The tor thread

[BlackHatCoiner]

Hello, I think it would be nice to have a thread talking about tor browser.

Now I have some questions, because I'm trying to understand how it works. When I connect to the tor network, am I purely anonymous? I've read it's decentralized, but I don't get how the anonymity takes part. Does it work like a vpn, but all the participants of this "game" share their IP addresses?

Also, how does the DNS works? How can I register a .onion?

[Artemis3]

Too bad you are unable to distinguish Tor from the Tor Browser. Perhaps you should start reading at the real page that was buried under an ugly domain site: https://2019.www.torproject.org/

If you are able to ignore the existence of the browser entirely, then we could move forward.

vpn is not meant for anonymity, the vpn server knows everything about you. Tor doesn't work this way, so called "Onion" networks work like the peels of an onion. You talk to a computer encrypted, this talks to a second computer and encrypts again the already encrypted data, this goes to a third, etc. At the opposite side the process reverses.

Once you enter the network, you don't get anyone's IP. A few of them share theirs, so you can enter, but once inside there are no IPs. Ideally you will never go out, but people are foolish enough to browse the "normal internet" from it. There are weakness at both the entry and exit, because that's outside its boundries.

The tor node you connect to, only knows your ip is connected to the onion, but has no idea what the content is.

You don't "register" a .onion. When you run your own node, you can simply host your own content securely, and it generates a random address for you, not unlike a crypto wallet address. If you don't share this address, nobody will ever know about it.

Tor nodes can be exit nodes, can be normal nodes that publish their IP to let others enter the network, and can be unpublished (only the people you tell know) or could just be bridges that relays from other tor nodes and nothing more, no in or out.

The exit node is what allow "normal" web content to be seen from tor. Don't run an exit node, leave that to the "whales" that can afford fighting half internet. Feel free to publish your ip or not depending on how free your country is, it helps people from oppressed regions easier access to the network.

You are the only one that can reveal or not your info. Also using secure software helps, avoid anything that is not Free and Open Source software, especially operating systems. And don't do stupid things.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Can't they track you from hosting a .onion domain? I mean every domain leads to an ip address. Even if you can generate it randomly (which i don't get why) when you connect, someone must know that you connected there.

I'm telling you, because I've recently installed it, and got a little shock... So many black markets that accept bitcoin...

And then I think that without bitcoin, those site wouldn't exist.

[franky1]

if the FBI raided a blackmarket. and you bought some illicit stuff to be delivered to your home address.. from that blackmarket while they were running it as a sting operation... then yes the FBI knows your address because you gave it to the blackmarket

if you cant imagine it as a onion. try imagining people blindfolded but handcuffed together holding each others hands in a line

you might know that sweaty hands on your right and callus hands on your left
so when sweaty hands squeezes your hand 5 times so you then squeeze 5 times with calluss hands on your left.. to pass the message on
but callus hands doesnt know of sweaty hands
nor what 5 squeezes translates to in real words

callus hands passes on the 5 squeezes to cold hands.
cold hands passes on the 5 squeezes to small hands
non of these people along the line know of sweaty hands
all they know is 5 squeezes and the person they directly holding hands with


but if the destination is bighands. and he knows that 5 squeezes =home address.. then he now knows  someones home address is doing something illegal even if he doesnt know they have sweaty hands

.. even if you are behind al the VPN/proxies/tor nodes in the world
if you tell the destination that you are blackhatcoiner on this forum
and then separetly they look at your forum post history and find other info about your real life such as your greek