New Release: Tor Browser 10

by sysrqb | September 22, 2020

Update 1700 UTC 2020-09-24: After investigating the error seen by Windows users while playing videos on Youtube, a user helped us identify the cause. Until this is fixed in an upcoming release, a workaround is setting media.rdd-opus.enabled as false in about:config.

The new shiny Tor Browser 10 for Desktop is now available from the Tor Browser download page and also from our distribution directory!

Android Tor Browser 10 is under active development and we are supporting the current 9.5 series for Android until the new one is ready. We are informed by Mozilla of any issues they learn about affecting the 9.5 series. We expect to release the new Tor Browser for Android based on Fenix in the following weeks.

Tor Browser 10 ships with Firefox 78.3.0esr, updates NoScript to 11.0.44, and Tor to 0.4.4.5. This release includes important security updates to Firefox.

This new Tor Browser release is focused on stablizing Tor Browser based on a new extended support release of Mozilla Firefox. Tor Browser 10.0 is the first stable release of the 10.0 series based on Firefox 78esr.

Note: Tor Browser 10.0 is the final Tor Browser series supporting CentOS 6. Beginning with the 10.5 series, CentOS 6 is not supported.

Note: In this release JavaScript is controlled by NoScript again. JavaScript was completely disabled on the Safest security level beginning in Tor Browser 9.0.7. The Firefox preference javascript.enabled is reset to true in this release. You must re-set it as false if that is your preference.

Give Feedback

If you find a bug or have a suggestion for how we could improve this release, please let us know. Thanks to all of the teams across Tor, and the many volunteers, who contributed to this release.

Full Changelog

The full changelog since Tor Browser 9.5.4 is:

