[tor-bugs] #22399 [Applications/Tor Launcher]: Tor launcher third-party censorship circumvention tools support

[Tor Bug Tracker & Wiki]

#22399: Tor launcher third-party censorship circumvention tools support
---------------------------------------+-----------------------
 Reporter:  iry                        |          Owner:  brade
     Type:  project                    |         Status:  new
 Priority:  Medium                     |      Milestone:
Component:  Applications/Tor Launcher  |        Version:
 Severity:  Normal                     |     Resolution:
 Keywords:  ux-team                    |  Actual Points:
Parent ID:  #21951                     |         Points:
 Reviewer:                             |        Sponsor:
---------------------------------------+-----------------------

Comment (by iry):

 Two common way a censorship circumvention tools can work with Tor:

 1. The censorship circumvention tools, for example a VPN, will handle all
 the traffic generated by Tor automatically.

 2. The other case is that the censorship circumvention tools, for example
 Lantern, Psiphon3 or Shadowsocks, will open a HTTP/Sock port(s) as an
 interface, listening the traffic coming from Tor.

 In the first case, users can simply click the "connect" button on the Tor
 Launcher and the censorship circumvention tool will help Tor bypass the
 Tor censorship. However, the current instruction ask users whether they
 would like to "make a direct connection to the Tor network". People who
 use a VPN may not think they are connecting to the Tor network "directly".
 So the instruction seems to be a little be misleading.

 In the second case, users need to configure the proxy setting on Tor
 launcher to use the interface provided by the third-party censorship
 circumvention tools. In this case, things are a little bit complex. The
 current instruction asks users if their connections to the Tor network are
 censored. If so, they will be guided to use a Tor bridge or some
 pluggable-transports. However, in heavily censored area, those tools may
 not be very effective. Therefore, it would be better to provide some
 instruction for users in heavily censored area on how to configure Tor to
 use some third-party censorship circumvention tools.

--
Ticket URL: <https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/22399#comment:1>
Tor Bug Tracker & Wiki <https://trac.torproject.org/>
The Tor Project: anonymity online