This is What a Tor Supporter Looks Like: Edward Snowden

by mikeperry | December 30, 2015

Edward Snowden

In mid-October, the Tor Project had an opportunity to interview Edward Snowden. Below are key excerpts from the conversation.

Tor: What would you say to a non-technical person about why they should support and care about Tor?

ES: Tor is a critical technology, not just in terms of privacy protection, but in defense of our publication right -- our ability to route around censorship and ensure that when people speak their voices can be heard. The design of the Tor system is structured in such a way that even if the US Government wanted to subvert it, it couldn't because it's a decentralized authority. It's a volunteer based network. Nobody's getting paid to run Tor relays -- they're volunteers worldwide. And because of this, it provides a built-in structural defense against abuses and most types of adversaries. Tor provides a level of safety, a level of guarantee, to the confidentiality, and in some cases anonymity of human communications. I think this is an incredible thing because it makes us more human. We are at the greatest peace with ourselves when nobody's watching.

Tor: Can you talk about how the world would be different if Tor did not exist?

ES: Without Tor, the streets of the Internet become like the streets of a very heavily surveilled city. There are surveillance cameras everywhere, and if the adversary simply takes enough time, they can follow the tapes back and see everything you've done. With Tor, we have private spaces and private lives, where we can choose who we want to associate with and how, without the fear of what that is going to look like if it is abused. What the Tor network allows is what's called a mixed routing experience where, due to a voluntary cooperation of peers around the Internet -- around the world, across borders, across jurisdictions -- you get individuals who are able to share traffic in ways that don't require them to be able to read the content of it. So you don't have to trust every participant of the Tor network to know who you are and what you're looking for.

Tor: Did you know that Tor is run by a non-profit organization?

ES: Yes, Tor has been extremely open. Almost everybody who is involved in development has an online presence; they're involved in online engagement. You can drop into the IRC and talk to these people directly and ask them questions, or criticize them (laughs). It's a very open and inclusive community, and I think that's incredibly valuable. They also have a very rich and well-supported mailing list, which is very helpful for people who want to move beyond being a passive user of Tor and actually start being an active participant in expanding the network, in running a relay node from your home, or even starting to experiment with running an exit, which I think is one of the most interesting parts of the Tor experience.

Please join Ed in supporting Tor today.

Comments

Please note that the comment area below has been archived.

February 06, 2016

In reply to by Anonymous (not verified)

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I just downloaded my Tor browswer and I love it. anonops

December 30, 2015

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Definitely TOR seems to be an extraordinary very useful project. I hope with time more and more projects like this one come to life, to contribute in the fight for our rights.

i do agree : tor & more projects like this one contribute in the fight for your us rights. it stays an individual tool inside a small association but it is not an organization with real goals in a real life. i know that tor works also like a community and it is helpful abroad but most official sites reject tor. i use tor because i am protected from individual & state surveillance but the journalists/investigators do not respect the privacy.

December 30, 2015

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Why I use Tor.

I once submitted information about the perpetrator (already in custody) of a horrible crime to an "anonymous" Police Tips site.

Within hours of sending the info, the director of the regional law enforcement forensics lab accidentally sent me a "friend request" on Facebook. Their "BFF" was a digital forensic analyst at some little corporation in Redmond, Washington.

It was immediately clear to me, having made the same mistake personally, what had happened and after the shock of "betrayal" wore off I messaged the director and asked how they knew me. POOF! The request was withdrawn in minutes. (FB makes it all too easy to click on the wrong button and accidentally send a friend request.)

It has been awhile now, a few years. I submitted "anonymous" information about my lifestyle to these "good" folks in law enforcement who, in turn, immediately betrayed my trust and their own promise of "anonymity." Somewhere in their files is my "anonymous" submission with my name "all over it." While there's nothing criminal in it, it would still destroy me, my family and my professional life immediately were it to be revealed.

The entire story is probably Hollywood worthy but I'll stop right here.

Use Tor.

I have had same stories ... the admin of the site (interpol) have been driven to an hospital -mental disorder- ... .
Using tor should not have avoided that.
But eu decided after this scandal to examine carefully the case and allow now an anonymous request (at least officially).
Tor cannot transform a dumb-admin in a professional one.

Use Tor _ the admin are rarely smart, intelligent, present, competent, educated.

@The entire story is probably Hollywood worthy but I'll stop right here.
i, i would like to read it. could you make one version in a pdf downloadable ?

Your IP is shown to websites when you visit. The government maintains a active database of what IP belongs to whom as the ISP's provide that information.

Also computers leave a digital signature (screen size, operating system and browser choice) that is also recorded.

The longer you use the same machine, the more accounts and time you enter your real information, the more they can just finger you in a second.

TOR isn't completely private, it just hides your IP.

When the FBI took over Freedom Hosting, they used a Javascript flaw in the TOR browser to get the real IP and other information from users at the other end of the TOR network.

Since there are always vulnerabilities in software, you can't trust anything 100% for long. One shot with one machine that can't be traced to you, with one IP that many people use and without being seen or recorded using it.

It has to be assumed that the NSA is recording all TOR related internet traffic at the ISP's and thus can put all the pieces together.

I think Edward got busted on TOR and to make it safely out of the country and needed a bargaining chip for entry into a safe haven location like Russia. Stealing the NSA files was part of that, the exposure thing was not so much for the people and change, but for himself.

Edward was making over $200,000 a year, lived in Hawaii, likely drove a nice car and had a sweet bartender girlfriend.

He gives all that up in a second? Why not sneak the files out and leak them anonymously? After all then he could just later quit his job and nobody would know it was him. Sure the government would watch him for a very long time, but they couldn't do anything without proof.

i am not sir Snowden but ;

>TOR isn't completely private, it just hides your IP.
tor is not a vpn , it does not just hide your ip, it does better
i guess using the word "private" you mean not absolutely secure with a high level of privacy hidden in a vault locked by superman (wonderwoman guarding your home 24/24).

>nsa and others ... waste money & time ; their job is also to make money and to regulate the official market on the net.

>I think Ed ... proof.
lol

> Edward was making over $200,000 a year, lived in Hawaii, likely drove a nice car and had a sweet bartender girlfriend.

But you are not criticizing anyone's Significant Other? Just checking.

> He gives all that up in a second?

Clearly not everyone has a moral compass. Thankfully this lamentable fact does not prevent courageous people, like Snowden, from recognizing that they have a moral responsibility to become a whistle-blower.

> Why not sneak the files out and leak them anonymously? After all then he could just later quit his job and nobody would know it was him. Sure the government would watch him for a very long time, but they couldn't do anything without proof.

You could do with a viewing of Citizen Four. Snowden explained very clearly why he chose not to try to leak the files anonymously, but to defect to the People by revealing his identity and describing how he had obtained the documents.

your post reads like the usual techno illiterati stump speech.

First, the most common ignorantly repeated line: Edward Snowden did not "flee" TO Russia... he was transitting from Hong Kong, and the US revoked his passport - probably knowingly, meaning the USG knew that people would mindlessly, and ignorantly, perpetuate the myth that he fled to Russia.

> I think Edward got busted on TOR and to make it safely out of the country and needed a bargaining chip for entry into a safe haven location like Russia. Stealing the NSA files was part of that, the exposure thing was not so much for the people and change, but for himself.

The facts decisively contradict both of these suppositions.

See Greenwald's book No Place to Hide for an account of the last minute decision to try to help Snowden travel from China to a third party via Russia. You will no doubt be intrigued by the apparent involvement of Wikileaks.

> Edward was making over $200,000 a year, lived in Hawaii, likely drove a nice car and had a sweet bartender girlfriend.

You aren't criticizing anyone's significant other, I trust? Just checking.

> He gives all that up in a second?

Clearly not everyone can easily accept the suggestion that some people possess a moral sensibility. But we wish to assure you that some people *do* know right from wrong. And what the NSA was doing, and is continuing to do, is wrong as wrong can be.

> Why not sneak the files out and leak them anonymously? After all then he could just later quit his job and nobody would know it was him. Sure the government would watch him for a very long time, but they couldn't do anything without proof.

