- tor-relays - lists.torproject.org

[Proposal] OnionCoin: Economic Incentives for Tor Relay Operators
by Gabx 01 Jun '26

01 Jun '26

Hello Tor relay operators, I'm Gab Virebent, a privacy infrastructure developer, and I've been working on an experimental cryptocurrency called OnionCoin that rewards Tor relay operators through a unique consensus mechanism. ## The Problem Running Tor relays costs money (bandwidth, electricity, VPS) but provides no economic return. This leads to: - High node churn (operators drop out) - Centralization risk (40%+ relays on Amazon/OVH/Hetzner) - Difficulty scaling the network sustainably ## OnionCoin's Approach: Proof-of-Relay OnionCoin uses "Proof-of-Contribution" consensus where block rewards are distributed based on: - 40% Stake (anti-Sybil, but logarithmic to reduce whale advantage) - 30% Tor Relay Work (bandwidth relayed for OnionCoin traffic) - 15% Bandwidth contribution - 10% Uptime - 5% Storage Key innovation: **30% of block rewards go directly to relay operators** who route OnionCoin P2P traffic through Tor. ## Node Identity via .onion Addresses Every OnionCoin node runs as a Tor hidden service: - Persistent cryptographic identity (Ed25519) - No IP exposure - Reputation tied to .onion address, not location - Economic stake provides Sybil resistance (min 10 ONC ≈ $100 at launch) ## Verifiable Relay Operator Identity (Critical Security Feature) Current Tor problem: relay operators are pseudonymous with no accountability mechanism. Bad actors can: - Run malicious exit nodes - Disappear and reappear under new identity - Sybil attack the network with multiple relays OnionCoin solution: **Blockchain-based operator identity** - Each relay operator stakes tokens (economic skin in the game) - .onion address = permanent on-chain identity - Reputation history is immutable and public - Bad behavior → stake slashing (Ethereum-style) - Good operators build long-term reputation → earn more rewards This creates: - **Accountability**: Exit node operators can be identified by their blockchain identity - **Sybil resistance**: Running 100 relays requires 100x stake (expensive) - **Quality incentive**: Good operators earn compound rewards over time - **Traceable history**: Community can see how long an operator has been active The .onion address becomes both your Tor identity AND your blockchain wallet. This solves the "who runs this relay?" problem without breaking anonymity (no real names, no IP addresses). ## Current Status - Prototype complete (Rust, MIT license) - Consensus logic implemented with passing tests - Tor integration (arti) planned Q3 2026 - Testnet launch planned Q4 2026 **Repository**: https://git.virebent.art/virebent/onioncoin **Release v0.1.0**: https://git.virebent.art/virebent/onioncoin/releases/tag/v0.1.0 (Signed with YubiKey Ed25519) ## What I'm Looking For 1. **Technical feedback**: Does this approach make sense? What are the risks? 2. **Pilot participants**: 10-50 relay operators interested in testing economic incentives 3. **Research collaboration**: Measure impact on relay uptime/bandwidth/churn ## Key Questions - Would economic incentives improve your relay operation sustainability? - What concerns do you have about mixing crypto with Tor? - What metrics would convince you this improves the Tor network? ## Contact **Email**: gabriel1(a)virebent.art **Website**: https://contact.virebent.art I'm happy to answer technical questions, discuss the consensus design, or hear why this is a terrible idea. All feedback is valuable. Thanks for running relays and keeping Tor alive. Best, Gab Virebent --- P.S. This is NOT an official Tor Project initiative. OnionCoin is an independent experiment to test whether cryptocurrency incentives can improve volunteer network sustainability. -- https://contact.virebent.art https://www.virebent.art https://archives.virebent.art

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Tor Metrics Country Error
by Diyar Ciftci 01 Jun '26

01 Jun '26

Good evening, One of my relays (azadisrvbasic) is being listed on tor metrics as being in the United States of America but it is in the United Kingdom of Gread Britain and Northern Ireland. Could this be corrected please. Kind regards, Diyar Ciftci https://diyarciftci.xyz

