[tor-dev] Anonymous Local Count Statistics Using PCSA - GSoC

[Aaron Johnson]

> These statistics not just tell about the user's country but also keep a
> track of unique IP addresses connecting from each country. This is
> needed so as to present more realistic stats. If we increment counter on
> any IP address instead of unique IP address then the statistics would
> also reflect  user(s) connecting again and again. If we don't count
> Unique IPs, we would have stats about per country usage rather than per
> country users. We could do much better and implement a way(as described
> by the OP of thread) that counts unique IPs at the same time preserves
> privacy.

It is true that this would count connections rather than unique IPs. However, Tor already infers the number of users by counting directory downloads and then adjusting that number based on  how many each user is expected to make. In addition, each user doesn’t necessarily correspond to a different IP because of NAT, and so counting connections may actually be more accurate.

Best,
Aaron