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Ask HN: How to create an anonymous site?

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Re: Ask HN: How to create an anonymous site?

#31
post #3

Don't. More specifically, if you truly care for anonymity, you won't be using a plain DNS+Web site. Instead, you should go for Freenet [1] or a Tor-hosted website [2]. [1] https://freenetproject.org/ [2] https://www.torproject.org/docs/tor-hidden-service.html.en

What are the technical differences between Tor (hidden services), Freenet and I2P?

Initially, Tor and I2P only pass information from one node to another while obfuscating it. At either end, you can now what the information is, but you do not know where it went through. It's basically a tunnel that goes somewhere. It is why you can use Tor to browse the web: you just use it to hide where you are connecting from.

On the other hand, Freenet is a paranoia-driven network over the Internet which makes information available and resilient. There is no such thing as a webserver on Freenet. An encrypted version of the data is sent to some nodes and passed from one to another. You don't know where the information comes from, you just get it at some point.

Finally, Tor implemented hidden services. This is almost the opposite of the initial situation where an user wants to access a known website without being known. The hidden service is hosted on some node, and you access it through the "Tor tunnel", meaning that you don't know where the service is. The user is still hidden by the network too.

Re: Ask HN: How to create an anonymous site?

#32

Here are a couple of interesting links: http://untraceableblog.com/ http://voidnull.sdf.org/ To answer your questions - you can buy domain for bitcoins and use some free hosting like Wordpress or Github Pages.

I can't believe they lost the opportunity to call it untraceablog.com.

On a serious note, those look really interesting.

Re: Ask HN: How to create an anonymous site?

#33
post #18
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. Buy BTC with cash This actually is harder than it sounds.

localbitcoins?

AFAIK sellers often require some data like a verified mobile phone number.

Than there is your registration on localbitcoin. You would need a truely anonymous email address.

And the site behaves really poorly if you try to use it over tor.

If you do the cash transfer in person, the seller might be able to identify you.

If you don't do it in person you would have to send it via some money transfer service.

It is allways hard not to leave traces when you interact with something / someone.

Edit: As 'austerity' stated: 4. Do not accidentally leak your identity in one of million possible ways. [...] But #4 is next to impossible.

Re: Ask HN: How to create an anonymous site?

#35
Besides the technical measures in the other comments, there are a bunch of other tricks that might be useful. (Please don't take this as advice, but just as a thought experiment! If I were writing a spy novel, these are some things my characters would do.)

Find a homeless person, and ask him/her to register a bank account in exchange for some cash or a meal. Use that account to set up your website anonymously. You'll find that you need to dirten money if running such an operation - reverse laundering or taking "clean" money and putting it untracably into the business. Such a proxy account is a vital ingredient.

Don't rely on Tor alone. It might be completely subverted, you wouldn't know until it's too late. Buy access to a botnet and route your stuff over it.

Have multiple servers. If you have one single server, its easy to trace. Either by brute force: the ISPs disconnect/slow down 50% of customers for a split second, depending on wheter your site went down or not they know in which half you are, repeat until they find you. There are much more sophisticated techniques that don't require active interference. But if you have at least two or three identical servers at different locations, it makes it a lot harder to catch you. Don't forget tamper-proofing your servers.

Have trustworthy accomplices. Generally, the less people you tell what you are doing, the better. But if you have a close circle of people you can really trust, it becomes much easier to pull this off. You can work from multiple locations, give each other alibis, etc..

Build fake personas. Don't just take a pseudonym, but create fake identities. Keep records on their interests, their motivations, what you disclosed about them. The purpose is to throw investigators off. You should be aware of techniques used by them, such as behavioral analysis, stilistic analysis, etc.. Working with accomplices can help alot in creating these fake identities and concealing your own (e.g. writing style).

Go somewhere safe. If possible, move your servers, or even yourself, somewhere where what you are doing is not punishable, or the authorities can be bribed.

This list could go on for ever... I'm not sure how practical many of these ideas are, but one thing is clear, you'll need a certain amount of "criminal energy" to pull this off - no matter whether your intentions are criminal or not. (Disclaimer: I'm too pussy to actually have done any of the above, so it may or may not work :-))

Re: Ask HN: How to create an anonymous site?

#37
I think most answers here are over thinking it; I do not think he wants a website that can defeat the NSA, just one where the service provider could get subpoenaed and not lead them to him.

So, just buy webhosting with Bitcoin at somewhere that does not require contact details.

e.g.

http://www.orangewebsite.com/

http://bitcoinwebhosting.net/

Sign up at the local library to cloak that IP then use tor after that if you think you will have a dedicated adversary.

Re: Ask HN: How to create an anonymous site?

#38
1. Go to a mall bathroom. Put on face makeup that disguises the shape of your face and its features.

2. Buy disposable cell phone in cash.

3. Go to a public place outside your normal orbit, clone your MAC and connect to the wifi.

4. Set up a Gmail account and blogger.com account.

5. Go back to mall bathroom and change into normal appearance. Do all steps each time you post information, using different malls.

Any information that can be dug up will be useless. Beware of cameras in the mall bathroom.

Re: Ask HN: How to create an anonymous site?

#40

For how long? Get a dyndns pro account, laptop(s) and host the site from multiple coffee shops. I didn't give this much thought, internet advice eh.

I always thought it would be neat to create a raspberry pi server and throw it in the ceiling tiles of a hotel with free wifi. Setup some kind of routing to the IP, and let it go.
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