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Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

blog.torproject.org

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Re: Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

#41

Post by throwaway2048 »

Karunamon wrote: post #20
evincarofautumn wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. If there is evil at Facebook, I haven’t seen it. It might be big, but at the most basic level it’s just a directory of people where you share stuff and see some ads to support the site. That’s not unlike the vast majority of sites that we all use every day. Besides, the goal of advertising on Facebook is to provide suggestions to people that are actually valuable. It’s good for people to get discounts on produc…

>Making money is just a happy side effect of creating actual value. Pretty much Google's MO as well. Aside: People really need to stop bandying about the word "evil" as a value judgement, it manages to be inaccurate, non descriptive, subjective, and emotionally loaded all at the same time. Every time Google changes the slightest facet of their service, the idiot crowd starts up with "WELL SO MUCH FOR DONT BE EVIL HUR…

>Every time Google changes the slightest facet of their service, the idiot crowd starts up with "WELL SO MUCH FOR DONT BE EVIL HURR DURR!!1"

By using rhetoric such as this you are lowering the discourse on this site every bit as much as the straw man you created.

Re: Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

#42

Post by dublinben »

Orva wrote: post #14

This is also reason why most of the time you cannot use online bank systems through Tor: banks block big chunk of Tor exit nodes as malicious traffic sources (for legimate reason, I believe).

I can't think of a legitimate reason to use online banking through TOR. A bank account is an inherently non-anonymous account, which defeats the purpose of accessing it anonymously.

Re: Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

#43

Post by yuvadam »

bpatrianakos wrote: post #23
danso wrote: post #5

Whether or not FB is deliberately blocking Tor now , how out-of-line would it be for them to eventually block it in the future? It doesn't seem in their best interest as a company to allow Tor connections...but other than that, what ethical obligations do they have to allow anonymous connections? FB already has a policy more-or-less mandating real identities...so for them, this is kind of a non-issue, right? By using…

I don't think it would be out of line at all. I got downvoted to hell for expressing similar opinions before but I think this is a perfectly reasonable opinion. Facebook is in the business of social networking, not activism. The number of users using Tor compared to the general population is bound to be so low that they either shouldn't care enough to bother blocking it or if they did for some reason, really wouldn't…

> Facebook is in the business of social networking, not activism.

Your distinction between "social networking" and "activism" at its core is a distinction between privileged users who are allowed to speak their mind however they please (seeing that the gracious host considers it to be 'profitable' and 'acceptable') and oppressed users whose speech, unfortunately, falls under the "activism" category, and as such should go seek alternative methods of spreading their vile thoughts.

Only a man of privilege can make such a distinction and keep a straight face.

I'd like to see you make the same claim as a citizen living under an oppressive regime.

Re: Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

#44

Post by evincarofautumn »

throwaway2048 wrote: post #41
Karunamon wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Making money is just a happy side effect of creating actual value. Pretty much Google's MO as well. Aside: People really need to stop bandying about the word "evil" as a value judgement, it manages to be inaccurate, non descriptive, subjective, and emotionally loaded all at the same time. Every time Google changes the slightest facet of their service, the idiot crowd starts up with "WELL SO MUCH FOR DONT BE EVIL HUR…

>Every time Google changes the slightest facet of their service, the idiot crowd starts up with "WELL SO MUCH FOR DONT BE EVIL HURR DURR!!1" By using rhetoric such as this you are lowering the discourse on this site every bit as much as the straw man you created.

Anecdotal people aren’t necessarily strawfolk.

Re: Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

#45

Post by arthulia »

binarysolo wrote: post #40

Tor has an unfortunately seedy underside, where data scrapers and online scammers (two of several use cases that I know of) use the service to obfuscate their actions and avoid crackdown. "That's why we can't have nice things." For those who are still somewhat paranoid, consider getting paid proxies for a much more reliable service while still maintaining IP anonymity.

Tor can't monitor your data itself (and put it to an identity), so it is considerably more anonymous.

