[tor-relays] Estimating the value and cost of the Tor network

[Moritz Bartl]

Hi,

Prices vary widely across different countries. We pay between $400 and
$1500 per Gbit/s per month in "popular and cheap locations". In a
scenario where we want to grow the network and at least keep the current
geographical diversity (or even grow it), we'd have to at least equally
strengthen less fortunate locations.

The list of the top 20 countries [0] contains countries such as Russia,
Poland, Norway and Hungary, where international bandwidth is quite
expensive. Hopefully someone from this list can help us compile or find
estimates for pricing per country. It would be interesting to learn the
prices even for mid-size (~50-100Mbit/s+) relays in any country outside
of the top five countries, even more so for crazy places that don't make
the top 20.

Another factor that we should not ignore is that, while it may be
possible to find a set of ISPs that allow mid-size exit relays, it gets
harder the more traffic you push, because of the additional workload
(and scariness) for the ISP from complaints.

[0] https://compass.torproject.org/

-- 
Moritz Bartl
https://www.torservers.net/