  • Windows + OS X + Linux
    • Update Firefox to 78.3.0esr
    • Update Tor to 0.4.4.5
    • Update Tor Launcher to 0.2.25
      • Bug 32174: Replace XUL <textbox> with <html:input></html:input></textbox>
      • Bug 33890: Rename XUL files to XHTML
      • Bug 33862: Fix usages of createTransport API
      • Bug 33906: Fix Tor-Launcher issues for Firefox 75
      • Bug 33998: Use CSS grid instead of XUL grid
      • Bug 34164: Tor Launcher deadlocks during startup (Firefox 77)
      • Bug 34206: Tor Launcher button labels are missing (Firefox 76)
      • Bug 40002: After rebasing to 80.0b2 moat is broken
      • Translations update
    • Update NoScript to 11.0.44
      • Bug 40093: Youtube videos on safer produce an error
    • Translations update
    • Bug 10394: Let Tor Browser update HTTPS Everywhere
    • Bug 11154: Disable TLS 1.0 (and 1.1) by default
    • Bug 16931: Sanitize the add-on blocklist update URL
    • Bug 17374: Disable 1024-DH Encryption by default
    • Bug 21601: Remove unused media.webaudio.enabled pref
    • Bug 30682: Disable Intermediate CA Preloading
    • Bug 30812: Exempt about: pages from Resist Fingerprinting
    • Bug 31918+33533+40024+40037: Rebase Tor Browser esr68 patches for ESR 78
    • Bug 32612: Update MAR_CHANNEL_ID for the alpha
    • Bug 32886: Separate treatment of @media interaction features for desktop and android
    • Bug 33534: Review FF release notes from FF69 to latest (FF78)
    • Bug 33697: Use old search config based on list.json
    • Bug 33721: PDF Viewer is not working in the safest security level
    • Bug 33734: Set MOZ_NORMANDY to False
    • Bug 33737: Fix aboutDialog.js error for Firefox nightlies
    • Bug 33848: Disable Enhanced Tracking Protection
    • Bug 33851: Patch out Parental Controls detection and logging
    • Bug 33852: Clean up about:logins to not mention Sync
    • Bug 33856: Set browser.privatebrowsing.forceMediaMemoryCache to True
    • Bug 33862: Fix usages of createTransport API
    • Bug 33867: Disable password manager and password generation
    • Bug 33890: Rename XUL files to XHTML
    • Bug 33892: Add brandProductName to brand.dtd and brand.properties
    • Bug 33962: Uplift patch for bug 5741 (dns leak protection)
    • Bug 34125: API change in protocolProxyService.registerChannelFilter
    • Bug 40001: Generate tor-browser-brand.ftl when importing translations
    • Bug 40002: Remove about:pioneer
    • Bug 40002: Fix generateNSGetFactory being moved to ComponentUtils
    • Bug 40003: Adapt code for L10nRegistry API changes
    • Bug 40005: Initialize the identity UI before setting up the circuit display
    • Bug 40006: Fix new identity for 81
    • Bug 40007: Move SecurityPrefs initialization to the StartupObserver component
    • Bug 40008: Style fixes for 78
    • Bug 40017: Audit Firefox 68-78 diff for proxy issues
    • Bug 40022: Update new icons in Tor Browser branding
    • Bug 40025: Revert add-on permissions due to Mozilla's 1560059
    • Bug 40036: Remove product version/update channel from #13379 patch
    • Bug 40038: Review RemoteSettings for ESR 78
    • Bug 40048: Disable various ESR78 features via prefs
    • Bug 40059: Verify our external helper patch is still working
    • Bug 40066: Update existing prefs for ESR 78
    • Bug 40066: Remove default bridge 37.218.240.34
    • Bug 40073: Disable remote Public Suffix List fetching
    • Bug 40073: Repack omni.ja to include builtin HTTPS Everywhere
    • Bug 40078: Backport patches for bug 1651680 for now
    • Bug 40082: Let JavaScript on safest setting handled by NoScript again
    • Bug 40088: Moat "Submit" button does not work
    • Bug 40090: Disable v3 add-on blocklist for now
    • Bug 40091: Load HTTPS Everywhere as a builtin addon
    • Bug 40102: Fix UI bugs in Tor Browser 10.0 alpha
    • Bug 40106: Cannot install addons in full screen mode
    • Bug 40109: Playing video breaks after reloading pages
    • Bug 40119: Enable v3 extension blocklisting again
  • Windows
    • Bug 33855: Don't use site's icon as window icon in Windows in private mode
    • Bug 40061: Omit the Windows default browser agent from the build
  • OS X
    • Bug 32252: Tor Browser does not display correctly in VMWare Fusion on macOS (mojave)
  • Build System
    • Windows + OS X + Linux
      • Bump Go to 1.14.7
      • Bug 31845: Bump GCC version to 9.3.0
      • Bug 34011: Bump clang to 9.0.1
      • Bug 34014: Enable sqlite3 support in Python
      • Bug 34390: Don't copy DBM libraries anymore
      • Bug 34391: Remove unused --enable-signmar option
      • Bug 40004: Adapt Rust project for Firefox 78 ESR
      • Bug 40005: Adapt Node project for Firefox 78 ESR
      • Bug 40006: Adapt cbindgen for Firefox 78 ESR
      • Bug 40037: Move projects over to clang-source
      • Bug 40026: Fix full .mar creation for esr78
      • Bug 40027: Fix incremental .mar creation for esr78
      • Bug 40028: Do not reference unset env variables
      • Bug 40031: Add licenses for kcp-go and smux.
      • Bug 40045: Fix complete .mar file creation for dmg2mar
      • Bug 40065: Bump debootstrap-image ubuntu_version to 20.04.1
      • Bug 40087: Deterministically add HTTPS Everywhere into omni.ja
    • Windows
      • Bug 34230: Update Windows toolchain for Firefox 78 ESR
      • Bug 40015: Use only 64bit fxc2
      • Bug 40017: Enable stripping again on Windows
      • Bug 40052: Bump NSIS to 3.06.1
      • Bug 40061: Omit the Windows default browser agent from the build
      • Bug 40071: Be explicit about no SEH with mingw-w64 on 32bit systems
      • Bug 40077: Don't pass --no-insert-timestamp when building Firefox
      • Bug 40090: NSIS 3.06.1 based builds are not reproducible anymore
    • OS X
      • Bug 34229: Update macOS toolchain for Firefox 78 ESR
      • Bug 40003: Update cctools version for Firefox 78 ESR
      • Bug 40018: Add libtapi project for cctools
      • Bug 40019: Ship our own runtime library for macOS
    • Linux
      • Bug 34359: Adapt abicheck.cc to deal with newer GCC version
      • Bug 34386: Fix up clang compilation on Linux
      • Bug 40053: Also create the langpacks tarball for non-release builds
Tags
tor browser
tbb
tbb-10.0

> I can't reproduce this. Are you still seeing this issue?