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relay not working 100%
by torgnole-relayed 01 Jun '26

01 Jun '26

Hi, I'm convinced that tor allows the needed strong anonymity on internet, and I want to contribute. I set up, as a newbie, a middle relay, in february 2026. I rode that a new relay needs to wait something like 80 days before running 100%, the time for the network to check it's liable. It is now running for months, and it is still not running 100%. I have rate-limited the traffic to 500KB/s as for the moment I'm using a low cost VPS. But it appears that it doesn't even reach 70KB/s (it is the best pike in the last days), and even more regrettable, it fell down to 10KB/s or worse since 2-3 days. It used to have 4 flags (Running, Stable, Valid, Fast) but I'm afraid it lose the Rapid flag in the last days. I really don't understand what's going on. Tor logs seem not to show anything helping. Nyx used to show thousand of "inbound" and thousands of "outbound", but rarely "circuits" or anything else (I have to say I understand nearly nothing in Nyx, as I can't find any tutorial explaining it deeply). Nowadays, Nyx shows thousands of inbound, but only a very few outbound, something like 20-30. Server dosen't seem to have failings. Tor version is 0.4.9.8. on linux relay is minotor (B438F0D3E2281C307B459DB2ABDDB48871D06C18) at https://metrics.torproject.org/rs.html#details/B438F0D3E2281C307B459DB2ABDD… VPS is on interserver.net (2TB/month). I can send logs or torrc if needed. So my questions are : - what's going on with my relay ? How is it possible it is still not running 100% ? - is the bandwidth enough for a middle relay, or should I opt for a bridge ? All the best,

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tor 0.4.8.x reaches end-of-life on 2026-06-01
by nusenu 25 May '26

25 May '26

Hi, this is a reminder that tor version 0.4.8.x reaches end-of-life on 2026-06-01, in one week from now. https://gitlab.torproject.org/tpo/core/team/-/wikis/NetworkTeam/CoreTorRele… kind regards, nusenu -- https://nusenu.github.io

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AROI Validation vanished due to ciissversion:3 on 1AEO Metrics
by ProSecureRelays 15 May '26

15 May '26

Hey there, is there any information out regarding the AROI-Status and the trasisition from ciisversion:2 to ciisversion:3? I was proud having it all setup, but then I followed the advice on creating an ed25519 key and added the proof in my github page. The setup was done correctly as far as I can see, however, this led to loosing my AROI Status :'( . I'm happy if someone sees my fault or has a clue what to do now to get the AROI back. Of course it would be easy to just revert the change to the contact info, but the must be a "Go-Live" when the ciisv3 is the desired value? Best regards, Joker P.S. What I also noticed - I have only one relay, but since I configured the ed-key, there was a notice in the tor log that MyFamily Descriptor is still needed aswell. [warn] FamilyId was configured, but MyFamily was not. FamilyId is good, but the Tor network still requires MyFamily while clients are migrating to use family keys instead. As with one relay, I didn't see the benefit, but added the fingerprint as desired with the MyFamily Option. The warning is gone since then. Additionally I also lost my "First-Seen" Date when doing the change to v3. But I heard this is already under investigation. Picture 1: Happy Family Cert is installed and valid. Picture 2: 1AEO stats claims missing ciisversion:2. Picture 3: On the Page from Nusenu (OrNetStats), I still see myself as verified, but the update rate is quite low. This reflects the data before the change.

