Our results narrowly suggest, however, users of Tor in more repressive “not free” regimes tend to be far more likely to venture via the Tor network to Clear Web content and so are comparatively less likely to be engaged in activities that would be widely deemed malicious. A host of additional questions remain, given the anonymous nature of Tor and other similar systems such as I2P and Freenet. Generally, users of Tor in politically “free” countries are significantly more likely to be using the network in likely illicit ways. Our results provide a clear, if probabilistic, estimation of the extent to which users of Tor engage in either form of activity. The Tor anonymity network can be used for both licit and illicit purposes. The white regions represent the kernel density distributions for each ordinal category of political freedom (“free,” “partially free,” and “not free.” Each point indicates the average daily percentage of anonymous services accessed in a given country. In “free” countries, the proportion jumped to 7.8 percent.Įnlarge / More politically “free” countries have higher proportions of Hidden Services traffic than is present in either “partially free” or “not free” nations. In countries with regimes rated “not free” by this scoring from an organization called Freedom House, access to hidden services was just 4.8 percent. Those users, however, aren’t evenly distributed geographically. Specifically, the fraction of Tor users globally accessing hidden sites is 6.7, a relatively small proportion.

Connections to hidden services were significantly higher in countries rated as more politically “free” relative to those that are “partially free” or “not free.” Licit versus illicit They found that, worldwide, almost 7 percent of Tor users connect to hidden services, which the researchers contend are disproportionately more likely to offer illicit services or content compared with normal Internet sites. Researchers on Monday unveiled new estimates that attempt to measure the potential harms and benefits of Tor. Critics, meanwhile, argue that Tor shields criminals distributing child-abuse images, trafficking in illegal drugs, and engaging in other illicit activities. Supporters say it’s a vital service for protecting online privacy and circumventing censorship, particularly in countries with poor human rights records. The Tor anonymity network has generated controversy almost constantly since its inception almost two decades ago.

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