From: Soren Stoutner Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2017 21:37:46 +0000 (-0700) Subject: Update Guide → Tor. X-Git-Tag: v1.15~23 X-Git-Url: https://gitweb.stoutner.com/?p=PrivacyBrowserAndroid.git;a=commitdiff_plain;h=3ec730a89f7d615eb1078c0d8607508f49c19616 Update Guide → Tor. --- diff --git a/.idea/dictionaries/soren.xml b/.idea/dictionaries/soren.xml index 366bf4cc..a3bba35f 100644 --- a/.idea/dictionaries/soren.xml +++ b/.idea/dictionaries/soren.xml @@ -35,10 +35,13 @@ exynos favoriteicon fbee + fdfilter + fdid firebase framelayout gerlach intl + ipleak isfolder khtml konqueror @@ -83,6 +86,7 @@ webkay webkitversion whatismyip + wouldn yoyo zenlte zeroflte diff --git a/app/src/main/assets/en/guide_tor.html b/app/src/main/assets/en/guide_tor.html index 46a6404a..83223f6e 100644 --- a/app/src/main/assets/en/guide_tor.html +++ b/app/src/main/assets/en/guide_tor.html @@ -1,5 +1,5 @@ - - - - - -

Tor and Its Limits

- -

There are two general categories of bad actors that want to infringe on the privacy of the web: malicious governments - with access to ISPs (Internet Service Providers) and mega corporations that run social and advertising networks. - TOR (The Onion Router) is useful in protecting privacy from malicious governments but not from mega corporations.

- - -

Malicious Governments

- -

Malicious governments often spy on their citizens to punish dissent or human rights activity. They commonly either - operate the local ISPs or they can force them to disclose information showing every IP address that is visited - by each user. Tor is designed to defeat this infringement of privacy by encrypting the traffic - from a user's device and routing it through three separate servers on the internet before sending it on to the final destination. - This means that no individual ISP, server, or website, can know both the IP address the user's device - and the IP address of the final web server. Malicious governments and the ISPs they control cannot tell which - web servers a user is accessing, although they can tell that the user is using Tor. In some parts of - the world, using Tor could be construed as an evidence of illegal behavior ("if you didn't have anything - to hide you wouldn't be hiding your traffic from us") and users could be punished because governments - assume they are doing something that is prohibited. Thus, Tor can be helpful, but isn't a panacea.

- - -

Mega Corporations

- -

When a user connects to a web server, the web server can see the user's IP address. Although it isn't a perfect science, - IP addresses can be turned into physical addresses with a fair amount of accuracy. - Small web servers typically rely on IP addresses to identify the location of the users visiting their site. - Tor is a good solution to mask the user's location from these servers. But large mega corporations - that own social media and advertising networks use a whole profile of information that is designed to track users - across devices and IP addresses. These profiles employ a variety of techniques to identify users, including JavaScript, - cookies, tracking IDs, and browser fingerprinting. Because the vast majority - of the websites on the internet either load an ad from one of the major networks or embed social media icons with their - associated JavaScript, these corporations have build profiles for almost every user online and can track their internet - activity across unrelated sites.

- -

They track every site that is visited, everything that is purchased, every credit card that is used to - make a purchase, every address that items are shipped to, and the GPS metadata of every picture that is - uploaded to the internet. They build a profile of a user's age, gender, marital status, address, political affiliations, - religious affiliations, family circumstance, number of pets, and everything else they can get their hands on. - They even buy up databases of credit card usage at local stores, so they can track the off-line purchasing patterns of the users - in their profiles. Because they already have much more accurate address information about a user than an IP address discloses, - Tor provides no real privacy protection against mega corporations.

- -

The single best privacy protection against mega corporations is to browse the web with JavaScript disabled, followed - by blocking ad networks, disabling cookies and DOM storage, and using a browser that is difficult to fingerprint.