Yes. This is something very new to TB10, I have never experienced this issue on previous releases. Let me be clear, this is running TB10 on Linux, I am not using TAILS.

I can use DDG only via clearnet HTTPS but not via .onion. Something has changed. Hmmmm?

Anonymous

geeyp (not verified) said:

September 22, 2020

Permalink

Norton stopped the latest download of Tor Update 10, saying unsafe. Now I cannot even access Tor. Please advise asap.

Some antivirus software will pop up malware and/or vulnerability warnings when Tor Browser is launched. If you downloaded Tor Browser from our main website or used GetTor, and verified it, these are false positives and you have nothing to worry about. Some antiviruses consider that files that have not been seen by a lot of users as suspicious. To make sure that the Tor program you download is the one we have created and has not been modified by some attacker, you can verify Tor Browser's signature. You may also want to whitelist certain processes to prevent antiviruses from blocking access to Tor Browser.
—support.torproject.org

By the way, you can be updating automatically from within Tor Browser, if you aren't already.

Anonymous

Nancy (not verified) said:

September 22, 2020

Permalink

The browser up date was interrupted by my computer crashing due to printing a document. When I restarted the computer I can no longer open up Tor. I have tried many things including a backup restore. My question is, if I download the newest version of Tor, will it delete my bookmarks, etc. I really don't want everything gone. I can not find where to upgrade the browser bundle.

This has happened to me before. When the computer crashed it corrupted omni.ja or addonStartup.json.lz4 if I remember correctly, preventing the browser from starting. Also what happens frequently is, the browser opens but comes up with half the stuff not loaded and requires a second load to open correctly, though this is a long standing issue.

Tor Browser is based on Firefox, so for things like bookmarks that aren't related to Tor, search for how to solve it in Firefox.

For your problem,

  1. With Tor Browser closed, backup (copy) your places.sqlite file, which contains your bookmarks, to a directory (folder) outside of your Tor Browser directory. It is found in the directory where you installed Tor Browser. For example, /tor-browser_en-US/Browser/TorBrowser/Data/Browser/profile.default/
  2. If you don't have your installer for 9.5.4, download it from https://archive.torproject.org/tor-package-archive/torbrowser/9.5.4/ Choose the correct installer for your OS, architecture (64 or 32 bit), and language. You might need 9.5.4 because your places.sqlite file might work only with 9.5.4.
  3. At this point, you could try one of two things. Either you could try installing 9.5.4 over your existing Tor Browser directory, which will overwrite files essential to run Tor Browser, or you could delete your existing Tor Browser directory and install a new clean copy of 9.5.4.
  4. Next, open Tor Browser. Configure it if necessary. Do you see your bookmarks in the browser? You might see them if you tried to install over your existing installation.
  5. If your bookmarks are not there, close Tor Browser as quickly as possible. Do not open the browser just yet because it might start updating to 10.0 when you open, and your places.sqlite file might work only with 9.5.4. Copy your backup of places.sqlite into your Tor Browser directory, overwriting the places.sqlite that is there. Then, open Tor Browser. You should see your bookmarks in the browser now.

If you installed 9.5.4 over your existing installation, then once Tor Browser is running and you see your bookmarks in the browser, I strongly suggest that you properly export your bookmarks to an HTML file as explained here https://support.torproject.org/tbb/export-and-import-bookmarks/ and write down any "etc." things as you said in your post. Then, delete your existing Tor Browser directory. Install a new clean copy of 10.0. And finally, import your HTML bookmarks into your new clean 10.0.

Pro tip: Always backup (export) your bookmarks and custom settings before you update in case something breaks in the process of updating.

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 22, 2020

Permalink

I updated, but it says "The bookmarks and history system will not be functional because one of Tor Browser's files is in use by another application. Some security software can cause this problem." I also can't browse on Tor anymore, and it always says "Secure Connection Failed An error occurred during a connection to [site]. security library failure. Error code: SEC_ERROR_LIBRARY_FAILURE"

Please help with the fix?