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Reducing ContactInfo to the family ID level
by nusenu 14 May '26

14 May '26

Hi, since we have a significantly less cumbersome and much less error prone way for tor relay operators to self-declare their relay groups using the Happy Family design I was thinking about whether we actually need ContactInfo at the relay fingerprint level or if we only need it at family ID level? The idea: - only a single relay in a family publishes a ContactInfo that is valid for the entire family benefits: - easiers ContactInfo management for relay operatos not using configuration management, since they only need to update a single config - less redundant information in relay metadata that gets received and distributed by tor directory authority - significantly smaller onionoo details files downsides: - no "backup channel" in case software has Happy Family related issues - like we saw in collector/onionoo - less flexibility you want to have different contacts for different servers I do not expect that rust-based tor relays - that hopefully significantly reduce the number of tor daemons an operator has to run to make use of multi-core CPUs will take over the tor network soon. So this will remain a relevant question for the time being. This topic is limited to relays and not bridges until bridges fully support Happy Family. If there are no strong reasons for relay level ContactInfos I might implement the idea in a minor variation in ansible-relayor: only a single tor instance per server will get a ContactInfo torrc entry. The CIISS spec would also be updated to reflect that. kind regards, nusenu -- https://nusenu.github.io

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What's wrong with geolocation here?
by Dennis Bronk 13 May '26

13 May '26

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Quetzalcoatl relays - Loss of may exits with immediate effect
by Dr Remmiz 13 May '26

13 May '26

Hi, I thought I would write to let you know that I have just lost all my servers - all exit relays, that were part supported and sponsored by rdp.sh. They had very kindly supported and sponsored many of my exit relays over the past several years. Rdp.sh made the decision to drop all my tor exit traffic after repeated and numerous Spamhaus listings. These had recently been forwarded to their upstreams who are now starting to cut their lines. This is with immediate effect as of several hours ago - and instead of 760 exit relays, I shall now be serving only 160 exit relays. I apologize for this disruption in service, but unfortunately it is out of my control. I shall endevour to rebuild some of my server pool, but this may take some time, and finding someone to help sponsor some of the servers I run will likely be difficult, and finding such a good provider as rdp.sh was, will also I believe be difficult. If anyone has any suggestions which may help, I'd be happy to hear them. Thanks for utilizing my server pool over the years. Regards, Zimmer

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Tor-ddos project is now dead
by Chris Enkidu-6 12 May '26

12 May '26

On my last post to the group I mentioned a serious illness. unfortunately I should have said a terminal illness. I probably have a couple of weeks.Since my original post I really had no legitimate offer from anyone to take it over. Just a few time waster conversations that went nowhere. So as of now both tor-ddos and tor-relay-lists are down. Sorry to do this but I have other things to worry about and since only a limited number of people on this list know about it. Others can judge me however they like. Thank you for reading this.

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Re: Reducing ContactInfo to the family ID level
by DTMF dont.track.my.stuff 10 May '26

10 May '26

Hello together, thank you for raising the idea. As far as i understood - defining some kind of data attributes centrally which are unique on family level is causing more struggle in usability even if there could be a slight benefit in reducing the general payload. ////////////////////////////////////////// Single Point of Truth /////// I see a potential down side in the definition of the central point of truth. It could be one relay of the family. But when a single relay is holding that information and that relay disappears or is compromise, the information could be lost/altered. Are there any other location (non-torrc) where that information could be included. Maybe some functionality that could be added by the TOR-Project themselves instead of having workaround with third party specs like CIISS. ////////////////////////////////////////// Levels of relevancy /////// Furthermore i see different levels of relevancy. - FamilyID / HappyFamilyID Level - vServer Level (Multiple Relays) - Relay Fingerprint Level The ContactInfo (according to spec ciissversion:3) can contain also data attributes (hoster, ram, etc..) which are only relevant on Relay Fingerprint Level, or even vServer Level (multiple relays). That means when we will end up in a hydrid-state anyways. All relays would contain their specific (Relay Fingerprint Level ) data attributes in the ContactInfo field - only one relay would have have the additional information. I also like to understand which data attributes of ciissversion:3 you are specifically talking about. @NUSENU Is it only about these - that you want to markup centrally? (1) email: (2) url: (3) proof: Kind regards DTMS - dont track my stuff

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