Snowden himself has stated that he took the sysadmin job in Hawaii specifically to obtain an important document his previous sysadmin job did not allow him to access. He always intended to leak the documents, and he has stated (and Greenwald backs this up) that he always intended to come forward as the source of the files, in order to prevent the USG from claiming that the documents were fakes.

>TOR isn't completely private, it just hides your IP.
Of course Tor "isn't completely private", but it does much more than just hide your IP.
The last few versions of Tor Browser Bundle protect you in many other ways:
1. It anonymizes your browser fingerprint as much as possible, using a common screen size, user agent string, etc. It also blocks Canvas fingerprinting and WebRTC.
2. A few add-ons greatly reduce the chances of data leakage or browser exploitation: NoScript, HTTPS Everywhere, Disconnect.Me.
3. Intuitive security levels with reasonable default settings help the user balance privacy and browsing experience without compromising too much on security or making the usual mistakes that people do when they have too much to configure.

>there are always vulnerabilities in software
Absolutely. Unfortunately, Tor is the best tool we have. Make a better one, if you like. Or better yet, improve it.

>NSA is recording all TOR related internet traffic at the ISP's and thus can put all the pieces together.
You know, some ISPs are not in America. Also, what good will this do? Crypto. Please read the Tor protocol, and if you have a viable attack that has not previously been discussed, announce it and demo a proof of concept. The community will be greatful.

>I think
Important words.

>Edward got busted on TOR
Evidence?

>needed a bargaining chip for entry into a safe haven location like Russia. Stealing the NSA files was part of that
Nice, accusing someone of a terrible crime with no evidence.

The sequence of Snowden's communications and travels, as well as his exfiltration of secret documents, are documented in detail by a large number of witnesses and involved people, including Micah F. Lee (Electronic Frontier Foundation), Laura Poitras (reporter), Glenn Greenwald (reporter), Ewen McAskill (reporter), Julian Assange (Wikileaks), Sarah Harrison (Wikileaks), the US State Department, Director of National Intelligence, and the heads of state and various other public officials in the governments of Hong Kong, Ecuador, the PRC, the USA, and Russia. All these stories, and Snowden's, match up perfectly. The chance that all the involved departments of all these countries' governments could agree on a fabrication with each other and with Wikileaks and several opposition journalists working for different outlets is extremely small.

The story does not match yours at all.

>the exposure thing was not so much for the people and change, but for himself
He admitted as much - he announced his identity to keep himself safe. No news there.

>After all then he could just later quit his job and nobody would know it was him.
O RLY.

how exactly would information you provided to the police on a crime destroy you, your family and your professional life?

Sounds like a load of bullshit.

because of criminal elements getting retribution. because of reputations. because the criminal he reported may have been in the police. or the mafia. or high level military. or friends with jason bourne. Or Batman.
Being a whistleblower is dangerous.
Chelsea Manning might have gotten away with it if she wasn't dobbed on. That destroyed her life.
So , see, the story is not bullshit at all. It was risky to provide the information that person did and they had to do it anonymously
Tor saves lives every day for this reason
It was important I clarify your reply so other people don't get the wrong idea about the original message

December 30, 2015

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Tor might not pay anyone to run Tor relays but gov. agencies paying Tor relayers, that's a different question.

Totally agree!

In a way it is funny to see Putin's trolls and Chinese fifty centers joining the "Western" spooks and whore media in smearing the same courageous American patriot.

December 31, 2015

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> Within hours of sending the info, the director of the regional law enforcement forensics lab accidentally sent me a "friend request" on Facebook. Their "BFF" was a digital forensic analyst...

I've had a very similar experience. However, this might not have been an error--- "analysts" often deliberately try to "friend" a "person of interest" under a false name, using some pretext, such as claiming to be a former schoolmate.

Tip lines and help lines for persons experiencing emotional distress are manifestly appropriate candidates for being accessible over Tor, or even being run as Hidden Services. See the first few pages of the fine book Dragnet Nation by Julian Angwin for another pointed example.

Everyone who uses Tails should know that this project would not be possible without the Debian Project, which was founded by Ian Murdock in 1993. Sadly, we have just lost him under mysterious circumstances involving a US police department.

https://bits.debian.org/2015/12/mourning-ian-murdock.html
Debian mourns the passing of Ian Murdock
Ana Guerrero Lopez, Donald Norwood and Paul Tagliamonte
30 Dec 2015

> With a heavy heart Debian mourns the passing of Ian Murdock, stalwart proponent of Free Open Source Software, Father, Son, and the 'ian' in Debian. Ian started the Debian project in August of 1993, releasing the first versions of Debian later that same year. Debian would go on to become the world's Universal Operating System, running on everything from embedded devices to the space station.

Given the manner in which all the world's governments seem to be taking a sharp turn towards fascism, perhaps setting the stage for a global genocide targeting anyone who is perceived as in some way "different" from others, and given the way in which privacy advocates seem to lose every public policy or legal battle in those countries which falsely claim to obey the Rule of Law, suicide increasingly appears to be a rational response. Over the years, more than one thoughtful writer has argued that what the law calls "mental illness" often reflects a particular sensitivity to injustice, inequity, and malintent and deception on the part of the ruling elite.

Here is a reminisce Ian wrote last summer:

http://ianmurdock.com/post/how-i-came-to-find-linux/
How I came to find Linux
Ian Murdock
17 Aug 2015

The book Rebel Code by Glynn Moody contains more about the founding of Debian.

>under mysterious circumstances involving a US police department
which ?
why do you not report the whole story/circumstances with your own opinion & details ?

From:

https://bits.debian.org/2015/12/mourning-ian-murdock.html

> The thoughts of the Debian Community are with Ian's family in this hard time.

> His family has asked for privacy during this difficult time and we very much wish to respect that. Within our Debian and the larger Linux community condolences may be sent to in-memoriam-ian@debian.org where they will be kept and archived.

From:

https://blog.docker.com/2015/12/ian-murdock/
In Memoriam: Ian Murdock
Ben Golub
30 Dec 2015

> He amazed everyone whom he worked with for the depth of his thinking, passion and experience. He was truly brilliant and an inspiration to many of us; his death is a loss to all whom he has known and touched.

From:

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/dec/31/ian-murdock-a-tribute…
Ian Murdock: a tribute to the man and his work on Linux
Doc Searls
1 Jan 2016

> [Ian] always subordinated his personal work, and even his technical preferences, to the principles that produce the best code for the most people. Those principles won’t die, and are proved every time we use code Murdock wrote or inspired – something none of us who use technology can avoid.

Something important for Tails users to know:

> Ian's dream has lived on, the Debian community remains incredibly active, with thousands of developers working untold hours to bring the world a reliable and secure operating system.

From Cory Doctorow:

> The Debian project fundamentally shifted the way free/open code got made by fusing an insistence on engineering excellence with a public declaration of the ethical nature of doing free software development.

People who want to remember Ian, or who appreciate what the Debian Project does, can donate:

https://www.debian.org/donations

http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/01/the-birth-of-debi…
The birth of Debian, in the words of Ian Murdock himself
Way back in 1999, I spoke to Murdock about Debian's package-based genesis.
Glyn Moody
6 Jan 2016

> As we reported a few days ago, Ian Murdock, the creator of the Debian GNU/Linux distribution project, died in rather unclear circumstances last week. Until more details emerge, it seems wise to refrain from speculation about what really happened. Far better to celebrate what is not in doubt: his important contribution to free software at a critical period in its growth.

Plus one.

> In November 1999, I spoke to Murdock at length, during one of the 50 interviews that form the backbone of my book Rebel Code: Linux and the Open Source Revolution. Inevitably, I was only able to use a few quotations from Murdock in the book's text, and now seems an appropriate moment to give a more complete version of how Murdock came to create Debian, told in his own words.

The apt package manager introduced by Ian was the key innovation which made Debian an instant success. It is absolutely essential to how anyone can easily install enormous open source systems such as R which are essential for anyone engaged in political activism (at least if you want to catch the bad guys lying with statistics).

> enormous open source systems such as R which are essential for anyone engaged in political activism (at least if you want to catch the bad guys lying with statistics).

