People still use tor? There are a ton of negative articles about it
I’m willing to do this but frankly tor intimidates me big time. I don’t know anything about it other than……. Yep that’s it.
I read through the mastodon post, and the project page, and cumulatively I didn’t get any answers that, like, make me feel better.
I assume this is a dark web node sort of thing? Is it safe for me to run the browser extension (idk shit about docker and don’t really want to learn rn), like I’m not putting a target on myself or anything? If yes to question 1, but no to question 2, what does put a target?
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Not a node, but a proxy. Entry node’s IPs in Tor are publicly known, so they are easy to censor. With Snowflake you create a proxy (bridge) between a censored user and an entry node, and since your IP is not listed as a node, you help the user bypass the censorship.
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In theory, nope. But if the user is doing something bad, a prosecutor could argue you helped them to do so. I don’t know about any case like this involving Snowflake, and I am not a lawyer. You could be a target if you were to host material, which is not the case with Snowflake.
In case it helps, I’ve been running the extension with no trouble that I’m aware of for a few years.
Thanks for this!
Well I spent the time between when I posted and when you replied looking into various things related to tor, legality, and snowflake more specifically, as well as a bit after your reply since you gave me a couple extra things to look into… (like if there’s a risk of running alongside self-host software like Plex and jellyfin, I didn’t find anything about it so I sort of assume it’s fine…?)…
I didn’t see anything overly bad other than if you yourself use tor, maybe, so took the plunge and… have had a whole two connections already, so yay, I’m a snowflake!
I feel slightly better about myself, like when I started using BOINC crowdsource computing for research in the early noughties. :)
ike if there’s a risk of running alongside self-host software like Plex and jellyfin
I don’t see why there should be any problem, as they use different ports. Plus I’ve had no troubles running a Jellyfin and Navidrome instances, plus some other self-hosted services alongisde Snowflake.
I’m really glad to have helped you :). Tor is very mystified, but an awesome tool, and very neat from a technical point of view. In case you haven’t seen them, I recommend these 2 amazing videos from Computerphile: How TOR works and TOR Hidden Services
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Or just install the browser add-on.
Ofc! But since this is the selfhosting community I figured the Docker thing would be more practical. My laptop with the browser isn’t always on.
