I run a relay 24/7, but sometimes also want to use Tor myself as a client. Until now, I've been using the Tor Button in my normal Firefox browser to switch in and out of Tor mode as needed, but now I see that going forward, the standalone Tor Browser Bundle is the only recommended way of using Tor as a client. How can I run the TBB on my system without interfering with my relay? When I just tried it now, the TBB brought up a second Vidalia instance which then tried to command my relay's existing Tor instance instead of spawning a second one for itself. This caused it to prompt for the relay's command interface password, but I cancelled out since I suspect that allowing the TBB to interfere with my relay's Tor process would lead to Bad Things, e.g. reconfiguring its options on the fly to a client-mode config and dropping all my users.
So... how do relay operators use Tor themselves, if they can't run TBB? Or is there a way to configure them to live safely together? Or have I misinterpreted the new TBB focus, and the relay bundles will continue to support use as a client in the future as they do now? I'm using Windows 7 if that matters, but I doubt it.
On 10/20/2011 09:30 PM, Rick Huebner wrote: [snip]
So... how do relay operators use Tor themselves, if they can't run TBB? Or is there a way to configure them to live safely together? Or have I misinterpreted the new TBB focus, and the relay bundles will continue to support use as a client in the future as they do now? I'm using Windows 7 if that matters, but I doubt it.
1. Configure your relay to allow SOCKS connections from 127.0.0.1
2. Run the browser (+ included extensions) from the TBB, but not Vidalia or the included copy of Tor.
3. Configure TorButton to direct traffic to the SOCKS port on your relay.
4a. Go to http://ip-check.info/ to verify your anonymity.
4b. Optional: use temporary firewall rules to verify that no HTTP[S] or DNS requests are leaving your machine. Remove temp rules when you're satisfied that all brower traffic is through the relay.
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/4192#comment:11
-----------------------------
This is how I route local browser traffic through a LAN-wide Tor relay:
$ diff config/no-polipo-4.0.js config/lan-tor-not-local+vidalia.js 77c77 < user_pref("extensions.torbutton.socks_host", "127.0.0.1"); ---
user_pref("extensions.torbutton.socks_host", "192.168.0.1");
81a82,90
user_pref("extensions.torbutton.custom.socks_host", "192.168.0.1"); user_pref("extensions.torbutton.custom.socks_port", 9050); user_pref("extensions.torbutton.saved.no_proxies_on", "127.0.0.1"); user_pref("extensions.torbutton.saved.socks_host", "192.168.0.1"); user_pref("extensions.torbutton.saved.socks_port", 9050); user_pref("extensions.torbutton.saved.socks_remote_dns", true); user_pref("extensions.torbutton.saved.type", 1); user_pref("extensions.torbutton.settings_method", "custom"); user_pref("extensions.torbutton.startup", true);
OK, never mind, I figured it out. The only points of conflict between my relay and the TBB are that the control ports and Socks listener ports for the two Tor instances both default to the same values. So I changed the ControlPort in Data\Vidalia\vidalia.conf to 9151 and added SocksPort 9150 to Data\Tor\torrc, and now the TBB runs alongside my relay without any issues.
It might not be a bad idea to change the default ports of one bundle or the other so that they don't conflict out of the box any more, or at least mention the need to change them in the applicable FAQs.
On Thursday, October 20, 2011 21:30:59 Rick Huebner wrote:
way of using Tor as a client. How can I run the TBB on my system without interfering with my relay?
TBB supports randomized socks port and control port configurations. I use it on a relay just fine.
These options are disabled on Windows due to some poor assumptions with Windows-based antivirus/firewall software. However, linux and macosx work fine by default.
'SocksPort auto SocksListenAddress 127.0.0.1 ControlPort auto' is all you need in your torrc
On Fri, Oct 21, 2011 at 11:17:13AM -0400, Andrew Lewman wrote:
On Thursday, October 20, 2011 21:30:59 Rick Huebner wrote:
way of using Tor as a client. How can I run the TBB on my system without interfering with my relay?
TBB supports randomized socks port and control port configurations. I use it on a relay just fine.
These options are disabled on Windows due to some poor assumptions with Windows-based antivirus/firewall software. However, linux and macosx work fine by default.
'SocksPort auto SocksListenAddress 127.0.0.1 ControlPort auto' is all you need in your torrc
In particular, you can do this from inside your TBB by going to the Vidalia 'advanced' settings window and clicking "Configure ControlPort automatically", and then restarting TBB. The checkbox secretly means "and socksport too".
This checkbox is checked already on OSX and Linux, as Andrew says. See also the reverse question at https://www.torproject.org/docs/faq#TBBSocksPort
--Roger
tor-relays@lists.torproject.org
-
Andrew Lewman -
Rick Huebner -
Roger Dingledine -
Steve Snyder