R is used extensively not only by the good guys (data-driven journalists) but also by the bad guys (GCHQ and NSA), as documented in several Snowden leaked documents, most recently the HIMR problem set:

https://boingboing.net/2016/02/02/doxxing-sherlock-3.html

Just as Tor is used extensively not only by good guys (human rights workers, muckraking journalists, political activists around the world, political dissidents in repressive countries, union organizers targeted by Walmart type mega-corporations, hacktivists targeting our enemies, such as HBGary Federal, Hacking Team, etc) but also by the bad guys (government agents, corporate spooks and shills, and criminal syndicates holding hospital databases hostage).

Technology provides tools. It's up to the individual whether to use them for good or evil.

December 31, 2015

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Why there is not mentioned people like Ross Ulbricht from Silk Road, Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, Tor Carding Forums and Evolution market admin Vertu, Eric Marques from Freedom Hosting?

I'm not trolling, I really support the people I mentioned and what they do. Seems that Tor project are focusing on civil rights and leftists. Personally I don't care about them but I fully understand that everyone needs completely anonymous, unregulated and uncensorable internet.

>Tor project are not focusing on civil rights (there are a lot of others organizations) but most of them are living in the us and believe that it is their ... duty maybe.
> no, everyone does not need your *internet* vision, i know a lot of users who do prefer to be monitored and do not wish to be anonymous or to access at an unrestricted/uncensored internet.

I probably wouldn't choose the same people you would, but I totally agree with you that more variety of champions would be good. We pulled together this donation drive at the last minute, on the theory that we'd best get some experience doing it. (EFF took many years to get where they are, so no time like now to get started.)

In particular, I think that the diversity of people who care about Tor is one of our biggest strengths. I look forward to showcasing that diversity more thoroughly for the next campaign.

January 03, 2016

In reply to arma

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@ arma:

> We pulled together this donation drive at the last minute, on the theory that we'd best get some experience doing it. (EFF took many years to get where they are, so no time like now to get started.)

I actually think you've featured a very impressive roster of supporters, and would prefer to see people like Matthew Green and Bruce Schneier featured before you get around to the people the poster mentioned.

> In particular, I think that the diversity of people who care about Tor is one of our biggest strengths. I look forward to showcasing that diversity more thoroughly for the next campaign.

Totally agree. I really hope this fund drive is a big success!

I think I understand why you chose to have your interviewees submit pictures and I think this is a great idea. Nevertheless it excludes human rights workers and others living in dangerous locales who have a very serious need for strong anonymity. Maybe the next campaign can be structured to allow some of them to say a few words about how they use Tor, without giving away anything too personally-specific.

I still hope Rob Thomas speaks up to explain how he reconciles recent US defense/IC contracts with his firms (you can find them in public records as easily as I did) square with his support of Tor. In cases like this, full disclosure is the best policy.

fair enough point.
for one thing Ross is in prison. He is also is directly responsible for dealing hard drugs to a lot of people. Hard drugs destroy lives. This is the opposite of admirable.

As an non profit organisation Tor needs to have a good public reputation. Aligning with convicted criminals of the magnitude of the aforementioned is not going to encourage people to give Tor the money it needs

As for Satoshi, well, if you can provide a photo and brief interview I'm sure Tor would field your suggestion

I'm not familiar with your other suggestions but seeing as one of them mentioned carding - that's seriously illegal - why do you think Tor the organisation would want to be seen supporting, advocating or be affiliated with that kind of behaviour? Why would anyone?

December 31, 2015

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Always use Tor! Who knows whats illegal in future or diffrent environment. Ed, these days hero. <3 tscpd

December 31, 2015

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I am more grateful than I can say to Edward Snowden for his heroism in blowing the whistle on the unbounded amorality, unconstitutionality, criminality, duplicity, deviousness, "collect it all" mentality, technologically enabled lethality, and un-American terroristic activities* of the enemy of all Peoples everywhere, NSA. And to Glenn Greenwald for having the courage to report on the leaked documents.

Just the latest in long overdue reporting which would be impossible without Snowden's profound patriotism:

http://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-spy-net-on-israel-snares-congress-14514…
US Spy Net on Israel Snares Congress
NSA's targeting of Israeli leaders swept up the content of private conversations with U.S. lawmakers
Adam Entous and Danny Yadron
29 Dec 2015

> Before former NSA contractor Edward Snowden exposed much of the agency's spying operations in 2013, there was little worry in the administration about the monitoring of friendly heads of state because it was such a closely held secret.

https://theintercept.com/2015/12/30/spying-on-congress-and-israel-nsa-c…
Spying on Congress and Israel: NSA Cheerleaders Discover Value of Privacy Only When Their Own Is Violated
Glenn Greenwald
30 Dec 2015

> All sorts of people who spent many years cheering for and defending the NSA and its programs of mass surveillance are suddenly indignant now that they know the eavesdropping included them and their American and Israeli friends rather than just ordinary people.

(* Terroristic activities? Yes indeed: the "signature drone strikes" targeting children and other innocents.)

As a Tor supporter it is concerning when the blog is for used for loud accusations on non-privacy issues where partisanship seems to be the main qualification.

E.g. rubbish like the NSA deliberately "targets" children for drone strikes.

Lets stick to what we know. We already know far too much about mass surveillance that oversteps rational or constitutional bounds by national data collection agencies of many democracies -- and of dictatorships where no bounds even exist.

> We already know far too much about mass surveillance that oversteps rational or constitutional bounds by national data collection agencies of many democracies -- and of dictatorships where no bounds even exist.

I question whether in a democracy The People can actually "know far too much" about government abuses, but as a human rights activist, I am happy to agree with you that oppressive dictatorships must be denounced. I'd add that one hardly needs to spy on their communications to be aware that numerous governments are rather openly violating human rights of people within their borders (see rsf.org, hrw.org, etc).

> Lets stick to what we know.

Here's some of what we know:

https://eff.org/nsa-spying/nsadocs

https://theintercept.com/drone-papers

As more whistleblowers bring out more documents, we will learn even more about the activities of NSA.

> As a Tor supporter it is concerning when the blog is for used for loud accusations on non-privacy issues where partisanship seems to be the main qualification.
>
> E.g. rubbish like the NSA deliberately "targets" children for drone strikes.

I understand why NSA employees don't like to think of themselves as working for a barbaric state-sponsored terrorism organization, but the facts are damning.

As you are probably aware, NSA and DOD employees are not permitted to read The Intercept, because articles there often cite documents leaked by a true American patriot, Edward Snowden. But when you get home, because there are obviously some things you should know that you don't yet know, I think you should really fire up Tails and go read this:

https://theintercept.com/2015/11/19/former-drone-operators-say-they-wer…
Former Drone Operators Say They Were “Horrified” By Cruelty of Assassination Program
Murtaza Hussain
19 Nov 2015

> U.S. DRONE OPERATORS are inflicting heavy civilian casualties and have developed an institutional culture callous to the death of children and other innocents, four former operators said at a press briefing today in New York.
>
> The killings, part of the Obama administration’s targeted assassination program, are aiding terrorist recruitment and thus undermining the program’s goal of eliminating such fighters, the veterans added. Drone operators refer to children as “fun-size terrorists” and liken killing them to “cutting the grass before it grows too long,” said one of the operators, Michael Haas, a former senior airman in the Air Force. Haas also described widespread drug and alcohol abuse, further stating that some operators had flown missions while impaired.

Then please read this:

https://theintercept.com/2014/02/10/the-nsas-secret-role/
The NSA’s Secret Role in the U.S. Assassination Program
Jeremy Scahill, Glenn Greenwald
10 Feb 2014

> The National Security Agency is using complex analysis of electronic surveillance, rather than human intelligence, as the primary method to locate targets for lethal drone strikes – an unreliable tactic that results in the deaths of innocent or unidentified people.
>
> According to a former drone operator for the military’s Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) who also worked with the NSA, the agency often identifies targets based on controversial metadata analysis and cell-phone tracking technologies. Rather than confirming a target’s identity with operatives or informants on the ground, the CIA or the U.S. military then orders a strike based on the activity and location of the mobile phone a person is believed to be using.
> ...
> The former JSOC drone operator is adamant that the technology has been responsible for taking out terrorists and networks of people facilitating improvised explosive device attacks against U.S. forces in Afghanistan. But he also states that innocent people have “absolutely” been killed as a result of the NSA’s increasing reliance on the surveillance tactic.
>
> One problem, he explains, is that targets are increasingly aware of the NSA’s reliance on geolocating, and have moved to thwart the tactic. Some have as many as 16 different SIM cards associated with their identity within the High Value Target system. Others, unaware that their mobile phone is being targeted, lend their phone, with the SIM card in it, to friends, children, spouses and family members.

