Tor

Peter B. Collins Presents Journalist Yasha Levine

In the wake of a recent article on Tor1 your author received an e-mail from Shava Nerad, the founding executive director of the Tor Project. Putting aside certain rhetorical devices that have cropped up in this debate, like name-calling or guilt-by-association, let’s examine some of Shava’s points to see if we can take the conversation in a constructive direction.
Choosing Sides

In the wake of Ed Snowden’s revelations there’s been a litany of calls for the widespread adoption of online anonymity tools. One such technology is Tor, which employs a network of Internet relays to hinder the process of attribution. Though advocates openly claim that “Tor still works”1 skepticism is warranted. In fact, anyone risking incarceration in the face of a leveraged intelligence outfit like the NSA would be ill-advised to put all of their eggs in the Tor basket.

We have all heard by now of the massive surveillance being conducted by the NSA and other governments across the world. China is a well-known anti-privacy country and others have decided to also spy on their citizens’ social network activities amongst other things. The Internet censorship trends are getting pretty bad.

Press TV – October 5, 2013

New documents have shown that the US National Security Agency has targeted people using a popular service which protected the anonymity of Internet users.
Documents leaked by former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden have revealed the US spy agency has targeted users of The Onion Router (Tor) which helped web users keep business secrets and conduct research anonymously.