Tor By: Michael C. Robinson What is Tor? A web anonymizer. - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

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Tor By: Michael C. Robinson What is Tor? A web anonymizer. - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Oct 16, 2022 547 likes •701 views

Tor By: Michael C. Robinson What is Tor? A web anonymizer. Started by the U.S. Navy. Open source and free software. From http://www.torproject.org From http://www.torproject.org From http://www.torproject.org The Chinese Firewall

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SLIDE 1

Tor

By: Michael C. Robinson

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SLIDE 2

What is Tor?

  • A web anonymizer.
  • Started by the U.S. Navy.
  • Open source and free software.
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SLIDE 3

From http://www.torproject.org

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SLIDE 4

From http://www.torproject.org

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SLIDE 5

From http://www.torproject.org

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SLIDE 6

The Chinese Firewall

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SLIDE 7

Pros of Tor.

  • Anonymity for people in oppressive

countries.

  • Hard for advertisers to hassle Tor users.
  • Some people/institutions need to be

anonymous:

– Law enforcement investigators. – Military personnel. – Journalists in the field. – Political and religious exiles.

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SLIDE 8

Cons of Tor

  • Anonymizes users indiscriminately.
  • Defeats geolocation filters.
  • Relays transmit blindly?
  • Exponential growth/not scaling well/slow.
  • Limitied funding and oversight.
  • Criminals can abuse.
  • Relay systems can be blocked.
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SLIDE 9

More Cons of Tor

  • Volunteer relays.
  • Back door controversy.
  • Doesn’t work for all Internet protocols.
  • Encryption isn’t end to end.
  • Financial support in flux:

– Naval research laboratory (2001-2006) – Electronic Frontier Foundation (2004-2005) – Rice University via NSF (2006-2007)

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SLIDE 10

Privoxy

  • Non caching web proxy.
  • Software in public interest under GPL v2.
  • Used on the Tor network.
  • Enhanced filtering capabilities.

– Modify web page data and HTTP headers. – Filter out Internet junk and annoying ads.

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SLIDE 11

Conclusion

  • Tor is fairly new and unproven.
  • Technical issues need to be solved.
  • Anonymizing random users is

controversial for some relay operators.

  • Funding is currently limited for Tor.
  • Tor defeats services based on location.
  • Privacy can never be assumed over the

Internet even with Tor.

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SLIDE 12

My Opinion

Tor is too new to know all of the ethical

  • implications. In some cases, getting

around censors is both appropriate and

  • necessary. The Internet should never be

viewed as a private network even though public key cryptography is powerful. A back door on Tor relays seems reasonable with warrants and appropriate policing to prevent abuse. The developers disagree.

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SLIDE 13

Works Cited:

  • “EFF Electronic Frontier Foundation,” Retrieved May 26, 2010

(http://www.eff.org/).

  • “Hacking Tor, the anonymity onion routing network,”

Retrieved May 26, 2010 ( http://isc.sans.org/diary.html?storyid=1794).

  • “Onion Routing,” Retrieved May 26, 2010 (

http://www.onion-router.net/).

  • “Privoxy – Home Page,” Retrieved May 26, 2010 (

http://www.privoxy.org/).

  • “Why Tor?,” Retrieved May 11, 2010 (

http://www.torproject.org/overview.html.en#overview).