NSA knows about this problem, and has repeatedly taken the decision to simply ignore it. But this kind of decision will, if there is any justice, eventually enable the ICC to try them on war crimes charges. Notice the distinction between a trial in which the defendents have an experienced defense team, and the NSA's approach: "conviction" and execution by algorithm.

If memory serves, Snowden told Greenwald that he had decided to leak to Greenwald, rather than other reporters, because he had been impressed by Greenwald's passionate denunciation of the NSA murder of Abdulrahman al Awlaki, aged 16, by a *targeted* drone strike just a few weeks after the strike targeting his father, Anwar.

Another term of art used by the drone assassins: "bug splat" (derived from a violent video game). Greenwald was the first to point out the moral damage this causes to the young servicepersons (often hardly more than children themselves) who actually push the button that launches the Hellfire missile:

http://www.salon.com/2012/07/10/bravery_and_drone_pilots/
Bravery and drone pilots
Glenn Greenwald
10 Jul 2012

> For a new generation of young guns, the experience of piloting a drone is not unlike the video games they grew up on. Unlike traditional pilots, who physically fly their payloads to a target, drone operators kill at the touch of a button, without ever leaving their base – a remove that only serves to further desensitize the taking of human life. (The military slang for a man killed by a drone strike is “bug splat,” since viewing the body through a grainy-green video image gives the sense of an insect being crushed.)

Concerning the extralegality, the editorial boards of many major US papers have been compelled by the reporting of Greenwald and others to denounce the extrajudicial drone assassinations:

http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jul/29/opinion/la-ed-drone-killings-la…
When the government kills
The Constitution's guarantee of due process means the president can't act as judge, jury and executioner of suspected terrorists, especially when they are U.S. citizens.
July 29, 2012

> Whether or not it succeeds in court, a lawsuit challenging the killings of Al Qaeda figure Anwar Awlaki and two other U.S. citizens clearly lays out the problems with the Obama administration's policy of "targeted killings" of suspected terrorists even outside the battle zone of Afghanistan.
>
> Allowing the president of the United States to act as judge, jury and executioner for suspected terrorists, including U.S. citizens, on the basis of secret evidence is impossible to reconcile with the Constitution's guarantee that a life will not be taken without due process of law. Under the law, the government must obtain a court order if it seeks to target a U.S. citizen for electronic surveillance, yet there is no comparable judicial review of a decision to kill a citizen. No court is even able to review the general policies for such assassin
>
> The suit filed this month by the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Constitutional Rights seeks an after-the-fact determination that the killings of Awlaki, an associate named Samir Khan and Awlaki's 16-year-old son, Abdulrahman, were not legal. The elder Awlaki and Khan were killed in a drone strike in Yemen in September; Abdulrahman Awlaki was the apparently unintended victim of a strike two weeks later.

NSA is the enemy of all people, everywhere, at any time. Even its own employees.

So please quit working for NSA, and become a dues-paying member of the ACLU. And don't forget to bring out more documents when you rejoin the rest of the human race.

You may be a terrorist if...

... you urge potential USG whistleblowers to leak classified documents.

> Department of Defense
> DIRECTIVE NUMBER 5200.27
> January 7, 1980
>
> SUBJECT: Acquisition of Information Concerning Persons and Organizations not Affiliated with the Department of Defense
> ...
> Information may be acquired [by military intelligence operatives] about activities threatening defense military and civilian personnel and defense activities and installations, including vessels, aircraft, communications equipment, and supplies. Only the following types of activities justify acquisition of information under the authority of this
paragraph:
> ...
> 4.1.3. Acts jeopardizing the security of DoD elements or operations or compromising classified defense information by unauthorized disclosure or by espionage.

So let me repeat: we need more USG employees to bring out documents when they defect to the People.

Your move, Ash.

This is what it is like to become a "collateral damage" statistic, from a child victim of the very first strike ordered by President Obama (which entirely missed the intended victim):

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/23/drone-strike-victim-barack…
Victim of Obama's first drone strike: 'I am the living example of what drones are'
Spencer Ackerman
23 Jan 2016

> Faheem Qureshi’s uncles sat with their neighbors, chatting, cracking jokes and sipping tea, in their family’s lounge for male guests. Qureshi, almost 14, stood nearby, bored and restless, thinking about when he could go to the nearby playground where he and the other Ziraki village kids played badminton and cricket.
>
> It had been a long day – Friday prayers, a food shopping errand at his mother’s behest, hosting – but also a happy occasion, as people stopped by to welcome an uncle home to North Waziristan, in tribal Pakistan, from a work excursion to the United Arab Emirates. Then he heard a sound like a plane taking off.
>
> About two seconds later, the missile punched a hole through the lounge. Qureshi remembers feeling like his body was on fire. He ran outside, wanting to throw water on his face, but his priority was escape. The boy could not see.
> ...
> It took nearly 40 days for Qureshi to emerge from a series of hospitals, all of which he spent in darkness. Shrapnel had punctured his stomach. Lacerations covered much of his upper body. Doctors operated on the entire left side of his body, which had sustained burns, and used laser surgery to repair his right eye. They could not save his left.
>
> His family kept the worst from him while he recuperated. Two of Qureshi’s uncles, Mohammed Khalil and Mansoor Rehman, were dead. So was his 21-year-old cousin Aizazur Rehman Qureshi, who was preparing to leave the family’s North Waziristan home for work, also in the UAE. Fourteen of Qureshi’s cousins were left fatherless.
>
> Barely a teenager, Qureshi was suddenly an elder male within his family, tasked with providing for his mother, brothers and sisters. Once a promising student who wanted a career in chemistry, his priority would become scrounging a living.

@ Drone killers: you did this. Feeling proud of your handiwork?

You can partially redeem yourself by providing documentary evidence to the people who are trying to bring up the USG/NSA/CIA leaders who ordered strikes like this on war crimes charges.

Incidentally, the heroic medical staff of MSF is evidently being deliberately targeted in Yemen by Saudi Air Force, which is well equipped with US provided planes and missiles. So there is another set of war criminals who must be brought to justice.

https://www.aclu.org/blog/speak-freely/stories-behind-governments-newly…
The Stories Behind the Government’s Newly Released Army Abuse Photos
11 Feb 2016

> Last week, in response to a long-running ACLU lawsuit, the Defense Department released 198 photos relating to prisoner abuse by U.S. military personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan. These photos are disturbing, but they are almost certainly less disturbing than the approximately 1,800 pictures the government is still keeping secret — and we’re still fighting for those in court under the Freedom of Information Act.

> Sixty of the 198 photos have legible Army criminal investigation file numbers printed on them. We used those numbers to search our Torture Database, which contains some 6,000 reports, investigations, emails, and other documents the government has been forced to release to us in the course of our 11-year-old FOIA suit.

Time and again, the Army dropped cases despite extensive evidence of abuses including numerous cases of prisoners tortured and killed by CIA, FBI, and US military while in USG custody.

So another group of war criminals who must be brought to justice.

Meanwhile, accused war criminal and CIA Director John Brennan is obviously feeling the heat. Good. Human rights campaigners are not going to just forget all about his crimes. We are going to keep digging up more evidence. We continue to share information with officials who may eventually issue an international arrest warrant. Our goal is to eventually see him arrested and prosecuted in the ICC or another court.

January 01, 2016

Permalink

-Individuals are being marginalized.
-Decisions for our future are without the populations interests.
-We don't know what our governments are doing!?
-And when we do, we don't have a platform to question, see first line...
-When on occasion some do, they are labeled terrorist or pinned down by the state with endless bureaucracy of ~justice~ (first a beating, then, charges with no relevance to the issue at hand) for years.
-We are many they are few, still they rule without our input.
-Yes, some input but only by flagrantly being so wrong it would make the population rise, nothing less!
We desperately need Tor to protect our individual actions within a disorganized population from our own making of lack of understanding, our governments!