- - -

Using Tor

- -

Despite the limitations, Tor can be useful in some circumstances. The Tor project has an app for Android called Orbot, - which is available on F-Droid - and everywhere else that Privacy Browser is distributed. Privacy Browser has a setting to use Orbot as - a proxy. When this is turned on, Privacy Browser's app bar will have a light blue background instead of - the default light grey. When Privacy Browser's Orbot proxy setting is enabled, internet access - will not work unless Orbot is running and connected to Tor. Because traffic is being routed through several Tor nodes, - using Tor is often much slower than connecting straight to the internet.

- -

- + + + + + + +

Tor and Its Limits

+ +

There are two general categories of bad actors that want to infringe on the privacy of the web: malicious governments with access to ISPs (Internet Service Providers) and mega corporations that run social and advertising networks. + TOR (The Onion Router) is useful in protecting privacy from malicious governments (which spy on traffic in transit) but not from mega corporations (which embed malicious code on web servers).

+ + +

Malicious Governments

+ +

Malicious governments often spy on their citizens to punish dissent or human rights activity. They commonly either + operate the local ISPs or they can force them to disclose information showing every IP address that is visited + by each user. Tor is designed to defeat this infringement of privacy by encrypting the traffic + from a user’s device and routing it through three separate servers on the internet before sending it on to the final destination. + This means that no individual ISP, server, or website, can know both the IP address the user’s device + and the IP address of the final web server. Malicious governments and the ISPs they control cannot tell which + web servers a user is accessing, although they can tell that the user is using Tor. In some parts of + the world, using Tor could be construed as an evidence of illegal behavior (“if you didn’t have anything + to hide you wouldn’t be encrypting your traffic”) and users could be punished because governments + assume they are doing something that is prohibited. Thus, Tor can be helpful, but isn’t a panacea.

+ + +

Mega Corporations

+ +

When a user connects to a web server, the web server can see the user’s IP address. Although it isn’t a perfect science, + IP addresses can be turned into physical addresses with a fair amount of accuracy. + Small web servers typically rely on IP addresses to identify the location of the users visiting their site. + Tor is a good solution to mask the user’s location from these servers. But large mega corporations + that own social media and advertising networks use a whole profile of information that is designed to track users + across devices and IP addresses. These profiles employ a variety of techniques to identify users, including JavaScript, + cookies, tracking IDs, and browser fingerprinting. Because the vast majority + of the websites on the internet either load an ad from one of the major networks or embed social media icons with their + associated JavaScript, these corporations have built profiles for almost every user online and can track their internet + activity across unrelated sites.

+ +

They track every site that is visited, everything that is purchased, every credit card that is used to + make a purchase, every address that items are shipped to, and the GPS metadata of every picture that is + uploaded to the internet. They build a profile of a user’s age, gender, marital status, address, political affiliations, + religious affiliations, family circumstances, number of pets, and everything else they can get their hands on. + They even buy up databases of credit card transactions at local stores, so they can track the off-line purchasing patterns of the users + in their profiles. Because they already have much more accurate address information about a user than an IP address discloses, + Tor provides no real privacy protection against mega corporations.

+ +

The single best privacy protection against mega corporations is to browse the web with JavaScript disabled, followed + by blocking ad networks, disabling cookies and DOM storage, and using a browser that is difficult to fingerprint.

+ + +

Using Tor

+ +

Despite its limitations, Tor can be useful in some circumstances. The Tor project has an app for Android called Orbot, + which is available on F-Droid + and everywhere else that Privacy Browser is distributed. Privacy Browser has a setting to use Orbot as + a proxy. When this is turned on, Privacy Browser’s app bar will have a light blue background instead of + the default light grey. When Privacy Browser’s Orbot proxy setting is enabled, internet access + will not work unless Orbot is running and connected to Tor. Because traffic is being routed through several Tor nodes, + using Tor is often much slower than connecting directly to the internet.

+ +

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