[tor-bugs] #1912 [Tor Client]: Choosing bridges by bw is problematic

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#1912: Choosing bridges by bw is problematic
------------------------+---------------------------------------------------
 Reporter:  Sebastian   |       Owner:  nickm             
     Type:  defect      |      Status:  needs_review      
 Priority:  normal      |   Milestone:  Tor: 0.2.2.x-final
Component:  Tor Client  |     Version:                    
 Keywords:              |      Parent:                    
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Comment(by nickm):

 {{{
 17:35 < nickm> Sebastian: Are we moving at all towards a resolution for
 1912
                IYO?  Is the max-believable-bandwith for bridges low
 enough?
 17:39 < Sebastian> nickm: hm. I still think my branch is what we should
 merge.
                    I don't really understand why arma thinks we should
 close as
                    wontfix.

 17:41 < nickm> Sebastian: I think that armadev doesn't want unbalanced
 circuit
                assignment where high-capacity bridges wind up underused
 and
                low-capacity bridges wind up overused.
 17:42 < Sebastian> nickm: yeah, I do understand that. I think that's
                    unrealistic though, and actively hurts newly starting
                    bridges that might not be around for a long time.
 17:42 < nickm> I am concerned about the lie-about-your-bw attack
 17:42 < Sebastian> that too
 17:42 < Sebastian> We do cap it at 10mb, but that doesn't mean much
 17:42 < Sebastian> because so many bridges have really low bw
 17:43 < nickm> Also, since we distribute bridges uniformly (rather than by
                bandwidth) I am not sure we are doing balancing at all well
 17:44 < Sebastian> nickm: yeah. I think our usual bw ranking stuff fails
 here.
 17:45 < nickm> Sebastian: So one solution could be to have a lower
                MAX_BELIEVABLE_BANDWIDTH for bridges, and also a
                MIN_BELIEVABLE_BANDWIDTH for bridges.
 17:47 < Sebastian> nickm: hm, yeah. Maybe my intuition is way off, but I
 feel
                    like the case where we have more than very few options
 for
                    bridges is rare
 17:56 < Sebastian> nickm: So I guess what I meant to say with that last
 comment
                    is that I'm not sure that is worth the complexity.
 17:59 < nickm> Sebastian: maybe the right answer is to do the weighting in
 the
                bridgedb.
 18:00 < Sebastian> yeah, I thought about that too.
 18:01 < Sebastian> It does seem like that would be the right approach.
 18:01 < nickm> Okay if I copy-and-paste this conversation into the 1912
                discussion?
 18:03 < Sebastian> Yeah. Feel free to always copy stuff from me from irc.
 }}}

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Ticket URL: <https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/1912#comment:9>
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