Tor will pay operators exit points

Lead developer Tor project Roger Dingledine (Roger Dingledine) proposed to discuss the wage model for exit point operators. The project has already got its first sponsor ( BBG ), which is ready to finance 125+ fast relays.

A distributed network of Tor routers provides an encrypted communication channel between the user's computer and the server. Packets pass through a chain of routers and are sequentially encrypted with the keys of each of them. Reaching the exit point, packets in an unsecured form are sent to the recipient (server) address. Such a system allows you to quite reliably hide the user's IP address, and also gives him access to sites that are blocked at his location due to local censorship.

Tor is used, among other things, by journalists, military, businessmen, government officials, and cybercriminals who, by the nature of their activities, need to hide their activity on the Internet from existing tracking systems.

According to Dingledine, the existing bandwidth of routers is enough for normal operation. The graph shows that their declared bandwidth is much higher than the actual amount of transmitted data.
')


At the same time, the successful operation of the network is explained, first of all, by a good load distribution, when the main part of the traffic goes through a small number of very fast exit points. In particular, 25-30% of the traffic goes through the five fastest exit points, and 80% of the traffic goes through the 40-50 fastest . In other words, this is no longer the “distributed” system, which should be according to the theory.

To remedy the situation, you need to attract a hundred or two very fast exit points to the network in order to diversify traffic. It is for this purpose that the sponsorship program with payment for exit point owners was formed.

Since the first sponsor has already appeared, there is finance to pay for the work of operators in the next 12 months. Dingledine proposes to discuss several issues:

1. What should be the amount of remuneration? Basic option $ 100 per month. How can you not offend old friends who have been working for free for a long time?

2. How to set the minimum channel width for "sponsored" operators? The base version is 100 Mbps.

3. How many Internet providers exist that can provide anlim 100 Mbit / s per month for $ 100 and which do not resist hosting a Tor proxy? What are the legal issues?

4. How to check the quality of work of “sponsor” relays and how to make them work not for money, but for the sake of an idea?