Last night, I read some articles about Tor. Tor is an anonymous network that redirects your communications securely and anonymously across the Tor network before entering the public internet. It prevents people from finding who / where you are and from spying on your internet connection. The idea is that the communication between you and say the web site you want to look at is encrypted and passes via a few other machines running the Tor network. It looks like the last person on the Tor network is surfing the web site you are looking at.
Long story short, it’s a tool emphasizing anonymity and protecting people’s freedom, privacy and confidentiality (quite useful when you are a dissident in a not so open country).
I did install Tor so that my machine ran as a Tor relay and exit node. A Tor relay relays the data flow from one Tor node to another. An exit node is the bridge between the Tor network and the real internet: in my previous example that’s the last guy that appears to look at the website you are surfing.
Why did I do that?
Good question. I was curious first and doing my part to keep the world good is something I try to do from time to time.
What happened?
That’s the sad part. I let the node run all night and when I tried to use my connection in the morning I had a couple of bad surprises:
- Google thought I was a bot trying to run automated queries and abusing the system. Consequently, every search I was doing was guarded by a captcha (annoying).
- freenode (IRC) must have thought I was a bad guy cause I could not log onto #hibernate-dev #jboss-dev and co
I suspect some people were abusing the system and hid themselves behind Tor and I was their gateway to the internet. That left a bad taste in my mouth, I’ve disabled my Tor relay.
End of experience.
Ahh, that was why Google showed me captchas since a few days ago. Fortunately, I’m not blocked by FreeNode yet.
Thank you for running a relay for a while. We are working to help site owners address abuse issues and preserve the privacy of their visitors. The good uses of Tor outnumber the bad, but a few jerks do make it hard for the rest.
Another option is to run a bridge. A bridge is the first hop into the network, distributed in a limited fashion. It helps censored users reach the internet, and doesn’t present the same issues to the person running the relay.
It is useful to know why people run relays and why they stop. Thanks again!
@Karen
You’re right, I will bring it back up as a bridge. Not as useful for the whole as an exit node unfortunately.
If you want freedom for yourself, you have to concede it to people who are doing things you don’t approve of. That’s how the system is supposed to work. Any large entity such as Google (be it goverment, corporations, etc) will be at odds with the notion of absolute freedom, even when it’s something relatively innocuous like electronic communication; their goal is to control (control computer systems, govern employees, uphold the law by controlling citizen behaviour, etc) so any real freedom goes against the core values of any of these.
That bad taste you felt? That’s what real freedom is.
@Andres
Like everything (pun intended) in life, freedom does not make sense as an absolute. It is an equilibrium constantly challenged: abusers and restrictors are a fascinating symbiotic couple.
@emmanuel:
One man’s abuser is another man’s freethinker.