January 01, 2016

Permalink

I don't support Edward Snowden.

1 He made his way firsly to China and then to Russia. The both are geo-political adversaries of the USA. This looks like an attempt to trade USA secrets.
2 If he really had wanted to inform the society he would have disclosed everything immediately, not the time the info got obsolete.

sometimes the truth is so far that imagine that someone could approach it without to be burned looks like an attempt to become an hero ,)

ahhh typical moron shouting me me me, you be the first to complain and calling for tor project help when your own government decide that you are no longer useful to them.

In fact I fell me oppressed and censored, that's why I'm here. But I seem to have no illusions about the true reasoning behind people's behavior. If Ed were honest he would have a job in an org with no business in surveillance and intelligence. This is my personal opinion.

lol

a neutral job does not exist ...
it is a phantasm.
a human being is so complicated that i do not believe that someone could understand the "real reasoning" hidden behind his/her behavior ...
it is a phantasm.
i guess you are speaking about sincerity or truth or an invisible resistant struggle in an underground unknown place where you could move & live with the help of the sacrifice of the others like in matrix ... and you are using the term "honest" ...
it is a phantasm.

and that is not my personal response/opinion ; eso es.

> If Ed were honest he would have a job in an org with no business in surveillance and intelligence.

So according to you, Freedom of the Press Foundation is a "surveillance and intelligence" business? Seriously?

As to the bare facts, Wikipedia is your friend:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden#Career

o security guard at CASL (on grounds U Maryland College Park, close ties to NSA)

o systems analysis at CIA HQ (iLangley, VA)

o student at a CIA tech school

o sysadmin for CIA under diplomatic cover (in Geneva)

o NSA contract sysadmin via Dell (near Tokyo)

o NSA contract sysadmin via BAH (in Hawaii)

As part of these jobs, he also taught counter-cyberespionage techniques to USG employees.

As to your point... what *is* your point?

> I don't support Edward Snowden.

Yes, we picked up on that.

> 1 He made his way firstly to China and then to Russia. The both are geo-political adversaries of the USA. This looks like an attempt to trade USA secrets.

Only if you are not acquainted with the facts. See for example

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/10/06/snowden_bbc_interview_analysis/
Edward Snowden denies making a deal with the Russian secret service
‘I burnt my life to the ground to work against surveillance’
Patrick McGoohan as The Prisoner in "Fall Out"
John Leyden
6 Oct 2015

> Snowden firmly denied doing a deal with the FSB (the Russian state security agency) in exchange for asylum in Moscow. “I burned my life to the ground to work against surveillance,” said Snowden. Why would I suddenly turn around, because I’m in a different geographical location, and say 'I’m all about surveillance ... that’s what I’d like to do from now on'.”
>
> He admitted FSB officers had quizzed him while he was stuck in Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport but denied handing over intelligence. “Everything I had is in the hands of journalists,” Snowden said.

Sources close to Russian intelligence have confirmed to reporters that they "got nothing" from Snowden.

More specifically, Snowden has said that he kept the documents on removable drives and gave these to Greenwald in Hong Kong. Later they made their way to The Guardian's offices in NYC. He specifically said that he never put any of them on any of his four laptops. The purpose of having four laptops was to have four different computers to use different software to perform different functions.

Snowden is an expert in defeating Chinese cyber-espionage, in fact before he defected to the People he taught USG operatives how to protect their computers when traveling abroad. He has stated that he used his knowledge to ensure that it would be very difficult or even impossible for an intelligence agency to surreptitiously decrypt the media.

> 2 If he really had wanted to inform the society he would have disclosed everything immediately, not the time the info got obsolete.

Many of the documents disclosed dragnet surveillance programs which were very active at the time of the leaks, including Prism, the dragnet collection of all calls made to or from nations such as the Bahamas, etc, etc. Some of the documents were dated April 2013, just two months before the leaks in June 2013.

Factually inaccurate smears won't get you very far in torspace.

Richard Rashke recently reviewed the demonization of Snowden by the enemies of freedom in Salon:

http://www.salon.com
Publicity hound, coward, liar: Whistleblowers are inevitably demonized by their enemies — Edward Snowden is no exception
Richard Rashke
13 Dec 2015

> The most powerful gun in the damage-control arsenal isn’t truth. It is demonization—a vicious assault on the character of the whistleblower in order to destroy credibility and distract from the message. The damage controller’s bag of tricks is as old as Machiavelli.

Last summer, Greenwald debunked a smear by the Sunday Times--- and recalled some relevant details from the Vietnam War era USG smears of another whistle-blower, Daniel Ellsberg:

https://theintercept.com/2015/06/14/sunday-times-report-snowden-files-j…
The Sunday Times’ Snowden Story is Journalism at its Worst — and Filled with Falsehoods
Glenn Greenwald
14 Jun 2015

> In the early 1970s, Nixon officials such as John Ehrlichman and Henry Kissinger planted accusations in the U.S. media that Daniel Ellsberg had secretly given the Pentagon Papers and other key documents to the Soviet Union; everyone now knows this was a lie, but at the time, American journalists repeated it constantly, helping to smear Ellsberg. That’s why Ellsberg has constantly defended Snowden and Chelsea Manning from the start: because the same tactics were used to smear him.

And Greenwald has explained another striking parallel:

https://theintercept.com/2015/04/07/political-rhetoric-us-never-changes…
Political Smears in U.S. Never Change: the NYT’s 1967 Attack on MLK’s Anti-War Speech
Glenn Greenwald
7 Apr 2015

> The script for smearing never changes — it stays constant over five decades and through the establishments of both parties — and it’s one of the reasons Ellsberg so closely identifies with Snowden and has become one of his most vocal defenders.
>
> A reader this morning pointed me to one of the most illustrative examples of this dynamic: an April 1967 New York Times editorial harshly chastising Martin Luther King for his anti-war activism. That editorial was published three days after King’s speech on the Vietnam War at the Riverside Church in New York City, which, as I have written about many times, was one of the most powerful (and radical) indictments of American militarism delivered in the 20th century

In the decades since Ellsberg's career was ruined and MLK was assassinated (questions about the role of an undercover FBI agent who was present on the balcony when King was killed still linger), both men have been widely honored.

Fortunately, Snowden hasn't endured decades before winning major awards: EPIC's "Champion of Freedom" award , the Sam Adams Prize, etc, etc. He's even garnered some grudging praise from top level spooks, and I don't mean just previous NSA whistleblowers. After returning from his secret visit to North Korea, DNI Dennis Clapper reluctantly admitted that Snowden leaks have had a positive effect: "I think it's clear that some of the conversations that this has generated, some of the debate, actually probably needed to happen. It's unfortunate they didn't happen some time ago, but if there's a good side to [the leaks], that's it."

And just look back at some of the incredibly silly things which US spooks were saying days after the first leaks appeared:

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Edward-Snowden-Beware-How-by-the-web-1…
Edward Snowden Beware: How Spooks Smear Whistleblowers
Steve Weissman, Reader Supported News
12 Jun 2013

> "China could be behind NSA leaks," screams the Newsmax headline on [former CIA agent Robert] Baer. "On the face of it, it looks like it's under some sort of Chinese control," Baer said... "We'll never get him from China. There's not a chance. He'll disappear there," says Baer. "He won't be able to go anywhere else"

Here is another debunking of USG anti-Snowden propaganda:

http://www.thenation.com/article/seven-myths-about-edward-snowden-nsa-w…
Seven Myths About Edward Snowden, NSA Whistleblower
A handy myth-stripping guide to NSA surveillance and its whistleblower.
Chase Madar
24 Jun 2013

Snowden already explained why the information he gathered is being released in small pieces... if he released everything at the beginning then there would have been much attention on his revelations only for a small time... and then everyone would have forgotten Snowdens' leaks... Releasing information from time to time, in small pieces, is a good way of keeping the attention level high on NSA & Co crimes.

One of the tactics which has always been employed by the enemies of the People is to demonize anyone who strikes a blow for freedom.

