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Glossary
Tor
Tor is a network that carries traffic through three volunteer relays so no single relay knows both you and the site.
How the route is built
Your request is wrapped in three layers and handed to the first relay. Each relay peels one layer, learns only its neighbours and passes the rest along.
- 1
The entry relay sees you
It knows your address and nothing about the site you asked for.
- 2
The middle relay sees neither
It only carries a wrapped message between two other relays.
- 3
The exit relay talks to the site
It knows the site and the request, and not who sent them.
Why sites know the exits
The list of relays is public by design, because a client has to know where to build a route from. The same openness lets any site keep that list of addresses of its own.
The addresses are published
Nothing has to be guessed, and the list refreshes on its own as relays come and go.
The pool is small and shared
Thousands of people leave through the same exit in the same hour.
The record follows the address
Whatever anyone did through that exit yesterday arrives with your request today.
Your browser right now
The browser usually paired with that network works by making everyone answer alike: one zone, one line, a standard window.
These are your own answers, and the distance between them and that common set is what makes you countable.
此刻您的设备
- Time zone
- 正在您的设备上测量
- Screen
- 正在您的设备上测量
- Browser line
- 正在您的设备上测量
- Languages
- 正在您的设备上测量
在您的浏览器中读取并在此显示，不会发送到任何地方。
Two opposite goals
Hiding in a crowd and holding a separate identity per account pull in different directions. Both are reasonable aims and neither is pursued by doing what the other asks.
| The aim | What it asks of you |
|---|---|
| One crowd with one look | Everyone answers the same, and standing out is the failure |
| One machine per account | Every profile answers differently, and repeating is the failure |
Where this app stands
A profile goes out through the address written on it, over http, https or socks5, or through your own server over SSH. The app then asks that exit which country it comes out of and sets the clock and the language from the answer.
Every part of the profile beside them is drawn from one seed, so the machine it describes agrees with itself from one value to the next.
Often confused with
A VPN
One company carrying your traffic, and it sees both ends of it.
A chain of proxies
Relays you picked yourself, with no layered wrapping and no route chosen for you.
The dark web
Hidden services are one use of the network, and reaching ordinary sites is another.
What this does not do
- The app does not bundle this network and routes nothing through it. A profile uses the address written on it and nothing else.
- It does not make one person look like many. Everyone on it is meant to answer alike, which is the opposite of what a separate profile is for.
- It does not change what your device answers. The drawing, the fonts and the hardware readings are produced on your machine whatever route carries them.
- It does not repair the record of an address. An exit already used for what you are about to do brings that history along with it.
Check it
Everything said here about the app comes from a file you can open.
- Which schemes an address on a profile may use
- packages/shared/src/proxy-line.js · apps/desktop/test/proxy-library.js
- The exit is asked which country it comes out of
- apps/desktop/src/lib/exitGeo.js · apps/desktop/test/exit-geo.js
- The parts of one profile come from one seed
- packages/shared/src/index.js · apps/desktop/test/fingerprint-consistency.js
- What a site reads back inside a profile
- apps/desktop/src/lib/fpAudit.js · apps/desktop/test/fp-audit.js
Questions
- Can I point a profile at it?
- The address on a profile takes a host, a port and a scheme, and a host on your own machine is a valid one there. Nothing in the app starts, updates or watches that network for you.
- Is it a VPN?
- No. A VPN is one company carrying your traffic, and here three relays are chosen so that no single one of them holds both ends.
- Why do sites challenge it so often?
- Because the exit addresses are published and shared. A site can recognise the address before it has read a single thing about your browser.
- Does it change my fingerprint?
- The network does not. The browser usually paired with it does, by making everyone answer the same way rather than by making you distinct.
- Is it slower than a proxy?
- Yes, and that is the design rather than a fault. Three relays in three places add distance that a single hop does not.
Give each account its own exit
A profile carries the address you set on it, and the app reads the country back from that exit before the browser opens.