[tor-talk] DoS and TOR?

[Roger Dingledine]

On Wed, Nov 07, 2012 at 03:35:38PM -0500, Chris Smart wrote:
> Hi folks.
> 
> Disclaimer: The following question refers to website testing,
> vulnerability identification etc.
> 
> Please bare in mind that I am an end user and not very knowledgeable
> about internet security or so-called "white hat" activity.
> 
> While researching DoS activities, many people recommend LOIC.  I'm
> using Windows 7 and the latest Tor Browser.  How do I integrate LOIC
> and Tor?

I haven't looked in detail at the LOIC design, but:

a) If you're trying to send UDP packets (or anything other than correctly
formed TCP streams), it won't work because Tor doesn't transport that.
https://www.torproject.org/docs/faq-abuse#DDoS

b) If you're trying to open a bazillion TCP connections or something,
you'll likely end up DoSing the Tor network way before your target
site notices.

Or to phrase it more simply: "don't do that and also it wouldn't do what
you want."

--Roger