[tor-relays] Combined relay and hidden service, good idea or not?

[teor]

Hi,

On 9 Jan 2018, at 08:09, Tortilla <tortilla at mantablue.com> wrote:

>>> Yes, if the HS operator does not want to mask the HS location, then it
>>> is all good. For that purpose, I agree that the warning message should
>>> be changed.
>> 
>> Indeed. I run some public resources (e.g. torproject.org mirror) on a
>> public URL with a .onion site as well. Nothing is intended to be hidden,
>> I simply want the content of anything I mirror to be available to Tor
>> users without relying on an exit.
>> 
>> After an "abuse" report warning me that my hidden site is "leaking" its
>> location, my root robots.txt and a separate README file now both display
>> the public and .onion addresses with a note that nothing is intended to
>> be hidden. (I also appreciate the individual who sent the warning!)
>> 
>> On the flip side, to a new/naive hidden service operator the warning
>> could be useful as it may not be immediately obvious to someone just
>> dipping their toes in Tor as to why and how this configuration might
>> reveal their hidden service's real physical location.
> 
> Certainly!  I'm not new to Tor/HS and still got tripped up by this,
> especially seeing the issue as having been closed, not having realized it
> has not in fact been "fixed" and the only thing done was to add a startup
> warning.  The issue really should be re-opened.  It's not unreasonable to
> conclude that if the issue linked in the warning is closed that the
> warning is obsolete.
> 
>> I avidly dislike warnings appearing in my logs that I intend to ignore,
>> I would prefer to see this be controlled by a preference in torrc,
>> either by an option to disable the warning, or better, require an
>> explicit switch to be set before tor will act as both a relay and a
>> hidden service. By making a "allow both HS and relay function" switch
>> that is disabled by default, we could place appropriate comments in the
>> default torrc file which explain the risks.
> 
> Absolutely agree -- at least if the intention is not to fix the
> information leak.  Less careful HS operators may never even see the
> warning.  Tor should probably refuse to start without explicit permission
> to act as a relay while hosting a HS.

Please open a ticket in the Core Tor / Tor component of:
https://trac.torproject.org

Thanks!

T