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Facebook is Blocking Connections from Tor Network

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Re: Facebook is Blocking Connections from Tor Network

#41

Post by yuvadam »

The privatized 'public' space makes an inevitable move.

Facebook can no longer stake any preposterous claim to "help people connect better". It is a business entity - always has been - and does not give half a damn about "making the world a better place", or whatever corporate marketing catchphrase they use right now.

Related to recent events or not, the privatized internet is continuing to backlash with severe consequences for anyone dependent on Tor to ensure that their tyrant government doesn't come knocking on their door just for speaking their mind.

Re: Facebook is Blocking Connections from Tor Network

#42

Post by conductor »

runn1ng wrote: post #12

news.ycombinator does this too. edit: at least for me, it's impossible to log in to HN and when I occasionally succesfully log im, everything I post while being on Tor is instantly dead.

pg described here [1] why HN sometimes can block Tor users.

[1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5864439

Re: Facebook is Blocking Connections from Tor Network

#45

Post by rainforest »

eli wrote: post #20
mooism2 wrote: post #3

Has anybody tried asking Facebook why they've done this? Possible reasons: 1. One or more governments (which ones?) have told Facebook to block Tor or else. (Or else what?) 2. A manual security review revealed more hacking attempts via Tor than legitimate use, so Facebook decided to block Tor. 3. After a sustained hacking attack via Tor, an automated Facebook security system automatically blocked Facebook access from…

Option 2 or 3 seem pretty likely. I'm pretty sure wikipedia blocks edits from Tor IPs because a huge number of them are malicious.

A lot of IRC networks block Tor exit nodes too. Since exit nodes are in short supply, it seems reasonable that there's a high likelihood each one has been used to launch attacks/spam Facebook and was consequently blacklisted.

Google takes a similar approach - if you use Tor there's a high chance it'll accuse you of being a bot and require a CAPTCHA.

Re: Facebook is Blocking Connections from Tor Network

#46

Post by user24 »

superuser2 wrote: post #32
darkarmani wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What personal information exists in facebook?

Associates. Thoughts. Articles you liked. Articles you didn't like. Private messages. Contact information. Photos. Location check-ins. Causes you support. The whole point of Facebook is to share some private information with a selected group of friends.

(and the NSA)

Re: Facebook is Blocking Connections from Tor Network

#47

Post by talmir »

superuser2 wrote: post #32
darkarmani wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What personal information exists in facebook?

Associates. Thoughts. Articles you liked. Articles you didn't like. Private messages. Contact information. Photos. Location check-ins. Causes you support. The whole point of Facebook is to share some private information with a selected group of friends.

That might be the "whole point" but that is not how everyone uses it. I have a facebook account myself which contains nothing but a username, a generic artsy avatar and a list of popular facebook pages I like to keep tabs on. I dont share any personal information and I dont have "friends" on facebook.

This is all purely out of convenience. If I wanted to go full on stealth mode I could have used Tor at which point my account would not give facebook any information apart from a couple of "like" clicks from a super generic gray faced account.

Activists can create these accounts and have a place where they can tell the world about their experiences without risk of being found out. They dont need to give out their IP addresses, they dont need to give out addresses. All they need is a cause and a way to speak and, given luck, people will start listening.

Now at least one small avenue of communication has been closed.

Re: Facebook is Blocking Connections from Tor Network

#48

Post by jtome »

eli wrote: post #40
jtome wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never realized that turning on/off noscript had something to do with google blocking me, thanks.

Makes sense -- most bots don't run JS.

Definitely, I guess this means all I need is phantom.js to steal all of google's search results now.

Re: Facebook is Blocking Connections from Tor Network

#49

Post by Arkanosis »

eli wrote: post #20
mooism2 wrote: post #3

Has anybody tried asking Facebook why they've done this? Possible reasons: 1. One or more governments (which ones?) have told Facebook to block Tor or else. (Or else what?) 2. A manual security review revealed more hacking attempts via Tor than legitimate use, so Facebook decided to block Tor. 3. After a sustained hacking attack via Tor, an automated Facebook security system automatically blocked Facebook access from…

Option 2 or 3 seem pretty likely. I'm pretty sure wikipedia blocks edits from Tor IPs because a huge number of them are malicious.

Yes. And because regular blocks are useless if people can use Tor to circumvent them. Legitimate users can get a block exemption to edit from a Tor IP, though.

Re: Facebook is Blocking Connections from Tor Network

#50

Post by forcer »

Isn't HTTPS connection enough to protect from snooping regimes? If the foreign government won't block FB access completely, user can go to https://www.facebook.com and will know that their data can only be seen by Facebook? Of course if government is blocking FB access, then I understand the need of TOR.
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