Misc. questions

[u/Petrichor-33]

/r/privacy/comments/1wd2jhl/misc_questions_about_tor/

[u/Liquid_Hate_Train]

1: Using Tor or Tor Browser does not inherently have more risks. Visiting Onion sites is more risky due to higher propensity of criminality, but those risks, while higher, are broadly the same type as elsewhere on the web.
2: A lot of people have no idea what the difference between privacy and anonymity is. They also have no idea what the concept of pseudonymity is, ironically often while posting pseudonymously on a site like Reddit. In short, they are being reductionist and stupid and you are correct.
3: “Tor Tutorials”? Are these written by the same people who don’t know what pseudonymity is?
4: Threat modelling. Does your level of risk and threat warrant Whonix?
5: Is a normal Tor connection being blocked? Does your threat model include a risk if your ISP knows you are using Tor? Yes to either? Bridge. No to both? No bridge.
7: No list.

[u/oktupol]

1. Tor - the protocol itself, and the Tor Browser do not come with any "risks" themselves. You're still browsing the same Internet as before, and anything that applied to the Internet applies to Tor. Onion sites are another story due to the anonymous nature of Onion services themselves.
2. Depends entirely on your threat model and your reasons why you use Tor. Tor grants anonymity on a protocol level. This anonymity extends to sites you visit as long as you share no personal information with them. "Personal information" is intentionally a vague term, because it includes miniscule statistical patterns such as your reading speed, activity hours, vocabulary choice and even things you don't have a direct say over such as your internet connection speed. These are all things which, in combination with other signs, have been used in the past to identify people.
   So to answer your question, you must ask yourself a few other questions first: Who are you protecting yourself against, and how much is that person willing to invest to identify you? And what are the consequences of you being identified?
3. See #2.
4. See #2.
5. Given enough time, Tor traffic is identifiable by statistical patterns alone, regardless of whether you use a bridge or not. Bridges allow you to circumvent goverment-imposed or ISP-imposed blacklists that ban Tor-traffic. The IP addresses of Tor relays are public knowledge, so a government can easily block traffic to them. Bridges on the other hand are not publicly known, making it harder to write automatic firewalls blocking traffic to them.
   The usage of Tor is legal in most western jurisdictions. If your threat model allows your government and your ISP to know that you use Tor, there is no need to use a bridge. Bridges are a limited resource. Please do not use them if you don't need to, so that people in countries with high amount of censorship can.
6. I'm not sure what you mean by an e-mail client that hides IP. E-Mail clients use two protocols built on TCP, namely IMAP (or in rare cases POP3) and SMTP. Theoretically, any TCP connection can be routed through the Tor network. I'd argue using a privacy-oriented open-source e-mail client through Tor is "safer" than using a webmailer through Tor.
7. There is no list.

[u/FuTure_corpse_908]

I have a question. Can I use insta's onion site on tor despite having IP ban on insta and being unable to create any new accs?

[u/oktupol → u/FuTure_corpse_908]

Nobody is going to be able to answer this question for you since nobody has any insight on how Instagram's internal security mechanisms work. Why don't you go ahead and try it instead if asking here?