[tor-relays] Running relays in universities? Exit nodes, perhaps? Please share your experience!

[Jordan]

I've had a similar experience at my university in the states. While they 
acknowledge overall public benefit, I was denied, citing the overhead of 
abuse complaints and "potential for subverting university firewalls" 
(their words...) as justification for rejection.

They did, however, note if I were to bring my own addresses, they might 
be able to convince the board of regents network administrators to 
announce my prefix and allow me to handle complaints on my own. They 
perceived my potential leveraging of university transit as exclusive and 
distinct (and more secure?) than polluting their precious (and largely 
unused) /16, and had no interest in granting a lowly undergrad access to 
their beloved sanctuary.

Best of luck!

On 04/17/2018 10:36 AM, Gunnar Wolf wrote:
> TL;DR - Have you got official permission to operate Tor exit nodes
>        	within an university campus/network? Relay nodes, even? Please
>        	share me how this permission was achieved! (or even if it was
>        	denied, please tell me!)
> 
> Hi,
> 
> I know this list is mostly technical in nature, so sorry for
> presenting a very different kind of topic here; I will send a very
> similar message to the tor-teachers list, but I believe the population
> of this list to be interesting..
> 
> I am trying to get my university's (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de
> México) OK to run an exit node from our campus' network. I currently
> operate one relay, am willing to set up some extra relays, and have at
> least one colleague in a different research institute with a relay of
> his own, but I believe we should aim for exit nodes.
> 
> Now, I don't want to set it up in a rogue fashion, as I'm sure that
> the university's NOC or CERT would not take long to get complaints and
> require me to shut it down. I have already made an official request
> for the permission to run an exit node and (as expected) it was turned
> down. Quoting (translation mine) the reasons for rejection,
> 
>     1. This assignation is not factible because the Tor network is not
>        compatible with the Acceptable Usage Policies of RedUNAM, being
>        this infrastructure oriented to the service of institutional
>        goals.
> 
>     2. While the Tor network can have reseearch purposes, due to its
>        nature and the hiding of IPv4 addresses and anonymous
>        connectivity, it is susceptible to be used by third parties from
>        outside the University with purposes conflicting with those
>        specified in item 1, without any possibility of control or
>        regulation from the University's part or from your project.
> 
>     3. Even more so: The Tor network, due to its definition and
>        structure, can potentially incorporate third people with
>        malicious or even delictive intentions, which would affect not
>        only the computers or networks in your Institute or all of the
>        University, but also networks outside the institution's control
> 
> So, I want to gather experiences from operators in different
> universities or research institutions. Which way did you have to
> argue? How hard was to get this OK? Did you ask a permission for a
> specific project, or as part of your networking infrastructure in
> general? Did you ask this before setting up the exit node, or as a
> "fait accompli" gathering not-too-ill results for a given time period?
> 
> Any help and pointers are welcome!
> 
> 
> 
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-- 
Jordan
https://yui.cat/