Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tor Browser 12.0

blog.torproject.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 230 posts

Re: Tor Browser 12.0

#91

Post by HackerNCoder »

bombcar wrote: post #82
sterlind wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

they shouldn't be, but there's a practical difference in how often your house gets raided by FBI agents. if a Tor user uses your exit node to email a bomb threat or access child porn, it's your source IP that shows up. the FBI should check your IP against the registry of exit node IPs, but if they don't it's still your door getting kicked in.

Exactly - and I've noticed there aren't very many exit nodes at all, small enough that I can start to recognize them by name.

Yea, there is only about 1000 (actually 1300, I just checked) exits - out of only ~6000 nodes total, the Tor network is actually kinda small.

Re: Tor Browser 12.0

#94

Post by INeedMoreRam »

jerheinze wrote: post #68
shaky-carrousel wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is, in my case. All my system updates run over Tor. I do it to generate noise.

This is one of the main reasons why I keep using Tor daily. The more people use Tor for normal browsing, the less interesting it becomes to be a Tor user, the better the anonymity for everyone else.

I also use Tor sometimes for the sole purpose of muddying up the waters for investigators.

Re: Tor Browser 12.0

#95

Post by bombcar »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #64
sterlind wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

iirc IC still mostly uses burner shell companies for IPs, at least for running ops. Tor is fine for innocuous browsing but Tor exit nodes will stick out like a sore thumb in the victim's logs or IDS.

I'm not someone who looks at a lot of server logs, but what characterises entries as being from Tor?

Being on the list of TOR exit nodes: https://www.dan.me.uk/tornodes

Re: Tor Browser 12.0

#96

Post by shaky-carrousel »

jerheinze wrote: post #68
shaky-carrousel wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is, in my case. All my system updates run over Tor. I do it to generate noise.

This is one of the main reasons why I keep using Tor daily. The more people use Tor for normal browsing, the less interesting it becomes to be a Tor user, the better the anonymity for everyone else.

Quoting Phil Zimmermann:

What if everyone believed that law-abiding citizens should use postcards for their mail? If a nonconformist tried to assert his privacy by using an envelope for his mail, it would draw suspicion. Perhaps the authorities would open his mail to see what he's hiding. Fortunately, we don't live in that kind of world, because everyone protects most of their mail with envelopes. So no one draws suspicion by asserting their privacy with an envelope. There's safety in numbers. Analogously, it would be nice if everyone routinely used encryption for all their email, innocent or not, so that no one drew suspicion by asserting their email privacy with encryption. Think of it as a form of solidarity.

Re: Tor Browser 12.0

#97

Post by bombcar »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #67
nirvgorilla wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. Suspicious just like when reddit became hostile to Tor. It's also a violation of the spirit of the internet. Tim Berners-Lee wrote about this in the December 2010 issue of Scientific American that any walled off website that blocks you from accessing it is unacceptable because it's not the web anymore.

For me old.reddit.com seems to work just as well with or without Tor (eg via Brave). The website served at the raw domain barely functions IME, so perhaps that's where the issue lie?

The problem is user account creation, usually.

Read-only access works pretty well in most cases (unless it is behind Cloudflare, then you're @#$%@#^%).

Re: Tor Browser 12.0

#98

Post by bombcar »

at-fates-hands wrote: post #60
edgyquant wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tor works by proxying through (at least) 3 PCs before hitting the open web. The problem is that you’re trying to download big files which is not a use case for tor. It’s specifically for browsing the web anonymously.

When I first starting using Tor in the mid aughts, I was using it to download movies and music. I remember talking with a security friend and he was like, "Bruh, what are you doing? That's not what Tor is for." and then launched into a 20 min rant about why I was misusing Tor and affecting other people using the service by what I was doing. It was a good lesson and helped me realize what Tor should really be used for…

It's likely that downloading music and movies is actually helpful for those using TOR to "avoid death" - because it provides more cover and traffic.

Re: Tor Browser 12.0

#99

Post by goodpoint »

optimalsolver wrote: post #9

The inescapable fact about Tor is that its traffic patterns make you stand out prominently. Just the fact you’re using it automatically makes you interesting and worthy of a closer look. All well and good if you’re just maintaining a cookie recipe site on the dark web, but it’s rarely ever that, is it?

> All well and good if you’re just maintaining a cookie recipe site on the dark web, but it’s rarely ever that, is it?

No, it isn't rare. Plenty of people use Tor for casual browsing without triggering invasive ads and similar. It just works.

Re: Tor Browser 12.0

#100

Post by robert_foss »

data_maan wrote: post #89

I once spoke with someone who knew someone who ran an exit node in Europe. He told crazy stories with police knocking every once in a while. Also the legal structure to do that was tricky, because you want to avoid the police searching your house; you'd also like tl spread responsability on multiple shoulders. So you have to create a kind of non-profit organization and run the exit node through that. It's very hard w…

I ran one in my student housing wardrobe a decade or so ago.

I too have some stories, but no one ever met up with me in the flesh.

Post reply on HN