What's with the rush to create new Tor alternatives?

[SigSauer]

It seems that more programmers are moving to Blockchain stuff. A few years ago, the inventor of the World Wide Web announced he was going to create a new web decentralization project called Solid by Inrupt. And now you've got even more new Tor alternatives, like Lokinet and Odin/Project Odin. Lokinet was created by people who were ideologically aligned with the owners of 8chan and cooperated with them in hosting their site there, however it failed initially due to attacks since the software is still in it's early phases of development. That's why Ron is now working on creating Odin, which is supposed to be Lokinet's evil twin. It hasn't been released yet, but it's still in the process of development.

What are the flaws of the Tor browser? Because I've heard many conflicting things about privacy, freedom of speech, etc.

 

[Vecr]

I don't think the Tor browser has ever censored a hidden service, but in theory they could push a browser update that hardcodes a blacklist.

 

[A Cardboard Box]

Tor is literally ran by the CIA.

 

[Baguette Child]

Tor is literally ran by the CIA.

I don't doubt this as plausible, but is there any actual proof for this?

 

[Vecr]

Tor is literally ran by the CIA.

No, it was started by the US Navy, but the CIA definitely runs exit nodes, so encrypting any traffic that exits the Tor network is a good idea. This does not apply to hidden services, as those are inside the network itself, and the traffic never passes out through a exit node.

 

[A Cardboard Box]

I don't doubt this as plausible, but is there any actual proof for this?

No, it was started by the US Navy, but the CIA definitely runs exit nodes, so encrypting any traffic that exits the Tor network is a good idea. This does not apply to hidden services, as those are inside the network itself, and the traffic never passes out through a exit node.

The CIA is the largest single donor to the Tor Project. I don't know how much of it is actually managed or monitored by the CIA but it's definitely a non zero amount.

 

[DumbDude42]

What are the flaws of the Tor browser?

i dont know about the browser, but the tor network has several (mostly theoretical) flaws. most of them are a consequence of pretty much anybody being able to run relays and exit nodes, including malicios actors who can use the node they run to try and run all sorts of traffic analysis and maybe come up with a correlation attack to deanonymize parts of the traffic they see

 

[CIA Nigger]

What are the flaws of the Tor browser? Because I've heard many conflicting things about privacy, freedom of speech, etc.

There's quite a few well documented problems with Tor, but the biggest one is the classic exit node security problem. This happens especially if you're using a site that does not use HTTPS as plenty of people mistakenly believe that Tor encrypts all traffic including outgoing traffic. Tor is also vulnerable to unmasking attacks which work via different methods. One of the most infamous ones is the "run a booby trapped file" method as said file will then phone home without using Tor's network, while others abuse browser and plugin exploits. There are quite a few successful Tor unmasking attempts that were fueled by user error, along with sloppy opsec such as using Windows on an unencrypted hard drive or asking people online how to run a deep web market.

Then there's the fact that Tor was funded by the US government and created by those with ties to them, and is still used by feds themselves. That's going to cause some people to accuse it of being backdoored, and as the Clipper chip, Dual_EC_DRBG, and the BULLRUN program showed those people have valid fears.

 

[MAPK phosphatase]

No, it was started by the US Navy, but the CIA definitely runs exit nodes, so encrypting any traffic that exits the Tor network is a good idea.

Remember the adage.
TOR through VPN, ops of wise men.
VPN through TOR, feds at your door.

 

[Vecr]

Remember the adage.
TOR through VPN, ops of wise men.
VPN through TOR, feds at your door.

Well, yeah, that's because the VPN "knows too much", and can be ordered to give over information, I'm talking about using HTTPS when connecting to websites, and using PGP when sending mails.

 

[MAPK phosphatase]

Well, yeah, that's because the VPN "knows too much", and can be ordered to give over information, I'm talking about using HTTPS when connecting to websites, and using PGP when sending mails.

I just wanted to make a rhyme tbh.

 

[Pop-Tart]

I mean even if tor was 100% clean. You would want other redundancies and backups just in case.

 

[⠠⠠⠅⠑⠋⠋⠁⠇⠎ ⠠⠠⠊⠎ ⠠⠠⠁ ⠠⠠⠋⠁⠛]

There's quite a few well documented problems with Tor, but the biggest one is the classic exit node security problem. This happens especially if you're using a site that does not use HTTPS as plenty of people mistakenly believe that Tor encrypts all traffic including outgoing traffic. Tor is also vulnerable to unmasking attacks which work via different methods. One of the most infamous ones is the "run a booby trapped file" method as said file will then phone home without using Tor's network, while others abuse browser and plugin exploits. There are quite a few successful Tor unmasking attempts that were fueled by user error, along with sloppy opsec such as using Windows on an unencrypted hard drive or asking people online how to run a deep web market.

Then there's the fact that Tor was funded by the US government and created by those with ties to them, and is still used by feds themselves. That's going to cause some people to accuse it of being backdoored, and as the Clipper chip, Dual_EC_DRBG, and the BULLRUN program showed those people have valid fears.

That said, all of the legitimate concerns about Tor- it's not secure if you're mentally retarded, it's technically possible to do traffic analysis if you own a large amount of the nodes, etc- exist with the alternatives.

Would you trust someone who worked for Ron Watkins to create a secure network? That guy had people like Frederick Brennan working for him, for pete's sake!

 

[TaimuRadiu]

I've asked this before but it didn't get answered:

Since I'm not a Chinaman, a child pornographer or a heroin addict, is there any reason for me to use Tor?

 

[Vecr]

I've asked this before but it didn't get answered:

Since I'm not a Chinaman, a child pornographer or a heroin addict, is there any reason for me to use Tor?

If it was a while ago, and you did not want the IP you used to access Kiwi Farms to be publicly known, then you could have used the onion service.

 

[murdered meat bag]

I've asked this before but it didn't get answered:

Since I'm not a Chinaman, a child pornographer or a heroin addict, is there any reason for me to use Tor?

You post here.

 

[TaimuRadiu]

You post here.

I got nothing to lose.

 

[⠠⠠⠅⠑⠋⠋⠁⠇⠎ ⠠⠠⠊⠎ ⠠⠠⠁ ⠠⠠⠋⠁⠛]

If it was a while ago, and you did not want the IP you used to access Kiwi Farms to be publicly known, then you could have used the onion service.

It's still here:

http://uquusqsaaad66cvub4473csdu4uu7ahxou3zqc35fpw5d4ificedzyqd.onion

 

[Vecr]

It's still here:

http://uquusqsaaad66cvub4473csdu4uu7ahxou3zqc35fpw5d4ificedzyqd.onion

I'm talking about the leak that happened a while ago, that included a table of usernames, emails, and IP addresses.

 

[Horrors of the Deep]

There isn't really a rush to make alternatives. Things like zeronet and other *nets were popping up way before. As for why a lot of them are popping up - this is a response to internet becoming increasingly fragmented. You can check the news and see half of the world setting up walled gardens and domain block lists, cloudflare lawsuits are a good example. Technically oriented people are generally annoyed by arbitrary bullshit like that.