Richard Rashke recently reviewed the ongoing demonization of Snowden by USG officials and USIC media operatives in Salon:

http://www.salon.com/2015/12/13/publicity_hound_coward_liar_whistleblow…
Publicity hound, coward, liar: Whistleblowers are inevitably demonized by their enemies — Edward Snowden is no exception
Richard Rashke
13 Dec 2015

> The most powerful gun in the damage-control arsenal isn’t truth. It is demonization—a vicious assault on the character of the whistleblower in order to destroy credibility and distract from the message. The damage controller’s bag of tricks is as old as Machiavelli.

Last summer, Greenwald debunked a smear by the Sunday Times--- and recalled some relevant details from the Vietnam War era USG smears of another whistle-blower, Daniel Ellsberg:

https://theintercept.com/2015/06/14/sunday-times-report-snowden-files-j…
The Sunday Times’ Snowden Story is Journalism at its Worst — and Filled with Falsehoods
Glenn Greenwald
14 Jun 2015

> In the early 1970s, Nixon officials such as John Ehrlichman and Henry Kissinger planted accusations in the U.S. media that Daniel Ellsberg had secretly given the Pentagon Papers and other key documents to the Soviet Union; everyone now knows this was a lie, but at the time, American journalists repeated it constantly, helping to smear Ellsberg. That’s why Ellsberg has constantly defended Snowden and Chelsea Manning from the start: because the same tactics were used to smear him.

And Greenwald has explained another striking parallel:

https://theintercept.com/2015/04/07/political-rhetoric-us-never-changes…
Political Smears in U.S. Never Change: the NYT’s 1967 Attack on MLK’s Anti-War Speech
Glenn Greenwald
7 Apr 2015

> The script for smearing never changes — it stays constant over five decades and through the establishments of both parties — and it’s one of the reasons Ellsberg so closely identifies with Snowden and has become one of his most vocal defenders.
>
> A reader this morning pointed me to one of the most illustrative examples of this dynamic: an April 1967 New York Times editorial harshly chastising Martin Luther King for his anti-war activism. That editorial was published three days after King’s speech on the Vietnam War at the Riverside Church in New York City, which, as I have written about many times, was one of the most powerful (and radical) indictments of American militarism delivered in the 20th century

In the decades since Ellsberg's career was ruined and MLK was assassinated (questions about the role of an undercover FBI agent who was present on the balcony when King was killed still linger), both men have been widely honored.

Fortunately, Snowden hasn't endured decades before winning major awards: EPIC's "Champion of Freedom" award , the Sam Adams Prize, etc, etc. He's even garnered some grudging praise from top level spooks, and I don't mean just previous NSA whistleblowers. After returning from his secret visit to North Korea, DNI Dennis Clapper reluctantly admitted that Snowden leaks have had a positive effect: "I think it's clear that some of the conversations that this has generated, some of the debate, actually probably needed to happen. It's unfortunate they didn't happen some time ago, but if there's a good side to [the leaks], that's it."

And just look back at some of the incredibly silly things which US spooks were saying days after the first leaks appeared:

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Edward-Snowden-Beware-How-by-the-web-1…
Edward Snowden Beware: How Spooks Smear Whistleblowers
Steve Weissman, Reader Supported News
12 Jun 2013

> "China could be behind NSA leaks," screams the Newsmax headline on [former CIA agent Robert] Baer. "On the face of it, it looks like it's under some sort of Chinese control," Baer said... "We'll never get him from China. There's not a chance. He'll disappear there," says Baer. "He won't be able to go anywhere else"

Here is another debunking of USG anti-Snowden propaganda:

http://www.thenation.com/article/seven-myths-about-edward-snowden-nsa-w…
Seven Myths About Edward Snowden, NSA Whistleblower
A handy myth-stripping guide to NSA surveillance and its whistleblower.
Chase Madar
24 Jun 2013

> [Snowden] made his way firsly to China and then to Russia. The both are geo-political adversaries of the USA. This looks like an attempt to trade USA secrets.

This was one of the first propaganda themes to be pushed by USG operatives back in June 2013, and within weeks it had been so thoroughly debunked that I am surprised to see it re-emerge.

Snowden didn't go to *China*, he went to *Hong Kong*, the former UK colony which was handed over to China under the understanding that it would become an autonomous region with press freedoms not available elsewhere in China. No surprise that the central Chinese government soon moved to quash the promised freedoms, but despite the very considerable risks in speaking out, Hong Kong remains one of the few places in China where most ordinary people support activists who speak out against one party rule, censorship, government crackdowns on peaceful street protests--- and in recent weeks, the alarming disappearances of several people who has published things the Chinese leadership didn't like to see in print:

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/01/answers-demanded-missing-hong-kon…
Answers sought on missing Hong Kong publishers
Protest held over disappearance of five employees of company specialising in books banned by Chinese government.
3 Jan 2016

> Pro-democracy protesters have marched in front of China's liaison office in Hong Kong to demand information about a missing book editor and four of his colleagues, who worked for a company specialising in books critical of China's government.

Further, Snowden was regarded in CIA/NSA (before his defection to The People) as an expert on counter-surveillance methods which could defeat Chinese cyberespionage methods in particular, including ways in which Chinese spooks target hotel guests. In fact, Snowden even taught cyber-safeguards to other employees of the USG.

So Hong Kong was actually a very shrewd choice of places to meet Greenwald and Poitras.

> If he really had wanted to inform the society he would have disclosed everything immediately, not the time the info got obsolete.

Most of the documents leaked by Snowden in Jun 2013 were only a few years old. Some were only a few months old. Hundreds of the most important documents described in detail programs which very much in operation at the time of the leak (and indeed in many cases continue to this day).

January 01, 2016

Permalink

ED or TOR : Could you please explain how can I : You can drop into the IRC and talk to these people directly and ask them questions . THANKS
Mr P
Houston TX USA

https://www.torproject.org/about/contact#irc
should get you started.

I'm afraid it's not super-easy for the average internet user though. IRC is mainly the way that we interact with each other, and that we interact with our community of volunteers and other helpers. You might have more luck using the helpdesk, or tor.stackexchange.com, or going to your local cryptoparties, or finding Tor people at conferences.

Snowden was quoted as saying:

> "You can drop into the IRC and talk to these people directly and ask them questions, or criticize them" (laughs).

Just a guess (would welcome correction): Snowden may have been citing the pre-configured oftc accounts in Tails, the Tor/GPG-equipped amnesiac operating system which he has stated he used (with other critical open source software) to blow the whistle on NSA.

You asked:

> Could you please explain how can I : You can drop into the IRC and talk to these people [Tor supporters?] directly and ask them questions

If I guessed correctly what he was talking about in the interview, I guess further that you tried using Tails and were unable to log onto any oftc chat servers. If so, the likely reason is that the oftc chat servers unfortunately started blocking the Tails accounts last year. But Tor Messenger is here in beta and you can perhaps try that (maybe wait for the first stable release if you yourself want to contact reporters as a whistleblower).

If you are talking about the pre-configured OFTC accounts in Tails, this might help:

https://lists.torproject.org/pipermail/tor-talk/2016-January/039818.html
From: bancfc
3 Jan 2016
Sun Jan 3 22:14:13 UTC 2016

> The OFTC servers have been blocking Tor users for weeks and the #tor is no longer a viable support channel for anonymous users. We are looking for other Tor friendly options at the moment and it would be great if you consider moving your channels too.

> Options we are considering for Whonix are Anarplex and DarkScience - the latter has an onion service.

January 01, 2016

Permalink

"even starting to experiment with running an exit, which I think is one of the most interesting parts of the Tor experience. "

some individuals who have run exit relays have found themselves arrested by police because of illegal stuff done using the exit relay. certainly their lives became very interesting when they were arrested at gun-point on child pornography/bomb threat charges. i don't think people should experiment with running an exit relay personally. maybe they could mitigate the risk by using fake billing info and traceless payment for the exit relay server so it can't be traced back to them easily. this is something that DOXBIN and PinkMeth did for their (illegal) hidden services. however, DOXBIN/PM used other secrecy techniques to hide who ran the server (such as always logging into it using Tor itself), something we can't expect individuals to do consistently.

i think larger orgs should stick to running exit relays and we can donate to them maybe. mr snowden means well but i think he is over-zealous. people who naively follow his ideas can find themselves victims of the police apparatus mr snowden wants to protect us from.

