12 September 2011

Tor in Russia

Date: Mon, 12 Sep 2011 07:48:28 +0000
To: tor-talk[at]lists.torproject.org
Subject: Subject: Re: [tor-talk] Tor banned in Pakistan.

On 09.09.2011 23:39, Phillip wrote:

>>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/aug/30/pakistan-bans-encryption-software
>>>
>> It is very bad news because I am affraid that another tyrannical regimes
>> such as Russian can make do it too.
>> But it seems to me that Tor-users can use bridges and etc. for avoiding
>> repressive measures from "law enforcement bodies" of their countries (if
>> the termin "law is applicable to such bodies :) ).
>
> Sorry to burst your bubble, but Russia is one of the last places I can
> imagine banning VPN's and Tor, especially from what I gather from my
> contacts in Russia...

Russia is very strange country, very strange... Last time many not only tirannycal but also idiotical norms were included into the Russian legislation In the list of them are laws banned people younger than 18 to be in the streets after 10 PM, ones banned alcohol selling after 11 PM and etc. In the beginning of this year the press-service of the FSB notified that it needed by their opinion to ban the Tor and even the skype and the Gmail. The Kremlin refuted that information but we in Russian know that in means only they intend but scanning of society reaction.

I am  in doubt that they can do it.

It seems that the Russian government aspire to ban all things which able or unable to be ban. the FSB already has direct access to all Internet

> connection hubs (i.e. in an apartment building), completely by-passing
> ISPs and legal requirements!

Do you mean the so-called "SORM"-system? But as I know in the USA and in the European countries works similar systems ("Echelon" and etc.). Do you thinks that the SORM can break my tor connection and sneef my Tor-traffic in the unencripted view?

> Have you seen the Russian net? The amount of piracy (as well as Tor
> traffic!) that goes through there is staggering!

It seems to me that the Putin's and Medvedev's junta have no real interest in fighting with piracy because they have no incoming from the show-bussiness or that income is so small that the have no real interest. But there are many wild cries of Russian governmental  officials, owners and servants of private organisations works for the FSB and etc. like Kaspersky AntiVirus Lab and even of hierarch ot the Russian Orthodox Cherch across over all Russian press and Internet for banning the Tor and another anonymizing  remedies.

Sometimes ago the Live Journal became the mainest Russian oppositional informatinal playground. Because it, the Putin's junta gave order to their commercials to by the LiveJournal and ... they bought is!!!

Now the LiveJournal belong to the so-called name "SUP Company" which works for the secret services of Russia.

And it is so stange to me that the US Government permit that spying activity of Russian secret services in the US territory...

> Regardless of all of
> the capabilities, authorities are simply not interested in you unless
> you *really* step on some toes (and, hint hint, running a Tor relay or
> exit node hasn't drawn their wrath so far)... And if you do happen to be
> such a person, it is much easier to break your door down using existing
> laws (using the crackdown on pirate copies of Windows as an excuse, for
> example) than amending the laws to include VPNs!

For break a oneman's door they need to know that it is a door of that man. Simply talking, they must find where that man live.

As I can confirm the Tor helps us resolving that problem about 4 - 5 years and they - till the present time - cannot find locations of our friends through our friends' Internet activity.

If they can, it is more strange to me why our friends don't arrested or killed such long time.

> But you're definitely right about the danger of the capability to block
> VPN's - I thought it was restricted to China and other such extreme
> regimes. If they can break your door down *just* because they're seeing
> encrypted traffic, there's definitely a problem!

It is a real problem! If they intend to arrest all people using the Tor and etc. it could be very serious problem for fighters with regim and for all people of my poor country...

> Which, of course, doesn't eliminate false positives, like running
> Facebook with the https always option turned on, or gmail, or any other
> SSL-encrypted site...

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