[tor-relays] Legal Status of Relays Worldwide [was: kittens seized]

[Nagaev Boris]

On Sun, May 21, 2017 at 8:47 PM, grarpamp <grarpamp at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> That's actually why the torservers.net people suggest *not* using disk
>>>> encryption. Having no barriers makes it much easier for the police to
>>>> realize that there's nothing useful to them.
>
>>> This falling over may perhaps not be preferred by operators who like to
>>> create wins in the crypto war. You want police to go get their warrants,
>>> waste their time and money, just to prove nothing upon decrypt...
>>> then you have higher recorded, thus marketable, percent of nothing
>>> found among all forced decrypt cases. Instead of closer to 100%
>>> of such cases just confirming already forgone criminal cases.
>>> Having higher barriers and costs and demonstrably less fruit
>>> ratio can make such seizures more unlikely in first place.
>
>> Can they force an operator to decrypt, if he lives in other country
>> which is non-US and non-EU (e.g. Russia or China)?
>
> Depends if hosting country can extradite, or threat influence at
> things of value such as bank accounts, travel bans, people, etc.
>
>> Does it make sense
>> to run nodes in countries you don't live in or visit?
>
> If poor odds or afraid of such things, the farther distant
> and / or opposite legally, politically, logically and physically
> the better.
>
>> What happens if an operator themselves is anonymous?
>
> They lose the remaining hosting contract worth of bitcoin,
> get the account / card canceled, nym blacklisted, etc.
>
>
> For only running an exit / relay and nothing else...
>
> Policy / nuisance shutdowns by the hoster do happen
> often, nodes just move and redeployed elsewhere.
>
> Detainer for questioning, are rare, oops, you're free to go.
> Raids and confiscation, are rare, and property seems to be returned.
> Actual arrests / night in jail / charges, are even rarer, oops you're
> free to go.

Unfortunately rarer things happen. The ongoing case in Russia:
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/04/13/tor_loses_a_node_in_russia_after_activists_arrest_in_moscow/
"According to TASS, he’ll be held for two months pending investigation."

Recent update on the story: students of MSU petitioning in support of
Dmitry Bogatov during a public event in the university were asked to
leave the event. The text (in Russian):
http://newstes.ru/2017/05/20/studentov-sobiravshih-podpisi-v-podderzhku-matematika-bogatova-vygnali-s-dnya-fizika-v-mgu.html

It seems to be the first such severe case in Russia.

> Charges that go to court, are extremely rare.
> Probably no one has *ever* been convicted that we know of?
>
> Because only running an exit / relay and nothing else,
> seems to be legal everywhere. (If it is illegal somewhere,
> then the operator is at fault for breaking that law.)
>
> And traffic passing through relays seems to have "ISP style"
> legal exceptions everywhere, that even cover "torts", so long as
> operators are not in business of inspecting or moderating.
>
> Which is why everything above is marked "rare".
>
>
> If you know of places where...
>  a) relays themselves are illegal
>    or
>  b) ISP style exceptions do not exist
> ... you should definitely reply with such a list.
>
>
> Real problems are rare, and running relays is fun :)
>
> Legal environments typically apply equally so once
> you know your environment you can always add other
> overlay networks / services / nodes into to the mix
> if you're bored or have unused bandwidth in your contract:
> I2P, CJDNS, GNUNet, Freenet, Pond, VPNGate,
> XMPP / IRC, Remailers, Crypto Currencies, IPFS, etc...
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-- 
Best regards,
Boris Nagaev