At 32c3 last week, we had a relay operator meetup, and more than 100 people attended. This is an astonishing number of people compared to even five years ago.

So yes, I agree with you that not everybody is in a good position to run an exit relay. But the actual legal issues are very rare. The much more common issue is that your ISP doesn't understand what's going on and gets scared and wants you to stop. We, the Tor community, need to keep working to educate ISPs about the importance of Tor, and about how exit relays work. Running your exit relay in some obfuscated hidden way is usually a terrible way to introduce Tor to the ISPs in a positive light.

For other tips on how to run an exit relay more smoothly, see:
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/TorExitGuidelines

January 02, 2016

Permalink

I hope he means the good side of Tor is why we should support it.... Otherwise, the bad side has stalkers, killers and hackers!(the insane type of them) But I think I get what he's saying.

https google translation could help you better ;) to understand the reason why you should wish support tor.

*we are using few percent of the net even with the hidden services _ 70% are for commercial area _ so, if you wish see the dark side it will be more on the 70 % than on the 1%.
killers,hackers,stalkers (lol) are not dangerous ; they are tagged as this but they are not as dangerous as in the real life.

January 04, 2016

Permalink

I want to use this opportunity to thank both the Tor Project, our Lebanon, N.H. Library Director [who had Tor installed in our local public library computer system]; and who stood up to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security-who contacted Lebanon NH Police to try to persuade our library director to cease using Tor, and our local Board of Library Trustees-who supported our Library Director's decision. ...and to also thank Edward Snowden for bringing this matter to the U.S. Citizen's attention.
I regret that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has "private sector representatives" [ALL Corporate (for-profit) representatives], but NO public interest representatives on their regional Fusion Center boards-such as the League of Women Voters. Our LEPC (Local Emergency Planning Committee) had League of Women Voter representatives, and other public-sector representatives-to safe guard the interests of all citizens, not just the for-profit "public sector".

January 05, 2016

Permalink

I believe Snowden is a modern era hero and we all should support projects like Tor, because they're working for us. For our privacy. For our rights. A lot of my friends tell me that they don't care about privacy so much because they have nothing to hide.... but as Snowden says, it's just like saying that you don't care about freedom of speech because you don't have nothing to say. So, keep on fighting for freedom.

If you want to use Tor to browse the web, download Tor Browser here

https://www.torproject.org/download/download-easy.html.en

(Hmm... why does the Project make that link so hard to spot on the home page?)

Make sure you download the correct version for your OS (Windows, Mac, Linux). Make sure you use GPG to verify the detached signature of the tarball. And be sure to read

https://www.torproject.org/about/overview.html.en#stayinganonymous

Note that Tor Browser provides a Tor-friendly web browser which is based on Mozilla Firefox. The "bundle" includes everything needed to make it run safely on your computer. But installing TB won't cause your computer to use Tor for other interactions with the Internet. In particular, it won't anonymize chats or file downloads with a tool such as wget or curl.

If you want to use Tor safely for more than web-browsing, you should check out Tails, an open-source live linux-based amnesiac operating system available free of charge here:

https://tails.boum.org/news/index.en.html

The Tail Project is a distinct NGO, but it maintains close ties to Tor Project.

"Amnesiac" means that the Tails system (technically, a stripped down security/anonymity-enhanced version of Debian, a Linux distribution) is designed to avoid leaving traces on the hard disk or other permanent storage of how you used your computer, which can be very important for whistleblowers, or activists or human rights researchers working in dangerous locations (which increasingly appears to mean "anywhere in the world").

To use Tails you put a "live" copy on removable media (a DVD or USB stick) and boot your computer or device from that. It won't touch your hard disk (if any).

Make sure to read the excellent Tails documentation:

https://tails.boum.org/doc/index.en.html

January 08, 2016

Permalink

@ Mike Perry and Tor Browser team:

An article by Patrick O'Neill, originally published in the Daily Dot, has just been republished in Salon. (For those who don't know, that's a mainstream left-leaning US magazine.)

I think this is a major achievement for the Project and for the Tor Browser team in the campaign to mainstream Tor, so congratulations are in order!

After all the disinformation which our enemies have relentlessly promulgated in the mass media, it's a joy to see a story which finally makes all the corrections which needed to be made to... pretty much everything the mass media has been saying for years about Tor.

I love the title, and the story gets even better from there:

http://www.salon.com/2016/01/08/this_is_the_web_browser_you_should_be_u…
This is the web browser you should be using if you care at all about security
Hint: It's not Chrome or Firefox
Patrick Howell O'Neill, The Daily Dot
8 Jan 2016

> No matter what you’ve heard about the Tor network, the basics of the service are simple: Tor keeps anyone who uses it safe, secure, and anonymous on the Internet.
> ...
> Once you have Tor, it’s as simple to use as Chrome or Firefox. (In fact, the Tor browser is a tweaked version of Firefox.) You can view most websites as you would with any other browser—the main difference is that now those websites won’t know who you are. You won’t be identified and tracked the way that you are around the Internet with other browsers.
>
> Tor lets you do plenty of other stuff, too. Using the Tor browser or working with other programs, you can chat anonymously or share files without giving up your identity. One of the most interesting uses of Tor is accessing so-called hidden services, anonymous websites that only exist within the Tor network. In the same way that Tor hides your identity, a hidden service website’s location and the identity of its owner is also hidden thanks to Tor’s technology.
> ...
> People often confuse the Deep Web and Dark Net. Adding further confusion is that these names are not used universally. Some call the Dark Net the Dark Web or the Deep Web the Deep Net. We use Dark Net and Deep Web. Here’s what each term truly means:
>
> The Deep Web is information on the Internet that is not available by standard search engines. This is a vast stretch of cyberspace because it includes private databases, administrative portals, emails, archives, and more. The Dark Net is a subsection of the Deep Web.
>
> The Dark Net or Dark Web are networks like Tor, I2P, or FreeNet that can only be accessed using specialized software and are often motivated by hiding certain data. When you’re talking about the Dark Net, the “normal Internet”—the one you used to access this article—is known as the Clear Net.
> ...
> Tor’s user base is diverse and, by design, it’s virtually impossible to know everyone who is on the network. Tor’s foundational purpose is to allow everyone, from spies to political dissidents, to surf the Web in such a way that no one can know who they are.
>
> Now, thousands of normal computer users utilize Tor in order to protect themselves from ads, tracking, and surveillance. Journalists use Tor to protect their sources and themselves. Both law enforcement and criminals use Tor in order to hide what they’re doing online. Businesses protect their Internet traffic using Tor. In countries like Iran and China, Tor is used to evade censorship and surveillance.
> ...
> Because of Tor’s origins within and continued connections to the U.S. military, there’s been much skepticism directed towards it throughout the years. If the Tor Project gets money from the U.S. government every year—which it does—wouldn’t that government insert a backdoor so it could spy on Tor’s users?
>
> Tor is open source, which means that every line of code that makes the program run is available for you to read right here. That code is written and audited by security professionals to make sure Tor does what they say it does: Keep users safe and secure from everyone, even the U.S. government.
>
> Despite understandable skepticism about the project’s connections to the U.S. government, no one has ever spotted a backdoor in Tor. On the contrary, no critic has ever really criticized the code in significant ways. The world’s top security professionals swear by Tor.
> ...
> Tor is a big step toward privacy, but there’s plenty more you can do, like using end-to-end encrypted messaging while also using Tor.

So, finally, a story which tells the truth about Tor (and even deftly debunks the usual lies told by the FBI propaganda machine)!

Hurrah!

Well, at least one correction:

> The Dark Net or Dark Web are networks like [hidden services accessible via] Tor, I2P, or FreeNet that can only be accessed using specialized software

> Using the Tor browser or working with other programs, you can chat anonymously or share files without giving up your identity.

Is that true, or should this read: "using Tor Messenger (once it is out of Beta), you can chat anonymously"?

January 14, 2016

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http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/265889-cruz-flip…
Cruz shifts on Edward Snowden
Bradford Richardson
14 Jan 2016

This is in a way somewhat amusing:

Sen. Cruz in 2013:

"If it is the case that the federal government is seizing millions of personal records about law-abiding citizens, and if it is the case that there are minimal restrictions on accessing or reviewing those records, then I think Mr. Snowden has done a considerable public service by bringing it to light."

