[tor-talk] Using Tor Browser without Tor?

[Patrick Schleizer]

Soul Plane:
> Is it ok to use the Tor Browser without Tor?

What do you mean by "ok"?
Ethical? Sure.
Legal? In most countries, where Firefox/Tor Browser is legal, this would
be legal as well.
Possible? Yes.
Useful? The more people doing it, the better.

> I don't need Tor but I like
> the privacy features that the browser offers.

I agree.

Even using Tor Browser for clearnet activities would make sense. It
wouldn't stop ISP level snooping, but people with dynamic IPs could
reduce tracking by commercial trackers (google analytics etc.) and this
has value in my opinion.

> Recently I noticed that if the Tor Browser is used without Tor and is set
> to manual proxy, but there is no HTTP/HTTPS/SOCKS proxy, name lookups will
> fail. I filed it as a bug here:
> 
> DNS lookup fails without proxy (TorBrowser without tor)
> https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/10808

Can you try the following please?

"Use Tor Button -> Preferences to set it Transparent Torification. Which
means, "no proxy" or in other words it means "use whatever the system
system provides".

(At least, Mike never answered me if Transparent Torification in that
context means something else.)

Also the TOR_SKIP_LAUNCH=1 environment variable (documented on
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/TorifyHOWTO/WebBrowsers for
Linux, probably useable for Windows as well) should be used here.

As well as the TOR_TRANSPROXY=1 environment variable might be useful.

> But it was closed as not a bug.

> If the Tor Browser is able to be used
> without Tor would you consider that a bug?

Not at all. As long as users are clear what they are doing.

Would be a great way to boost the number of Tor Browser users and
developers. Many users are interested to improve their browser
fingerprint, installing all sorts of add-ons, discussing this all over
the web forums.

It would be best if Tor Browser was maintained as general "privacy
browser", usable by clearnet/i2p/Tor/JonDo/Freenet etc. users.

Wouldn't be hard to strip Tor from Tor Browser or to make Tor optional
or to make the anonymity service configurable. I can't take
more projects, though.