[tor-dev] Crux: Privacy-preserving statistics for Tor

[str4d]

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str4d wrote:
> Vasilios Mavroudis wrote:
>> Hello,
> 
>> I would like to introduce our project "Crux", which enables the 
>> computation of privacy preserving statistics on sensitive data.
>> The project was developed at University College London (UCL) by
>> me, in close collaboration with George Danezis.
> 
> This is fantastic work. Haven't read all of your thesis yet, but
> it looks similar to the stats collection system that we ran for a
> while inside I2P, but with the privacy protections that I wanted it
> to have. Well done!
> 
> 
>> "Crux" was designed with Tor hidden services in mind (in
>> accordance with this 
>> <https://research.torproject.org/techreports/hidden-service-stats-201
5
>
>> 
- -04-28.pdf>
> 
> 
> Tor
>> Tech Report), but it can be applied on various kinds of data
>> (given an appropriate parser).
> 
> Excellent. I want to use this in I2P :)
> 
> 
>> It supports three statistics (i.e. mean, median, variance) and
>> its threat model is compatible Tor's (see technical document
>> below).
> 
> I will look into this, but I doubt there will be any
> insurmountable incompatibilities with I2P's threat model.
> 
>> Currently, we don't have a parser specific for the data
>> collected by the Tor relays, but we plan to keep adding
>> functionality.
> 
>> The source code can be found here: 
>> https://github.com/mavroudisv/Crux The theoretical background, 
>> threat model, security argument and technical details can be
>> found here: link <http://mavroudisv.eu/files/thesis.pdf>
> 
> 
>> Ideas, comments, feedback much appreciated!
> 
> Firstly: needs more docs. I shouldn't have to read your entire
> thesis in order to figure out how to run it :P The README is a good
> start, but the command parameters need clarification/definitions,
> and it is not at all obvious how the relays work. An XLS file is
> also mentioned without explanation.

I have now tried running the code, but the "unit test" run by
authority.py fails because bsbdb.btopen() returns an empty dict. I
don't know if this is because the table files are broken or because of
a local issue with my setup (I am using a virtualenv, but I get the
same empty dict when I try to open the tables manually outside the
virtualenv). I am not going to try and fix the latter on my own,
because bsddb is deprecated since Python 2.6, so you shouldn't really
be using it :) (But it must be something else, because I tried using
bsddb3 instead and that also returns an empty dict).

str4d

> 
> Secondly, you could probably simplify configuration by managing
> hidden service connections yourself. I believe the Stem library can
> do this? I2P has a python library that can be used to listen on and
> connect to I2P Destinations, with a socket-like interface.
> 
> It's not clear to me from your thesis whether you plan to merge
> the relay component into the Tor relay code (and have the Tor
> relays talk directly to the query processors), or have your relays
> running separately and interfacing with the Tor relays to fetch
> stats. This will potentially alter how it would be used with other
> networks. In I2P's case I'd imagine it would be easiest (in terms
> of usability by those setting up relays) to write an I2P plugin in
> Java that performs the relay role, but I wouldn't want to be
> duplicating a lot of logic that subsequently needs to be kept
> in-sync with upstream :)
> 
> str4d
> 
> 
>> Vasilis
> 
> 
> 
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> 
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