Photo: NYT
A turn of the tide for online anonymity?
TOR BROWSER COMPROMISED?
The Tor web browser, which has about 2 million users who are anonymised with a combination of encryption and rerouting all traffic multiple times, may be starting to fall victim to the war on anonymity.
That’s according to a new investigation from German news outlet NDR, which reports that police have been able to crack and identify several Tor users’ traffic recently.
Tor is the world’s largest network for anonymous internet browsing. Tor users route their connection via servers, known as Tor nodes, to disguise what they are doing.
Using the Tor browser, they can navigate websites on the internet anonymously or access pages on the so-called darknet. There are Tor nodes in operation in around 50 countries, with around two million people using it every day.
It is popular among journalists and human rights activists, especially in countries where the internet is censored. For years, Tor has been a technically almost insurmountable hurdle for investigative authorities.
Research has now revealed that police have apparently recently expanded their strategy to overcome Tor. This requires surveilling individual Tor nodes, sometimes for years.
The logic behind the measure, which experts call ‘timing analysis’: The more nodes in the Tor network are surveilled by the authorities, the more likely it is that a user will attempt to disguise their connection via one of the monitored nodes.
By timing individual data packets, anonymised connections can be traced back to the Tor user, even though data connections in the Tor network are encrypted multiple times.
In response, Tor said in a blog post that it’s “still the best solution” for internet privacy. However, it also admits its team is left with “more questions than answers” about what is happening.
“From the limited information The Tor Project has, we believe that one user of the long-retired application Ricochet was fully de-anonymized through a guard discovery attack,” the post reads.
As MalwareBytes explains, extensive network surveillance can allow authorities to identify Tor users if they can match time patterns and track network entry and exit points.
And the fewer active Tor nodes supporting the network, the easier this surveillance becomes. Tor was “designed” to have hundreds of thousands of nodes around the world, MalwareBytes says, but currently only has about 8,000 active relays at time of writing.
The more nodes that exist, the more decentralized the network is, and therefore, the harder it is to monitor the entire network and piece together user identities.
But is this once mighty shield from the prying eyes finally starting to crack?
Debate is ongoing, but one thing is for sure: The authorities are hell-bent on breaking the walls of anonymous online activity and encryption, and not to catch ‘pedos’ or ‘terrorists’.
No, they have been pushing for the end of online privacy for very different reasons.
WAR AGAINST ENCRYPTION
Western nations, particularly right here in Australia, have been forming a united front against the ‘dangers’ that the dark web, anonymous activity, and untraced communication can have.
In 2018, the government passed anti-encryption legislation that compels companies to grant authorities access to encrypted information, in a move that already has had vast implications for digital privacy.
Australia’s draconian anti-encryption push has literally made world headlines, and has been highlighted in discussion papers of researchers and freedom advocates, for the sheer attack on fundamental rights it is.
More recently, in March, Australia’s Davos-attending eSafety Commissioner announced they will force big tech to scan photos, emails and more, as part of ‘mandatory online scanning standards’.
What are they ‘scanning’ for?
“Illegal content being stored”, and if they don’t report, they could face fines of nearly $700,000 per day.
But it doesn’t stop there.
For the last two years, the government has also been working to replace our existing and long-standing patchwork of surveillance laws, in what it has described as the “…most significant reform to Australia’s national security laws in more than four decades”.
In addition, let’s not forget that an international coalition of over 60 nation states, including Australia, launched A Declaration for the Future of the Internet to ‘fight disinformation’.
Tor’s security is so good that the TOTT interface doesn’t match well with it, particularly if you are a member on the website, and I’ve had to create alternative websites for users on that browser.
Mainly because if our website can’t identify basic details about you, like if you are located on planet Earth, it will reject you. A meeting of the security forces who don’t realise they are on the same side, per say.
But if authorities are beginning to break the walls down of Tor, it spells a very interesting path for the future of freedom and anonymity online.
Almost like Winston and Julia enjoying their last night in the hidden room above the thrift shop before the Thought Police bust down the door..
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After Paul, now Thor. (It appears to be a hunt for super-encrypted neogods, anonymizing the Gardens of Eden with their believers with super-secure paradisiacal defense mechanisms.)
When I said (the young global lieder 2017) Durov, I thought, look how interesting. In summary:
“August 8, 2024
Putin signed a law on de-anonymization of bloggers. Putin signed a law on the provision of information by bloggers to Roskomnadzor
Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law on the de-anonymization of owners of Telegram channels and pages on social networks with more than 10 thousand subscribers. The corresponding document appeared on the website of the official publication of legal acts.
From November 1, 2024, owners of pages on social networks and messengers with more than 10 thousand subscribers will be required to report information about themselves to Roskomnadzor. The composition of the information provided will be established by the Russian government.
*Roskomnadzor (The Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media) is an executive body subordinate to the Ministry of Digital Development, which monitors compliance with Russian laws in the media and on the Internet.
~
August 9th, 2024
The United Nations passed its first cybercrime treaty on Thursday in a unanimous vote supporting an agreement first put forward by Russia.
The passage of the treaty is significant and establishes for the first time a global-level cybercrime and data access-enabling legal framework. […] Russia also supported the draft treaty, which was a surprise given earlier concerns raised by the country’s representative.”
…
Then the French arrested Pavel..
But, as freedom journalist Tucker puts it:
“But in the end, it wasn’t Putin who arrested him [Durov] for allowing the public to exercise free speech. It was a western country, a Biden administration ally and enthusiastic NATO member, that locked him away… Darkness is descending fast on the formerly free world.”
Yes, indeed.