> "The bookmarks and history system will not be functional because one of Tor Browser's files is in use by another application. Some security software can cause this problem."

Possible solution:
https://blog.torproject.org/comment/289228#comment-289228
But that problem continued in 9.5.4 and 10.0, so this Tor blog post needs a note added to it.

Exactly this error is happening on my system. I've restarted and tried reinstalling TOR but it's made no difference. Started to happen following the update. TOR was working ok before the update.

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 22, 2020

Permalink

Starting with Tor Browser 10 on Ubuntu NoScript is now preventing videos from playing if they are visited directly e.g. https://example.com/video.mp4

NoScript ignores any attempt to allow the media to play and changing Tor Browser's security level has no effect.

This seams to only apply to directly linked media from a remote server, embedded media still play normally, and local files also play normally.

Just to add to this. Directly visited videos seem to briefly start playing before showing the NoScript blocked icon. Seems counterintuitive? Though this is not a new thing.

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 22, 2020

Permalink

media.videocontrols.picture-in-picture.enabled; true

Picture-in-picture blue icon appears over the right side of videos played in safer mode. It never appeared in older versions. None of the bugs reference it. Is picture-in-picture considered safe now, or was it overlooked in this release?

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 22, 2020

Permalink

You removed Enhanced Tracker Protection and DNT options from normal Firefox browser. This is very bad, allowing anyone to distinguish Firefox+Tor or TorBrowser.

Add back ETP like normal Firefox has.

Sysrqb, thanks for commenting. The first part of his request is actually valid, please don't dismiss it by rightfully faulting his last words.
TorBrowser has the User-Agent of Firefox, so by design it needs to blend in with the Firefox signatures. If now TorBrowser differs more (like he claims), it needs to be investigated and addressed ASAP. Would you be so kind to open the ticket for the issue?
Thanks.

When experienced users of Tor Browser talk about distinguishing, it's usually in comparison to other users of Tor Browser. It is definitely not in comparison to normal web browsers because those are not designed to remain as identical as possible, and they start their traffic on the regular Internet. When you customize options like those compared to other users in the Tor network, you don't protect yourself from trackers. You make your Tor Browser more distinguishable from other Tor Browsers. Remember, Tor Browser does not operate starting on the regular Internet but through the Tor network. Tor Browser is designed to attempt to blend in with all of the other Tor Browsers coming out of the exit nodes as you are at the same time.

DNT: https://blog.torproject.org/comment/283701#comment-283701

Enhanced Tracking Protection is a third-party blocklist managed by Disconnect.me:
https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2019/06/04/firefox-now-available-with-enh…
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/enhanced-tracking-protection-firef…
https://2019.www.torproject.org/docs/faq.html.en#TBBOtherExtensions
https://2019.www.torproject.org/projects/torbrowser/design/#philosophy

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 22, 2020

Permalink

Disable:

Always check if Tor Browser is your default browser
Recommend extensions as you browse
Recommend features as you browse
Show alerts about passwords for breached websites
Prevent accessibility services from accessing your browser

Anonymous

kniebolo (not verified) said:

September 22, 2020

Permalink

XML Parsing Error: undefined entity
Location: chrome://browser/content/browser.xhtml
Line Number 1317, Column 7:

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

Permalink

Updated from 9.5.4 and browser no longer connects to the port set with TOR_CONTROL_PORT environment variable. Why is there no documentation of this change and how do I fix it?

Anonymous

Mark (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

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On Windows 10, it's not possible to load any website. Absolutely everything returns the "Secure Connection Failed" error.

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

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fullscreen mode of tube shows the real screen resolution, the letterboxing function doesn't work at this case.

Anonymous

JohnDoe (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

Permalink

Hello, it's not possible to post in the tails blog post however the title is wrong it says version 4.10 instead of 4.11, I hope any admin who sees my message will fix this.

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

Permalink

We have detected that you have connected over Tor.There appears to be an issue with the exit node...
I get this massage constantly while using DDG Onion.
Is that a problem of DDG?
I am using the latest android version.

