Hi, We are currently having a discussion over at torservers.net on whether it is wise to offer hidden service hosting. Most people don't have a server, they use free email or pay for cheap webhosting. The barrier to create hidden services is quite high. I feel that the Tor network could definitely use an ISP who offers hidden services hosting. My idea was to use a separate, disk encrypted virtual machine for hosting hidden services, and only open it towards the Tor network. Regular, non-anonymous donators should then be able to open their files towards the Internet, too.
>> If you use that server for other things beside Tor you will have a >> hard time to explain and argue when abuse requests arrive - in fact >> you can't. >> It is quite easy to differentiate between a client (tor-exit) or a >> server (hosted content) also for authorities. Thank you. You're right, this has to be investigated further. I don't think that hosting content - on a logically different machine - influences the forwarding argument for the Tor nodes. Also, I don't see how it is "quite easy" for authorities to differentiate between middle node traffic and hidden services - that's what they are there for after all. >> You will not be able to use the response template if you get abuse >> requests because it does apply for Tor only. Then it will still apply for the IP addresses of the nodes. >> [...] "We further recommend that you not keep any potentially illegal >> files on the same machine you use for Tor, nor use that machine for >> any illegal purpose. Although no Tor relay in the US has ever been >> seized, nor any relay operator sued, the future possibility cannot >> be ruled out. >> If that happens, you will want your machine to be clean." [...] The Tor machine will be clean. If I rent a virtual machine, I also don't know what happens on other VMs, and this is how I interpret this. I'm not even so sure if DMCA applies for me, a German hoster offering services, even when using US servers. Internet law isn't easy. Moritz Bartl http://www.torservers.net/ *********************************************************************** To unsubscribe, send an e-mail to majord...@torproject.org with unsubscribe or-talk in the body. http://archives.seul.org/or/talk/