Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
blog.torproject.org
Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
1–10 of 40 posts
Re: Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
#2This is a great step forward, however the nature of all "domains" is centralised. DNS is a great idea, that decouples the centralisation to many parties, but it is central at many points; registrars, ICANN, DNS servers (though can be local). Tor's unique .onion address are the perfect way to fix the centralisation and the security, but comes at the cost of human readability.
Re: Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
#3ew. gross.
CAs : Web of Trust :: domains : what Tor should do
Re: Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
#4This is a great step forward, however the nature of all "domains" is centralised. DNS is a great idea, that decouples the centralisation to many parties, but it is central at many points; registrars, ICANN, DNS servers (though can be local). Tor's unique .onion address are the perfect way to fix the centralisation and the security, but comes at the cost of human readability.
I really liked the idea that created peercoin. I.e. a currency that also enabled distributed the registrar's (at least I believe so).
Re: Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
#5Why not use Namecoin? Seems like a good fit.
Re: Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
#6The way DNS works in I2P[0] is pretty neat[1]. Nothing in this post sounds quite like it. It provides a great "default" user experience while allowing for finer-grained control and tighter security if a user chooses. To summarize:
- Users have a local "Address Book" which maps friendly names (e.g. forum.i2p) to I2P destination keys.
- There are well-known I2P hidden services providing address book subscriptions. The default install includes a subscription that is maintained (and signed!) by the project maintainers.
- The address book makes it clear where names are coming from. So if you decide to un-trust one of your existing subscriptions, you can still keep addresses you added yourself, etc.
- New sites submit their name & key to popular address book services, but there is an additional trick you can use. Pass people a link like " rel="nofollow">http://mysite.i2p/?i2paddresshelper=. This is known as a "jump" link. Your local HTTP proxy will take you to a page asking if you would like to add the name to your address book, or if you'd simply like to keep the name for this session but not save it.
The whole system is easy to use while staying flexible, secure, and in the user's control. I'm curious if the Tor team has tried out I2P or considered a system like this.
If it's not making sense to you from my summary, I highly encourage you to get I2P and try it out!
[0] https://geti2p.net/en/ [1] https://geti2p.net/en/docs/naming
Re: Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
#7Why not use Namecoin? Seems like a good fit.
That's what they're doing:
>During the past years, many research groups have experimented and designed various secure name systems (e.g. GNS, Namecoin, Blockstack). Each of these systems has its own strengths and weaknesses, as well as different user models and total user experience. We are not sure which one works best for the onion space, so ideally we'd like to try them all and let the community and the sands of time decide for us. We believe that by integrating these experimental systems into Tor, we can greatly strengthen and improve the whole scientific field by exposing name systems to the real world and an active and demanding userbase.
Re: Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
#8ew. gross. CAs : Web of Trust :: domains : what Tor should do
They're not using a ca-like central authority model. They're using Namecoin (or something like it), which is decentralized authority, verifiable via crypto.
Re: Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
#9ew. gross. CAs : Web of Trust :: domains : what Tor should do
They're not using a ca-like central authority model. They're using Namecoin (or something like it), which is decentralized authority, verifiable via crypto.
never said they should. saying the kind of complexity presented by a blockchain is an insane way to work in low-trust environments with competent adversaries.
they should be working on reducing the complexity in the trust model. I trust the person who told me about a service. why can't I just get the keys from them, and verify that all of my other friends agree?
Re: Improving on Tor .onion Address Usability
#10The way DNS works in I2P[0] is pretty neat[1]. Nothing in this post sounds quite like it. It provides a great "default" user experience while allowing for finer-grained control and tighter security if a user chooses. To summarize: - Users have a local "Address Book" which maps friendly names (e.g. forum.i2p) to I2P destination keys. - There are well-known I2P hidden services providing address book subscriptions. The…
hate to be tinfoil-hat about this, but I2P seems sane in every way that Tor seems all-but-intentionally insecure in the face of sophisticated adversaries.
this seems a good example of "fruitful surface area" for security vulns. another unrelated design decision is for Tor to reuse a single route which can be identified with relatively high accuracy via traffic analysis.