Silk Road forums

Discussion => Security => Topic started by: club on April 19, 2013, 01:26 pm

Title: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: club on April 19, 2013, 01:26 pm
As I understand it (and I may be wrong here) but the way Tor's hidden services URLs work is that it's kind of like it's own mini DNS system which is independent of the general Internet's DNS. I would assume if you had full access to Tor's equipment and data, you could determine the true IP of the hidden service URLs?

I don't know where the Tor people are located, but their contact phone numbers on their website are both American. So I'm assuming they are US-based. If that's the case, and LE has been very publicly open about wanting to take down SR, complete with US senators being very vocal about wanting it dead, why aren't LE trying to subpoena, or otherwise seize data from the Tor office which could lead to SR's true IP?
Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: Drks1ide on April 19, 2013, 09:20 pm
Maybe TOR runs of data center that is not in us . Just like pirate bay .  Phone numbers could be setup as a relay or voip.  Just because the US address and contact info does not mean its current or fully active.
Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: astor on April 19, 2013, 10:07 pm
As I understand it (and I may be wrong here) but the way Tor's hidden services URLs work is that it's kind of like it's own mini DNS system which is independent of the general Internet's DNS. I would assume if you had full access to Tor's equipment and data, you could determine the true IP of the hidden service URLs?

Hidden services publish their descriptors in a distributed hash table hosted by relays with the HSDir flag. These relays are run by volunteers in many different countries and they are not controlled by the Tor Project.

Even if you seized the servers, you wouldn't get the hidden service's IP address. In fact you wouldn't get any information that isn't already available to anyone who knows the onion address and makes their Tor client fetch the descriptor. You establish a connection to the hidden service through introduction points and rendezvous points. The hidden service builds three-hop circuits to the intro and rendezvous points, so it is protected.

You can read the details here: https://gitweb.torproject.org/torspec.git?a=blob_plain;hb=HEAD;f=rend-spec.txt

I don't know where the Tor people are located, but their contact phone numbers on their website are both American. So I'm assuming they are US-based.

Their main office is in Walpole, Massachusetts, but they have paid developers in several countries, and I think their servers are hosted near DC.


If that's the case, and LE has been very publicly open about wanting to take down SR, complete with US senators being very vocal about wanting it dead, why aren't LE trying to subpoena, or otherwise seize data from the Tor office which could lead to SR's true IP?

Because they would get no useful information.
Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: sweetbro on April 20, 2013, 03:22 am
its possible that the us government runs it and is making money off the international drug trade. they wont be seizing any logs. they will be hiding it from alex jones and jesse ventura. that female african american slueth on jesse's 'conspiracy theory' show actually interviewed a man in the dark about this. you couldnt see what he looked like.



Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: lokiju on April 20, 2013, 03:39 am
I'd like to know why MtGox isn't protected by TOR servers and can be attacked so easily (and has been attacked so easily)
Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: Drks1ide on April 20, 2013, 03:48 am
I'd like to know why MtGox isn't protected by TOR servers and can be attacked so easily (and has been attacked so easily)
Most likely the data center is on a clear net. 
Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: jase00 on April 20, 2013, 04:55 am
TOR isn't a centralized server running anywhere. The TOR network is made up from users. When you connect to TOR you connect to some random kind person who is running a TOR node, that then connects to someone else running a NODE etc etc and then you eventually get to your destination.
You could even setup your client to be a TOR node and then people would go via you to get to other TOR nodes, This is pretty good as it helps the network.

If you are really brave you could be an exit-node, but then people who access real websites will appear from your IP address so I would be careful with that.

And oh my god.. the word 'clear net' is so annoying.
Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: sweetbro on April 20, 2013, 05:03 am


And oh my god.. the word 'clear net' is so annoying.

we could try lightnet if you like.. as apposed to darknet.. up to you bud
Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: jase00 on April 20, 2013, 05:09 am
can't we just say website :)

Surely people can see http://www.blah.com isnt encrypted while http://dsfsdsdsdjfsisjedfewfwfsdfewfewwe.onion is
Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: MDUK on April 20, 2013, 06:28 am
This is a pretty dumb question.
TOR isn't a company, it's a decentralized network.

An equivalent question would be "why isn't LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Bitcoin HQ?".

The answer to both: Because no such place exists.
Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: kingghb on April 21, 2013, 05:15 am
I'd like to know why MtGox isn't protected by TOR servers and can be attacked so easily (and has been attacked so easily)

The site being attacked has nothing to do with it running as a regular web server. It's because it's a huge target for monetary gain.
Title: Re: Theoretical: why isnt LE trying to seize logs and equipment from Tor HQ?
Post by: thereefers245 on April 21, 2013, 05:23 am
its possible that the us government runs it and is making money off the international drug trade. they wont be seizing any logs. they will be hiding it from alex jones and jesse ventura. that female african american slueth on jesse's 'conspiracy theory' show actually interviewed a man in the dark about this. you couldnt see what he looked like.

I'm not sure if you're being ironic or not