[tor-dev] GSoC: Implement consensus diffs

[Ian Goldberg]

On Tue, Apr 22, 2014 at 05:02:23PM +0200, Daniel Martí wrote:
> Hello everyone,
> 
> My name is Daniel and this summer I'll be working on consensus diffs
> [0], heavily based on proposal 140 [1]. This should allow for quicker
> and scalable consensus udpates, which will have more weight as the
> consensus grows larger. I've never gotten involved in Tor before, so I'm
> really looking forward to this summer.
> 
> My intention is to use a simplified ed format as described on proposal
> 140, but I am open to alternatives and suggestions. As far as the diff
> creation algorithm, I plan on using a dynamic programming algorithm for
> the Longest Common Substring problem. Like before, comments are very
> welcome.

The proposal (140) doesn't appear to discuss the client
fingerprintability aspect of this: they reveal the last time they used
Tor (if recentish).  Say you're a mobile client that gets a dynamic IP
address.  With this, you reveal that you probably aren't or maybe are
the same person that was last seen over there at that particular time.

What are the implications here?
-- 
Ian Goldberg
Associate Professor and University Research Chair
Cheriton School of Computer Science
University of Waterloo