[tor-relays] Malicious Tor relays - post-analysis after two months

[Georg Koppen]

Mike Perry:
> On 10/3/20 6:38 AM, nusenu wrote:
>>> Me and several tor relay operator friends have questions about
>>> Malicious Tor exit nodes. How do you define a node as malicious ?
>>
>> In the particular case (at least the initial detection): Traffic manipulation at the exit relays.
>>
>>> How bad is the situation now ?
>>
>> This group [1] is still rather active and at this point they run a 3 digit number
>> of relays, but it is not the only malicious group that is active on the Tor network and
>> might not even be the group I worry about the most.
>>
>> [1] https://medium.com/@nusenu/how-malicious-tor-relays-are-exploiting-users-in-2020-part-i-1097575c0cac
>>
>>> Is there any other risk than ssl
>>> striping ?
>>
>> I think so, yes.
>> The good thing about ssl-stripping attacks is, that it is easy
>> to protect against and easy to detect (if you are aware). The catch is that
>> most users are probably not aware.
>> So when compared with all other types of attacks that malicious relays can perform,
>> ssl-stripping is probably not the biggest worry.
>>
>>> After the long
>>> discussion on the tor relay mailing list, what will be implemented as
>>> a solution ?
>>
>> As far as I can see, nothing will change/be implemented in the near future
>> at the Torproject or Tor directory authority level.
>>
>> for Roger's (long term) plan see:
>> https://gitlab.torproject.org/tpo/metrics/relay-search/-/issues/40001
>> linked from
>> https://blog.torproject.org/bad-exit-relays-may-june-2020
>>
>>
>>> * is there / will there be things
>>> implemented as a conclusion of the "call for support for proposal to
>>> limit large scale attacks" ?
>>
>> Nothing came out of that thread.
>>
>>> * has it been possible to prepare / set
>>> up precautions to avoid this king of situation
>>
>> I don't think anything has been implemented to prevent or reduce the risk of this from reoccurring.
> 
> Unfortunately, our OODA loops[1] on all development and funding actions
> are devastatingly, catastrophically long. This is due in part to slow
> funding cycles, and in part due to an internal debate over Agile vs
> Waterfall methodology[2]. I am in the Agile camp. I believe that Agile
> will help us respond to things like this in hours, days, or at most
> weeks, rather than months and years. 

If one has folks working on the topic, maybe. But that was and is not
the problem here. We did not have a bunch of engineers who messed up
their Waterfall model. We had and still don't have (as of me writing
this mail) anyone being assigned to work on that.

So, Agile or whatever would not have helped us in that scenario.

Georg

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