Does anybody else gets this message?

Anonymous

alexander1 (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

Permalink

How do you get wayland to work? Seems to be x11 by default.

MOZ_ENABLE_WAYLAND=1 doesn't help

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

Permalink

Letterboxing appears to still be producing temporary window sizes that don't comply to the divisible by 100 rule. For example while resizing a window, width and height can be all over the place. I expect this to leak information about the window manger in use.

Similar temporary sizes are produced when using "Find in This Page" (Ctrl+F), window menu (Alt), "Full Screen" (F11), or "Developer Tools". 

  1. <br />
  2. window.onresize = function() {<br />
  3.   document.body.innerHTML += "<br />" + Date.now() + ": " + window.innerWidth + " / " + window.innerHeight;<br />
  4.   window.scrollTo(0, window.scrollMaxY);<br />
  5. };<br />

I run your js code on a localhost apache2 server. Interesting values all quite over the place:
1601986376300: 900 / 700 <- pressing strg+f
1601986395300: 900 / 676
1601986395300: 900 / 611
1601986395400: 900 / 608
1601986395400: 900 / 602
1601986395400: 900 / 600
1601986451800: 900 / 599
1601986451800: 900 / 598
1601986451900: 900 / 600
1601986451900: 900 / 598
1601986451900: 900 / 600
1601986452100: 900 / 599
But I'm not sure how this could reveal the window manger in use.

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

Permalink

Google and YouTube display a pop-up on European exit nodes for Alphabet Inc. privacy switches. Those links open new tabs to other Alphabet domains where the switches are. Will customizing those switches backfire and identify us across domains? Does Tor Project recommend users avoid those switches, or do the default preferences in Tor Browser nullify that possibility of backfiring?

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

Permalink

Picture-in-picture isn't working for me on macOS and linux. The button shows up (except on YouTube) and it expands when I hover over it but clicking does nothing. Is this known/is this supposed to happen?

Anonymous

Johnny (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

Permalink

One more thing to take care of. When Android version is released, make sure that intl.locale.requested and intl.accept_languages are set to default values or can be changed and stay changed. That's something currently Fenix nightly won't do.

Anonymous

anonymous (not verified) said:

September 23, 2020

Permalink

just a heads-up; bug when browser is set to "Safest," javascript.enabled is still set to true in about:config. Tor Browser 10, non-alpha, linux

Yes, that was this note:
"""
Note: In this release JavaScript is controlled by NoScript again. JavaScript was completely disabled on the Safest security level beginning in Tor Browser 9.0.7. The Firefox preference javascript.enabled is reset to true in this release. You must re-set it as false if that is your preference.
"""

Anonymous

invalid (not verified) said:

September 24, 2020

Permalink

What´s up with https-everywhere?
It may be in a built-in addon in omni.ja now, but it doesn´t work apparently. So many sites now open as http and you have to manually change them to https and there´s nothing indicating https-everywhere is present, which also mean you can´t force encryption. Tried Tor 9.54 with https-everywhere removed and that works exactly the same way. So https-everywhere seems not to work in Tor 10. Also tried to install https-everywhere manually but it is being removed and the xpi-file gets deleted.

Anonymous

Trump (not verified) said:

September 24, 2020

Permalink

I can't remove HTTPS Everywhere since this new version, is there a reason to prohibit its removal? please add that option, I just removed NoScript tho.

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 24, 2020

Permalink

Browser size is not rounding properly, it's slightly off both in width and height (x99 or x98 instead of x00). I've tested this with various sites, including AmIUnique and TorZillaPrint, and compared it to 9.5.4 release which is always rounded to multiples of 100.

AmIUnique also reports that my canvas is unique. The displayed canvas is not just white anymore like in previous releases but filled with RGB lines.

I've tried running a fresh copy of the browser as well (i.e. not upgraded from older release but unpacked from tarball), and the issues persist. I'm not sure if it's safe to use the new release in terms of anonymity anymore, so I'd appreciate an answer from the team.

Anonymous

Anonymous (not verified) said:

September 24, 2020

Permalink

Have you considered incorporating something similar to LocalCDN (but better), so people can use safest mode but also have websites work correctly? Thank you for this great release!