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Use of Tor and e-mail crypto could increase chances that NSA keeps your data

arstechnica.com

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Re: Use of Tor and e-mail crypto could increase chances that NSA keeps your data

#41

Post by bigiain »

pavanred wrote: post #23
bigiain wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends on what you mean by "using TOR right" - and that depends on who/where you are and what you're trying to protect yourself against. A Chinese/Egyptian/Turkish dissident might consider it perfectly sensible to use TOR to access their gmail account - that's a perfectly valid way of hiding from your local (non-US) government and spy agencies.

What I mean by using Tor right, for instance, is avoiding use of certain browser plugins that can potentially give away your location.

Yeah - fair enough.

On oft-hear piece of advice is to never use an identity you ever use elsewhere over TOR - for me, as a "non US person", even if I can trust TOR and TLS/SSL to ensure the privacy of my data in transit, it doesn't matter if the far end of my connection through TOR ends up at my gmail/apple/facebook/linkedin/twitter/dropbox/yahoo/amazon/any-other-US-affiliated-corporation. Being "non US" and located outside the US means the bar for any "legal requests" those companies receive is _very_ low.

(Hmmm, I wonder if proxying all my web traffic through a vpn with a definitely-in-the-US endpoint might be a worthwhile bit of civil protest? I wonder if tcp connections originating from my Digital Ocean vps in New York and heading to US datacenters have slightly better legal protection or "presumtion of domestic provenance" than tcp connections originating here in Australia? Maybe I should be doing this anyway for all the analytics/ad-tracking web-bugs...)

Re: Use of Tor and e-mail crypto could increase chances that NSA keeps your data

#42

Post by LoganCale »

dfc wrote: post #40
hobs wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you just want them to store more? Because using tor to renew your car registrations seems like an obvious way to connect some dots. If that's all, then I salute you!

You do realize that: "A global passive adversary is the most commonly assumed threat when analyzing theoretical anonymity designs. But like all practical low-latency systems, Tor does not protect against such a strong adversary. Instead, we assume an adversary who can observe some fraction of network traffic; who can generate, modify, delete, or delay traffic; who can operate onion routers of his own; and who can com…

I think the point was that it defeats the common purpose of using anonymity software if you are submitting identifying information (your car registration information) through it. It doesn't necessarily have long term consequences—you can generate a new identity—but it nullifies that session's anonymity.

However, that doesn't mean there isn't a good reason to use it anyway to make a statement and promote legitimate usage of Tor.

Re: Use of Tor and e-mail crypto could increase chances that NSA keeps your data

#43

Post by rayiner »

mpyne wrote: post #37
jlgreco wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This shouldn't be a surprise at all. Using Tor hides your location, so they assume you are foreign unless proven otherwise. That covers Tor, but not the rest... > As a European, what I find more disturbing about all the news about PRISM and related programs, is how US centric the reports Agreed. I worry that the American government has done damage to the cause of globalisation that will take a very long time to hea…

Don't take this the wrong way, but you mention the effect on globalization as if it were obvious that the damage should worry the American government. On the contrary, the U.S. has vacillated between isolationism and interacting with other nations before. I don't know if you've been over to the U.S. but we have a stunningly large continent of people who feel that it is absolutely treasonous to give foreign aid at all…

> Even many of our liberals see "globalization" as a code term for "child labor" and "sweatshops".

Right. Globalization can be used as a powerful force to subvert or bypass democracy, and to create a worldwide "race to the bottom."

Re: Use of Tor and e-mail crypto could increase chances that NSA keeps your data

#44

Post by rayiner »

mfwoods wrote: post #10

This shouldn't be a surprise at all. Using Tor hides your location, so they assume you are foreign unless proven otherwise. If I were to agree with the law that allows all of the snooping that the NSA does, I'd say this is pretty reasonable. As a European, what I find more disturbing about all the news about PRISM and related programs, is how US centric the reports about it are and how little other western government…

> yet US politicians try to legitimize everything by saying it's only non-US citizens they spy on, and say it like then it's suddenly okay.

Not so much that it makes things "okay" but that it makes things "legal." The NSA isn't supposed to spy on U.S. citizens, that's outside its scope of operation.

Re: Use of Tor and e-mail crypto could increase chances that NSA keeps your data

#45

Post by selimthegrim »

e3pi wrote: post #24

"The document, titled Minimization Procedures Used by the National Security Agency in Connection with Acquisitions of Foreign Intelligence, is the latest bombshell leak to be dropped by UK-based newspaper The Guardian." All good news! 1: The Guardian is still time-releasing, I thought they caved under a IGIC -sorry, what ever its called over there - gag order. 2: Now we know what to do to backup into the NSA cloud! A…

It's called a D-notice.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DA-Notice

Re: Use of Tor and e-mail crypto could increase chances that NSA keeps your data

#46

Post by dfc »

LoganCale wrote: post #42
dfc wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You do realize that: "A global passive adversary is the most commonly assumed threat when analyzing theoretical anonymity designs. But like all practical low-latency systems, Tor does not protect against such a strong adversary. Instead, we assume an adversary who can observe some fraction of network traffic; who can generate, modify, delete, or delay traffic; who can operate onion routers of his own; and who can com…

I think the point was that it defeats the common purpose of using anonymity software if you are submitting identifying information (your car registration information) through it. It doesn't necessarily have long term consequences—you can generate a new identity—but it nullifies that session's anonymity. However, that doesn't mean there isn't a good reason to use it anyway to make a statement and promote legitimate us…

So location anonymity is not a common purpose of anonymity software?

Re: Use of Tor and e-mail crypto could increase chances that NSA keeps your data

#47

Post by bigiain »

dfc wrote: post #40
hobs wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you just want them to store more? Because using tor to renew your car registrations seems like an obvious way to connect some dots. If that's all, then I salute you!

You do realize that: "A global passive adversary is the most commonly assumed threat when analyzing theoretical anonymity designs. But like all practical low-latency systems, Tor does not protect against such a strong adversary. Instead, we assume an adversary who can observe some fraction of network traffic; who can generate, modify, delete, or delay traffic; who can operate onion routers of his own; and who can com…

The "renew my car registration" example was intended to imply that'd I've chosen to "give them some connected dots" - dots which are operationally useless (or worse - preferably adding noise to make the job harder and evidence that the job is sometimes wasted effort).

I'm assuming "they" have access to government servers and networks, and that they'll easily be able to connect me - as a real and (at least mostly) law abiding citizen - to a clean-slate browser using SSL over TOR - logging in to a government web server with real world credentials and doing some mundane and law abiding everyday task.

Re: Use of Tor and e-mail crypto could increase chances that NSA keeps your data

#48

Post by [deleted] »

ewzimm wrote: post #17

The only long-term way to hide data is not to use public networks for communication. Eventually, quantum computers should be able to eat though any of today's crypto. It will be interesting to see what happens when everyone running for public office has their entire life on display.

[deleted]

Re: Use of Tor and e-mail crypto could increase chances that NSA keeps your data

#49

Post by mpyne »

dfc wrote: post #15

If you want to read the documents without having to use that awful viewer or load js from every social networking site known to man: (increment the p# from 1-9) Procedures used by NSA to target non-US persons: Exhibit A: https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/7166... Procedures used by NSA to minimize data collection from US persons: Exhibit B: https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/…

> It is amazing how many requests the guardian wants to make to third party sites.

Maybe they're just trying to make sure every social site knows you're there so that NSA can figure it out later with PRISM? ;)

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