[tor-talk] GEOIP's

[Mike Fikuart]

Hi Group,

I am looking into the various files used by the OR’s and OP’s and would like to know more about the GEOIP file and use.  I have already seen in the dir-spec<https://gitweb.torproject.org/torspec.git/blob/HEAD:/dir-spec.txt#l1522> document that these GEOIP’s are created in the “Extra-info” document and relate to country codes for bridges and in turn was referred to the blocking.pdf<https://svn.torproject.org/svn/projects/design-paper/blocking.pdf> document, which went a bit further in the same vein.

The blocking.pdf (Design of a blocking-resistant anonymity system, Tor Project technical report, Nov 2006) suggests "the compressed GEOIP database is only a few hundred kilobytes”, but the geoip file on my relay is about 2MB.  Is this just because it is decompressed, now a much larger DB or is not the DB being referred to in the document?

The geoip file has 82,363 different Country Code entries listed.  What do they relate to, as this would far exceed the bridges and relays?

I seem to remember (but now cannot find the reference) that the geoip’s have been responsible for improving the routing of data or selection of relays for circuits.  Is this correct and how does this work?

I would appreciate an explanation or a point in the direction of the appropriate documentation, thanks.

Yours sincerely

Mike Fikuart IEng MIET

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