[tor-talk] TBB as user debian-tor

[unknown]

On Fri, 14 Oct 2011 12:00:15 +0200
Marco Bonetti <sid77 at slackware.it> wrote:

> ----- Original Message -----
> > it's files to debian-tor with: chown -R debian-tor tor-browser_en-US/
> maybe "chown -R debian-tor:debian-tor tor-browser_en-US/" should be a little better

Mixing permissions from "local-browser-tor" from TBB and "global-system-debian-package-tor"
seems to be an unnecessary confusion.

> > xhost + & sudo -u debian-tor /tor-browser_en-US/start-tor-browser
> as already pointed out, "xhost +" is a bit too wide open, try with "xhost local:" to accept only localhost X11 connections
> 

It's still too broad permission: any user from localhost can connect to Xserver
In xhost command username can be specifyed. IMHO it's still a dangerous way.


Debian/Linux/(other Unix-like) has two choices now:

1. Officialy recommended: use TBB as is, starting from start-tor-browser.sh,
with Vidallia and "local-tor with-users-rights" -- from your own username.

2. Risky and complex if configured mistakenly: also use start-tor-browser.sh
but just to start TBB-FF (avoiding new restrictive measures), then kill -9
Vidallia and local Tor and use firewall to send your traffic to system-tor.

2-nd point is actual if you use different tor profiles, transparently anonimyzing
(with iptables + system tor), anonymizing routers, virtual machines, parallel running
separated X-sessions, global SELinux policies, etc.

I trying discuss it before: 

https://lists.torproject.org/pipermail/tor-talk/2011-October/021739.html

You can follow this tread and find working solution.

Use it at your own risk!

Will be better if TBB provide officialy options for using 
system Tor-daemon for Linux users.

Self-made measures is the best way to "shoot yourself in the foot", 
but very restrictive and rigide ways to use current TBB
 are "unix-unfriendly" overmuch.

I think some secure, officially adopted, broadly tested tradeoff between advanced 
and unexperienced using of Tor in Unix-like is needed.

First step may be an option (non-default) in some config to start T-Browser without 
 bundling it to local Tor and Vidallia. 

I hope that developers finds a way to give users a choice for experimenting
even though this choice is potentialy way to "shoot yourself in the foot".