Tor, is a network that relies on a system known as onion routing. Onion routing was invented in the mid 90s, and is the backbone of what many call the dark or deep net. This technology uses a basic concept to obscure users identity and helps provide an anonymous experience. This might come as a surprise to many, but this technology was initially funded and created by the US government. In this article we will look at everything Tor related, from its history, to how it works.
Tors History
The history of Tor, or more specifically Onion Routing, started in the mid 90s, at the United States Naval Research Laboratory. Two researchers were tasked with creating a new way to protect government communications. The researchers came up with the idea of encrypting data in multiple layers. The layers of encryption resembled the layers of an onion, which is where the name came from.
Onion routing was used by the government for years, but was never made public. Tor itself would first be developed in 2002, with the first public version coming a year later. Tor implemented the same onion routing concept used by the government.
How does tor work?
Using tor is a simple as downloading the tor browser, and connecting to a tor network. Some regions require the use of Tor bridges because of internet restrictions. Bridges can be easily enabled through the settings.
Tor achieves near complete user anonymity by obscuring your ip, and sending all your traffic through multiple… layers. There are thousands of tor nodes, that host and encrypt user traffic. A tor user connects to 8 random nodes in series every time. Data has to be encrypted while passing through each node one by one. If the user is at any point compromised, only the last node will be exposed.
Think of it like connecting to a vpn, then through that vpn connecting to another one and so on 8 times. The benefits of this is that data is encrypted multiple times, one for every node. It also means that to get access to your IP one has to compromise 8 nodes which is near impossible.
How safe is the Tor network?
Use of VPNs is always recommended when connecting to Tor. It is common knowledge that internet providers and governments can pay extra attention when accessing tor. Other than that. directly tracking Tor users is near impossible. There are a few ways that javascript plugins can expose your IP but most are blocked on tor.
The main threat for tor users are malicious exit nodes. Malicious exit nodes are rare but tend to appear from time to time. They are nodes hosted by bad actors, designed to sniff users data. This is especially an issue when a users exit node is malicious. This would be a much larger issue if it wasn’t for HTTPS encryption. These nodes are mainly designed to target onion addresses as they lack HTTPS support.
Is Tor Legal?
Despite the silly nature of this question, there are many people that infact believe Tor is illegal. This is completely wrong, as the use of Tor is perfectly legal withing the bounds of most countries. This might surprise many, but even accessing a dark-net market can be legal as long as no illicit transaction takes place.
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Conclusion
Tor has been around for over 20 years, and is a tool trusted and loved by many. Despite its plethora of illicit uses, Tor offers many unbeatable features for everyone. The ability to communicate completely anonymously cannot be underestimated. With the rise of wikileaks, some would even argue that onion routing is necessary for a proper democracy.
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