Re: Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

#46

Post by discodave »

dublinben wrote: post #42
Orva wrote: post #14

This is also reason why most of the time you cannot use online bank systems through Tor: banks block big chunk of Tor exit nodes as malicious traffic sources (for legimate reason, I believe).

I can't think of a legitimate reason to use online banking through TOR. A bank account is an inherently non-anonymous account, which defeats the purpose of accessing it anonymously.

My money laundering scheme is entirely legitimate!

Re: Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

#47

Post by kyboren »

It worries me that Facebook is not deliberately blocking Tor.

Suppose an oppressive regime wants to block its people from anonymously accessing a service: Facebook, Google+, Twitter, etc. They have traditionally been locked in an arms race of sorts with Tor developers: the regime will identify Tor relays and filter connections to them; Tor developers step up with bridges. The regime uses DPI to attempt to identify Tor connections, and Tor developers put out Obfsproxy. And so on, and so on.

Now it's clear to everybody that their best option is not to prevent outbound connections to Tor, it's to prevent inbound connections from Tor on the services they don't want their people to use anonymously. All they have to do is ensure they inflict maximum abuse on the targeted service from Tor, and in this way give that service the incentive to cut off the users most in need.

I'm not suggesting abuse on the Tor network comes largely from intentional government 'territory denial'. However, it's frightening that there is such an easy way for them to deny the services which are in practice essential to the universal free exercise of speech on the Web.

Re: Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

#48

Post by vidarh »

dublinben wrote: post #42
Orva wrote: post #14

This is also reason why most of the time you cannot use online bank systems through Tor: banks block big chunk of Tor exit nodes as malicious traffic sources (for legimate reason, I believe).

I can't think of a legitimate reason to use online banking through TOR. A bank account is an inherently non-anonymous account, which defeats the purpose of accessing it anonymously.

The bank account is not anonymous, true. But you may be in situations where you are not concerned about your anonymity, but in protection against someone discovering your location.

Re: Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

#49

Post by CaptainZapp »

evincarofautumn wrote: post #9
maskedinvader wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook is not forcing you to give them your personal information ? I understand and pretty much agree with most of what you say but can we agree that Facebook is simply another company trying to make money and be a thriving business and not an evil organisation trying to take over your life and destroy your liberties ? capiche ?

This. If there is evil at Facebook, I haven’t seen it. It might be big, but at the most basic level it’s just a directory of people where you share stuff and see some ads to support the site. That’s not unlike the vast majority of sites that we all use every day. Besides, the goal of advertising on Facebook is to provide suggestions to people that are actually valuable. It’s good for people to get discounts on produc…

  If there is evil at Facebook, I haven’t seen it.
For me Facebook's relentless race to the bottom in terms of privacy, their underhanded tactics on re-fiddling privacy setting defaults and their relentless push to try getting me to give up ever more private data was evil enough for me.

Evil enough so that I "deleted" my Facebook account and don't intend to use the service ever again.

Your mileage may (and apparently does) vary.

Re: Facebook Is Not Blocking Tor Deliberately

#50

Post by baddox »

andrewcooke wrote: post #31
bpatrianakos wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it would be out of line at all. I got downvoted to hell for expressing similar opinions before but I think this is a perfectly reasonable opinion. Facebook is in the business of social networking, not activism. The number of users using Tor compared to the general population is bound to be so low that they either shouldn't care enough to bother blocking it or if they did for some reason, really wouldn't…

your logic is fine, except for the assumption that ethical obligations come only from maximizing profit. why do you have such a low ethical standard for companies? i realise it's fairly common in the usa, but what's the motivation? is it just that you get your opinions from the same companies, and so eat what you are fed? is this what you want from your world? do you simply feel you have no choice, and are stating a…

I believe that the truth values of ethical sentences are subjective (actually, I believe that ethical sentences don't have truth values, but that's a longer story), so while I certainly have ethical preferences for how individuals and organizations should behave, I only approve of "enforcing" my preferences through my own social/commercial choices, rather than utilizing external violence (like government regulation) to enforce my ethical preferences.
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