[tor-talk] !!! Important please read. !!!

[Mark McCarron]

Regards,

Mark McCarron

> Date: Wed, 8 Jan 2014 13:22:27 +0100
> From: a.krey at gmx.de
> To: tor-talk at lists.torproject.org
> Subject: Re: [tor-talk] !!! Important please read. !!!
> 
> On Wed, 08 Jan 2014 11:25:02 +0000, Mark McCarron wrote:
> ...
> > In regards to identifying Tor users, this is more simple than anyone imagines.
> 
> No, it isn't.
> 

Yes, it is.

> > A simple DB at an ISP recording IP addresses of those connecting to Tor nodes is all it takes.
> 
> Not all tor nodes are publicly known.
> 

Certainly, but for anyone not supplying Tor entry nodes, which would be the majority of users, it is all it takes.

> > In fact, the EU mandates that this data be held for 2 years:
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_data_retention#European_Union
> 
> No, it doesn't. The requirement is for access ISPs to log the association
> between user and ip addresses over time, and for email/voip providers
> to log all mail transfer/voip connections. Access providers are not
> required to log each individual TCP connection, and that would be needed
> for finding out even regular guard users.
> 

At a technical level, it is a two part system.  We have the unclassified system which records user's IP addresses.  Then we have the classified system (i.e. PRISM, Warrentless wiretaps, etc) which records which servers connections are made to.  When combined, this satisfies the EU mandate which as can be seen requires that "destinations" be recorded.

This is then combined with similar info from other nations providing a complete overview of connections.  When we add the "full take", they can then replay every data exchange.  When you add the crypto breaks, well...I think you can see where this is going...

They're crafty fuckers that way.  The know the public would never accept it.  The idea is to break it up into components so that seeing the big picture is difficult and speculative.  But its complete.

> > That data can be correlated with access to hidden services and other websites,
> 
> This, to the extent that it is actually true (namely that you can
> correlate the times a person is online with the times a given persona
> seems to interact with a webservice), is valid for any possible
> anonymization network that provides interactive access to the web.
> 

No, its not.  Traffic obfuscation techniques can eliminate the global view.  It just needs to be implemented correctly.

> > so we know for a fact that Tor is extensively compromised at present and provides no anonymity as it fails to deal with traffic analysis.
> 
> In a fully infiltrated network anonymous communication is impossible.
> So what are you aiming at?
> 

We need to improve Tor.

> Andreas