Sen. Cruz in 2016 (in a recent statement to the NYT):

"It is now clear that Snowden is a traitor, and he should be tried for treason. Today, we know that Snowden violated federal law, that his actions materially aided terrorists and enemies of the United States, and that he subsequently fled to China and Russia. Under the Constitution, giving aid to our enemies is treason."

January 28, 2016

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I salute John Kiriakou for continuing to courageously blow the whistle, most recently on abuses by prison guards in US Federal prisons:

https://www.truthdig.com/report/item/an_assault_on_justice_20160127
An Assault on Justice
John Kiriakou
27 Jan 2016

> Two federal prison guards in Florida recently agreed to plead guilty for beating a prisoner and then covering it up. One officer faces up to three years in a federal prison, while the other is looking at a year.
> ...
> The two Florida officers are no anomaly. About a year ago, I finished a 23-month stay in a federal prison for blowing the whistle on the CIA’s torture program. I couldn’t believe some of the things I saw there.
> ...
> One of my cellmates at Loretto, whom I’ll call “James,” was a mentally ill homeless man from Pittsburgh. He’d purposefully violated the terms of his federal probation so he could spend the winter months indoors.
>
> James was clear with both the medical staff and his cellmates that he was mentally ill and needed to be medicated. We appreciated his candor.
>
> But the medical staff’s primary mission is to keep costs low, and drugs for serious mental illness are expensive. Since James was supposed to go home in a few months anyway, they didn’t give him his meds. You can guess what happened: James began to spiral into insanity, and he was sent to solitary confinement.
>
> James’s struggles angered the staff. After one incident in solitary, he was stripped naked, beaten, and thrown outside. It was January, and the temperature in the central Pennsylvania mountains was 10 degrees. An eyewitness told me that James apologized and asked to be let back in. He started crying after a couple of hours in the cold. Then he curled up into a ball and fainted.
>
> No guards were punished for what they did to James. Even if he’d reported it to the federal Bureau of Prisons headquarters, who would have listened to him? Would you believe a uniformed law enforcement officer or a mentally ill homeless man?

January 28, 2016

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Another act of petty revenge by USG: ten years after he disclosed the unconstitutional PSP to the NYT, whistleblower Thomas Tamm is suddenly facing disbarment for--- get this--- "ethics" violations. Yes, it seems the Bar Association has the curious idea that blowing the whistle on a huge Constitutional violation--- no-one in USG denies this is the case--- is a violation of ethics:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/01/ethics-charges-filed-against…
Ethics charges filed against DOJ lawyer who exposed Bush-era surveillance
David Kravets
26 Jan 2016

> A former Justice Department lawyer is facing legal ethics charges for exposing the President George W. Bush-era surveillance tactics—a leak that earned The New York Times a Pulitzer and opened the debate about warrantless surveillance that continues today.
>
> The lawyer, Thomas Tamm, now a Maryland state public defender, is accused of breaching Washington ethics rules for going to The New York Times instead of his superiors about his concerns about what was described as "the program."

Can't advise you, but maybe some else can help.

Another reason to donate generously to TP: once Tor Messenger gets out of beta, with more user donations TP may be able to set up and staff chat rooms dedicated to Tor support questions which cannot be easily blocked by third parties. I think this is one of those measures which would help a lot to "mainstream" Tor, but I also think the users will have to help make it happen by providing the "no strings" funding needed.

One of the more thankless needed tasks is cleaning up the website and marking or removing information which is hopelessly out of date.

January 30, 2016

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Further developments in the Double Standard for Leaking front:

Senator Cruz and most of the other US Presidential candidates are loudly calling for Snowden's head. The Bar Association is suddenly trying to disbar Thomas Tamm, ten years after he disclosed the unconstitutional PSP. The Obama era DOJ has filed for criminal charges related to alleged leaks (these charges typically would result in decades long to life prison sentences) than all previous administrations combined.

So what happens when a general leaks top secret information to his illicit lover? He loses his job, but he isn't charged with any crime. He is not even demoted--- which means he gets to keep his lucrative four-star pension (which amounts to double dipping, since he also is paid very handsomely in military-industrial complex corporate sinecures):

http://thehill.com/policy/defense/267609-pentagon-wont-demote-petraeus
Pentagon won’t demote Petraeus
Kristina Wong
30 Jan 2016

> Defense Secretary Ash Carter will not seek to demote retired Gen. David Petraeus for sharing classified information with his biographer, according to a Jan. 29 letter from the Pentagon to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).

Of course, Carter leaks to his favorite reporters all the time, and he is looking forward to enjoying his own post-governmental sinecures, so it's no surprise he is protecting one of his own kind.

A curious feature of the US Presidential race is that at least two candidates are probably constitutionally disqualified. Cruz does not meet the "natural born" requirement (he was born in Canada), and the FBI is leaking (to congressional allies) a bit of juicy gossip: Hillary Clinton is likely to soon be indicted on felony charges for exposing all manner of Top Secret information in her personal email server.

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/267524-gop-rep-f…
29 Jan 2016
GOP lawmaker: FBI ‘would like to indict both Huma and Hillary’
Mark Hensch

> Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) said the FBI likely has enough evidence right now to indict Hillary Clinton and her valued aide Huma Abedin, but that agency chief James Comey is being constrained.
>
> “I think the FBI director would like to indict both Huma and Hillary as we speak,” Issa told The Washington Examiner in an interview published Friday. “I think he’s in a position where he’s being forced to triple-time make a case what would otherwise be, what they call, a slam dunk."

(This kind of language usually indicates that the leaker is Comey himself, or a top aide.)

The political establishment will no doubt prevent the DOJ from actually indicting her, but can anyone doubt that anyone who did not enjoy her deep ties to Wall Street would be immunized from prosecution?

So what happens to the first US presidential candidate whose campaign is in some danger of being derailed by a criminal indictment for an electronic faux-paux? She gets endorsed by WaPo and NYT (two papers which are, needless to add, owned by billionaires, in keeping with virtually all remaining US newspapers):

blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/267608-new-york-times-endorses-clinton-kasich
New York Times endorses Clinton, Kasich
30 Jan 2016

Clinton aid Huma Abedin, who may be charged as a less immunized proxy for Clinton herself, is the wife of a former Congressman who was forced to resign after he sent some dick pics, so the Clinton camp is well versed in electronic impropriety (as in, "do it but don't get caught--- oops, we got caught, again").

February 01, 2016

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Ashkan Soltani, who has worked on cybersecurity for privacy groups, and later worked with Barton Gellman at WaPo on the Snowden documents, was hired in December as a senior adviser to WH CTO Megan Smith, in a move which was widely applauded by privacy advocates.

But in another act of petty revenge by proxy, the people who recently lost the official USG background check dossiers on all USG employees with security clearances have barred him from actually taking the job:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/02/researcher-who-helped-write-…
Researcher for Snowden journos leaves White House, denied security clearance
They won't say why, but White House personnel security sent Ashkan Soltani packing.
Joe Mullin
1 Feb 2016

February 05, 2016

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http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/feb/05/edward-snowden-us-govern…
US government jet lay in wait for Snowden in Copenhagen
David Crouch in Gothenburg
5 Feb 2016

> A US government jet was lying in wait in Copenhagen to extradite the whistleblower Edward Snowden if he had come to Scandinavia after fleeing to Moscow in June 2013, the Danish government has revealed. The twin-engined Gulfstream aircraft, which had previously been used to fly Abu Hamza to the US from the UK, landed shortly before the FBI called on Scandinavian police forces to arrest Snowden and hand him over for extradition.

The Guardian article does not identify the aircraft, but it is one of the most notorious of all the USG aircraft used for state-sponsored kidnappings:

http://registry.faa.gov/aircraftinquiry/NNum_Results.aspx?NNumbertxt=97…

I am sure many readers would be very interested to know the current location of this aircraft. The last flight for which a flight plan was filed may be a return to its home base KHEF (Mannassas Regional Airport, also the home base for many FBI spy planes) from EGGW in London, in Jun 2014 (a year after the USG's failed attempt to kidnap Snowden).