[tor-talk] Project Gutenberg

[mick]

On Thu, 31 Oct 2013 17:59:39 +1030
DeveloperChris <developerchris at rebel.com.au> allegedly wrote:

> Could exit nodes act as caches. I know that would introduce a number
> of issues including a compromised exit node revealing what was
> retrieved by that node (but not whom for) so if it was limited to a
> few popular 'safe' sites it could help alleviate those sites from
> some of the traffic burden.
> 

I think that might cause a few problems. Firstly, the obvious one of
definitions. Define "safe". Who gets to decide whch sites are OK to
cache and whch aren't. Definitions will vary according to the user's
location and the regime under which s/he lives (or the location or
regime under which the owner/operator of the relay lives.

Secondly, by caching (and thus later serving) data the relay ceases to
be just a neutral "common carrier" and moves into the realm of
hosting provider. I see lots of room for lawyers to get fat(ter) on the
back of legal argument about whether a relay providing a cached copy of
a document can be sued (for whatever reason). Look at the stupid
situation we already have where sites simply pointing to torrent
sites are taken down (while of course Google, which has fat lawyers,
doesn't get taken down).

Thirdly, the simple act of serving a copy from cache, rather than
transparently passing the request out to the end server, means that
the relay by definition is now intercepting Tor traffic (even if
only to "help" the end user).

Fourthly, the end user might not /want/ Tor to "help" in this way
(I wouldn't). What guarantee do I have that the Tor relay is giving
me exactly what I wanted and not some "tampered" copy. How can I
really trust a supposedly anonymous network which I now know to be
looking into my requests with a view to giving me a "better" or
"faster" service.   

And how would I cope with SSL?

Best

Mick 
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 Mick Morgan
 gpg fingerprint: FC23 3338 F664 5E66 876B  72C0 0A1F E60B 5BAD D312
 http://baldric.net

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