[tor-relays] Blog: How Malicious Tor Relays are Exploiting Users in 2020 (Part I)

[Igor Mitrofanov]

Is there anything Tor can do inside the Tor browser itself?
I would understand and support something as drastic as disabling non-HTTPS,
non-Onion connections altogether. When the user types a URL with no
protocol prefix, the browser will assume HTTPS.
This may break some websites, so a transition may be required. Such a
transition can start with a warning banner, proceed to a warning page, then
to a browser setting to enable it, and finally to disabling the capability
for good.

The above assumes there is much less benefit in running a rogue Tor exit if
the operator cannot see or alter the content it is relaying.

On Fri, Aug 14, 2020 at 1:25 PM niftybunny <
abuse-contact at to-surf-and-protect.net> wrote:

>
> https://medium.com/@nusenu/how-malicious-tor-relays-are-exploiting-users-in-2020-part-i-1097575c0cac
>
>
>    - There are multiple indicators that suggest that the attacker still
>    runs >10% of the Tor network exit capacity (as of 2020–08–08)
>
>
> And on this one: I trust nusenu who told me we still have massiv malicious
> relays.
>
>
>
> On 14. Aug 2020, at 19:12, Roger Dingledine <arma at torproject.org> wrote:
>
> On Thu, Aug 13, 2020 at 03:34:55PM +0200, niftybunny wrote:
>
> This shit has to stop. Why are the relays in question still online?
>
>
> Hm? The relays are not online -- we kicked them in mid June.
>
> We don't know of any relays right now that are attacking users.
>
> Or said another way, if anybody knows of relays that are doing any attacks
> on Tor users, ssl stripping or otherwise, please report them. I believe
> that we are up to date and have responded to all reports.
>
> That said, there is definitely the uncertainty of "I wonder if those
> OVH relays are attacking users -- they are run by people I don't know,
> though there is no evidence that they are." We learned from this case
> that making people list and answer an email address didn't slow them down.
>
> I still think that long term the answer is that we need to shift the
> Tor network toward a group of relay operators that know each other --
> transparency, community, relationships, all of those things that are
> costly to do but also costly to attack:
> https://gitlab.torproject.org/tpo/metrics/relay-search/-/issues/40001
> https://lists.torproject.org/pipermail/tor-relays/2020-July/018656.html
> https://lists.torproject.org/pipermail/tor-relays/2020-July/018669.html
>
> But the short term answer is that nobody to my knowledge has shown us
> any current relays that are doing attacks.
>
> Hope that helps,
> --Roger
>
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