In addition to the above, even more interesting, at least in my humble opinion, shortly after Durov’s arrest and the storm of – quite fair – condemnation of Western hypocritical democratic and, in fact, totalitarian actions, quite quietly for the same Western alt-media that condemned the West for Durov…
“August 28, 2024
The TASS Director General said that public opinion does not need anonymity
According to Andrey Kondrashov, freedom lies in the fact that the user must know who writes a particular text on the network
…
“Public opinion, if it does not push people to terrorism, to something destructive like ethnic and religious hatred, does not need anonymity. Unlike scoundrels and those [people] who push fakes. Therefore, the more open everything is, the better,” he said, answering a question about the opportunities that anonymity on the Internet provides.
According to Kondrashov, freedom lies in the fact that the user must know who writes a particular text on the network. “His freedom is to be hidden, and mine is to know. Therefore, it is still necessary to figure out whose freedom is being defended today, because I, as a citizen, want to be free from fakes. And as professionals, we are fighting them. We even have a whole section “Checked by TASS”, when we check not only isolated fakes, but also common misconceptions,” he added.
…
From “Checked by TASS”:
July 18 2023
Is it true that the COVID-19 vaccine can lead to death?
..
Conclusion:
In world practice, there is no evidence of a relationship between the use of vaccines against coronavirus infection and an increase in mortality rates.
The Russian Ministry of Health urges not to trust unverified sources of information and not to panic. And also notes that reliable information with news about coronavirus is posted on the websites Stopcoronavirus.RF, the Ministry of Health of Russia, Rospotrebnadzor and the World Health Organization.”
Hopefully, they will bring to light the anonymous scoundrels who spread fakes. Because they are not like in the totalitarian West, where “Darkness is descending fast on the formerly free world.” Tucker is right, as we see – Russia chooses the light, the illuminating the darkness. It’s completely different.
And, just to finish with a little more light, for aesthetics, from the same link:
05.07.2023 – Andrey Kondrashov appointed as the new CEO of TASS. RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan commented on the appointment of a new TASS CEO. She noted that Andrei Kondrashov is “one of the most decent and correct” people known to her.”
It is good when two worthy people and first fighters against the darkness of Western propaganda recognize each other. A little more about Margarita:
“October 22, 2021
We jumped. In Russia, children began to die en masse from covid
Editor-in-chief of the Russia Today TV channel Margarita Simonyan – about what the stubbornness of anti-vaxxers led to
…
Have you been waiting for this, idiots?
At first, anti-vaxxers evoked understandable sympathy in me. People are afraid, people have not been explained, people are confused.
..
After all the persuasion, the remaining anti-vaxxers began to cause me dislike and doubt their cognitive abilities.
..
Dear friends, acquaintances and people who just know me.
If you do not have antibodies and you are not consciously vaccinated, do not come to my house. Do not come to my work. Do not approach me on the street and at a party.
I don’t know you.
If it weren’t for you, we would have already forgotten about covid.
And because of you, my children may die now.
..
And it is you, unconscious conscious anti-vaxxers, who are a direct threat to the health and life of my, your own and other children.
Suffocate yourself on a ventilator, crawl with a saturation of seventy along the corridors of crowded hospitals – this is to your health. But I cannot forgive you for the death of the children of my country.
..
..forget my phone in advance.
Cross it out of your notebook right now.”
…
December 20, 2022
Vladimir Putin awarded Margarita Simonyan the Order of Honour
..
“I don’t usually worry when I speak in public. But now, seeing every day what is happening in Donetsk, it is impossible not to worry. Thank you for tearing our people out of the bloody jaws of these cannibals with pain, for daring to do this. We will help with this. I serve Russia!” said Simonyan in response.”
……
Darkness doesn’t stand a chance.
From my understanding is that Tor Browser is good for Torrents set it up right. Since no longer use Tor Browser or Torrenting, now use Opera GX and Yandex search engine much better than Duck Duck Go.
Even using Yandex engine still feel that Google has its claws in the search results.
German police, have gone down the Nostalgic NAZI era, where their Main game is Protection of Gang rapists, whilst imprisoning Concerned citizens, who Post expressions of disgust on Social media, at U.NemPathetic Moral/PsychoLogical & Physical inadequacies ‘TreatMeants/Supports’ on/of their fellow citizens! OR, The NEO Polizei Stormtrooper S.A, see fit to use a whole squad to Prioritise 11 Year old’s waving a Palestinian flag!
MIS/DISinfo ‘Laws’ ARE against the FundaMentAlls of MOST Global Constitutions – AND, INCLUDING, THE UNITED NATION’S OWN ‘UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS’ (UDHR)!the Declaration was proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in Paris on 10 December 1948 (General Assembly resolution 217 A) as a common standard of achievements for all peoples and all nations. AND, translated into 500 Languages!
FOR ALL TO SEE – ARTICLE 19 Unless the ‘E’ CommiCsar OR GovernMeant IS ILLITERATE!!
Quote; “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas, thru any media and regardless of frontiers.” = FOR ALL TO SEE, AND IN DIRECT VIOLATION OF UNITED NATIONS HUMAN RIGHTS PROTOCOLS!!
THE Governments would do ‘Well’ to REMEMBER their SWORN ‘obligations’, to their ‘EMPLOYERS’= THE UNITED PEOPLES OF AUSTRALIA!! – NOT THE WEF! NOT DAVOS! NOT THE BILDERBERGS! NOT THE UNITED NATIONS! NOT THE CORPORATES! NOT NATO! NOT AUK-WARdnUSs!
Wellness – John D.