your downloads for account maintenance and download limit enforcement purposes (if applicable).

— http://www.giganews.com/support/#q4.1

> We do not store any specific information about your downloads. We only store the amount downloaded, date and access IP address for accounting purposes.

— http://www.news.astraweb.com/privacy.html