Hello. Tors community Leader gus just called for help to run more Snowflake proxies due to the recent internet restrictions in Iran.
What is Snowflake?
Snowflake allows you to connect to the Tor network in places where Tor is blocked by routing your connection through volunteer proxies located in uncensored countries.
Similar to VPNs, which help users bypass Internet censorship, Snowflake disguises your Internet activity as though you’re making a video or voice call, making you less detectable to Internet censors.
How can I help?
You can set up a standalone proxy on your Server or, if you don’t feel for the hustle, you can install Tors Browser extension and just keep your Tab open.
You can even help with just your phone! Install Orbot (iOS/Android) and enable Kindness mode.
Every Snowflake counts! Thank you!
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are there any potential dangers in running this? like someone downloading CSAM through my connection? would love to help with bandwidth, but legal troubles are quite scary…
I was also wondering this. There’s some info here specifically https://forum.torproject.org/t/are-there-any-risks-to-running-standalone-snowflake-on-home-network-if-so-how-significant-are-they/16710/5
thanks! i guess it’s pretty safe.
It is, but the sad reality is that while you contribute your capacity for good cause it’ll be abused by bad actors as well. Obviously with snowflake node you don’t get to see what’s excactly going trough, but some time ago I had exit node running and I got several calls from my ISP that there’s malicious traffic coming from my IP address. ISP managed it pretty well when I explained what’s going on but eventually they got so many complaints from other peers on the network that they took ‘hard route’ and told that they’ll take my connection down unless I shut down the node. No hard feelings for the ISP, they took all the abuse mails and other annoyance for me and I absolutely understand their decision. But it’s good to at least acknowledge that tor isn’t just to get around oppressive policies.
It makes me so happy when I see someone is using my snowflake proxy
That link for orbot doesn’t go anywhere. At least for me. A bunch of qr codes - 3 of which 404. None get to a download.
The fdroid link 404s.
Anyway, here’s the current release for android
https://guardianproject.info/fdroid/repo/orbot-latest.apk
If you run Linux you can run it - you don’t need a dedicated server. You can config to your specs. See here https://community.torproject.org/relay/setup/snowflake/
sudo apt install snowflakeor snowflake-proxy for just the server On debian/Ubuntu.
Termux can run the proxy using the same command
pkg install snowflake-proxyAnd here’s the official site
https://snowflake.torproject.org/
Ironic, though, they don’t use the snowflake widget on their own site
But you can just open this page in any browser https://snowflake.torproject.org/embed.html
I already do it on my browser and I get dopamine hit everytime I see the number count go up but I didn’t know about the mobile app, about to do it right now.
You can also just donate! They even have merch if you want some of your money going that direction
You could even do both if you are feeling really generous
