[tor-talk] Darknets/science vs. GPA/LEA/Law, and playing dirty pool

[eliaz]

> On 11/8/2014 1:43:29 PM, Sam Pizzey (sam at pizzey.me) wrote:
> > On 08/11/2014 16:14, l.m wrote:
> > How's the presence of a
> > darknet running on Tor hidden services supposed to make me feel
> > anyway? That's your freedom being used to poison kids and evade
> > punishment.
> >
> On the contrary, it makes me feel that my freedom is being used to
> provide an environment where some of the damage done by people with your
> misguided viewpoint can be mitigated.

I can appreciate both views, but I wonder if it helps our understanding
of the problem to glom onto only one of these opposites. On the one hand
participating in Tor gives anonymity/freedom to people (many, I hope)
who use it for communal/good ends. But it also allows a few (I hope)
people to abuse it. Tor's a carrier, it's not its place to censor/judge
traffic. That's a is a function of the cops/courts and of society at
large. If by some horrible chance Tor had an internal monitoring
function, I don't know that I'd opt into judging any HS or user - I'd
probably end up obsessing over each individual case. I'd much rather
spend my time helping to make Tor more anonymous and free, leaving it to
the cops to chase those they think are miscreants. Of course I also have
to fight against the illegitimate use of police/state power. Such is
life. Just MO. - eliaz