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I ran a bridge once. First thing that happened is I could no longer use my banks website or app. Got a message that I was using tor. I was not an exit node I gu

I ran a bridge once. First thing that happened is I could no longer use my banks website or app. Got a message that I was using tor. I was not an exit node I guess they blocked all exit nodes and bridges. Second thing that happened is I worked at the power company and the union went on strike. While on strike some dummy put in a lot of power outage reports and used tor. So IT wanted to see if anyone else was using tor and my IP when I worked from home came up as Tor so I had to go through a whole thing at work that I just run a bridge and I had nothing to do with the tickets. They requested I stop running the bridge and I did. No more tor bridges for me!

3np 5y ago
> So IT wanted to see if anyone else was using tor and my IP when I worked from home came up as Tor That sounds like it has nothing to do with you running a bridge but about you connecting to work through tor. And/Or you weren’t running a bridge but a public relay. In either case the company’s IT sound like dummys.
- flatiron 5y ago
  I was not connected to work via tor. My ip was listed on the tor network as a bridge. IT simply got all the tor IPs and cross checked it against IPs connected to their VPN and I came up. On another note a coworker downloaded a bollywood movie on BitTorrent and forgot to stop sharing and connected to the work VPN and IT got a dmca notice. They then went on a huge investigation about BitTorrent. Some people got nasty emails their IP was listed on public trackers. Their kids were using BitTorrent and they were getting nasty emails about it. That was a bit big brother for me even though I didn’t get sucked up into that thankfully.
  - 3np 5y ago
    > My ip was listed on the tor network as a bridge Seems like you're mixing up the terminology (which is understandable, I've done it myself a couple of times in the past). https://support.torproject.org/censorship/censorship-7/ https://support.torproject.org/censorship/censorship-7/ Bridge relays are Tor relays that are not listed in the public Tor directory. There are still ways to get and detect bridge addresses but I'd be surprised if the kind of IT department that would give you trouble for running one would also go through the effort of doing so? > On another note a coworker downloaded a bollywood movie on BitTorrent and forgot to stop sharing and connected to the work VPN and IT got a dmca notice. They then went on a huge investigation about BitTorrent. Some people got nasty emails their IP was listed on public trackers. If they were listed as seeds illegally sharing copyright-protected content (and the kids weren't just downloading Debian ISOs), that's par for course.
    - flatiron 5y ago
      Yep yer right I was a relay.
gnuhack 5y ago
No more freedom anymore. It gives us something to think about. We are following a path that will lead us into very obscure times...
- viraptor 5y ago
  You're free to run tor nodes. You just have to accept the consequences of others not liking that. That's not impacting on your freedom, and it's also part of their freedom to not like you for running a node.
  - booleandilemma 5y ago
    You’re free to do X, but your life as you know it is over if you do. Does that feel like freedom to you?
    - hatware 5y ago
      It's shocking how few understand the times we are living through.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
  - brigandish 5y ago
    There are consequences to everything and different consequences to the same actions in different places, to talk about “accept the consequences” without addressing that is not helpful nor insightful in any way. The real points to focus on are: - whether the consequences are appropriate - whether they are natural, a side effect of intervention, or direct consequence of intervention For example, if you criticise the king of Thailand while in Thailand or as a Thai person you will have committed the crime of lese-majesty and can get you 15 years per instance. If we apply your principle of that being an example of freedom for which "you just have to accept the consequences" then we have learnt nothing and provided nothing of worth. If, however we ask whether that is appropriate and whether it can change (it is a direct intervention so it can) then we can assess it. That clearly does impact freedom, as does the bank deciding not to serve a customer that is running a Tor node. How is it their business anyway? What impact does running a bridge have on them? Regardless, let's say it was an exit node and the OP was accessing bank services via their own exit node - do they not authenticate the customers accessing their accounts?
m-p-3 5y ago
I wished they'd only filter by exit nodes but they grab everything including the relay nodes. That's annoying, otherwise I'd run a relay node at home.
- 3np 5y ago
  Bridge relays aren't. The person you're replying to was running a public relay, not a bridge. https://support.torproject.org/censorship/censorship-7/ https://support.torproject.org/censorship/censorship-7/
  - m-p-3 5y ago
    I know, and I wish I could have run a public relay, as they're also important to the network. Sadly it was too penalizing to be automatically blocked from accessing some services.
bauruine 5y ago
This sounds like you where runnig a relay and not a bridge. Bridges are not public so your bank had to actively harvest them to block you which seems unlikely.
- flatiron 5y ago
  You are correct. I was running a relay.
jeroenhd 5y ago
It's sad to see incompetent IT block random bridges and relays. I would be stubborn and switch banks, to be honest. Your power company story is even worse, because the people who supposedly know how computers work couldn't be bothered to find out how running a bridge does has nothing to do with requests coming in. I wonder if these companies are so aggressive against things like cheap VPNs and Apple's private relays as they are against TOR.

3np 5y ago

> So IT wanted to see if anyone else was using tor and my IP when I worked from home came up as Tor That sounds like it has nothing to do with you running a bridge but about you connecting to work through tor. And/Or you weren’t running a bridge but a public relay. In either case the company’s IT sound like dummys.

flatiron 5y ago
I was not connected to work via tor. My ip was listed on the tor network as a bridge. IT simply got all the tor IPs and cross checked it against IPs connected to their VPN and I came up. On another note a coworker downloaded a bollywood movie on BitTorrent and forgot to stop sharing and connected to the work VPN and IT got a dmca notice. They then went on a huge investigation about BitTorrent. Some people got nasty emails their IP was listed on public trackers. Their kids were using BitTorrent and they were getting nasty emails about it. That was a bit big brother for me even though I didn’t get sucked up into that thankfully.
- 3np 5y ago
  > My ip was listed on the tor network as a bridge Seems like you're mixing up the terminology (which is understandable, I've done it myself a couple of times in the past). https://support.torproject.org/censorship/censorship-7/ https://support.torproject.org/censorship/censorship-7/ Bridge relays are Tor relays that are not listed in the public Tor directory. There are still ways to get and detect bridge addresses but I'd be surprised if the kind of IT department that would give you trouble for running one would also go through the effort of doing so? > On another note a coworker downloaded a bollywood movie on BitTorrent and forgot to stop sharing and connected to the work VPN and IT got a dmca notice. They then went on a huge investigation about BitTorrent. Some people got nasty emails their IP was listed on public trackers. If they were listed as seeds illegally sharing copyright-protected content (and the kids weren't just downloading Debian ISOs), that's par for course.
  - flatiron 5y ago
    Yep yer right I was a relay.

gnuhack 5y ago

No more freedom anymore. It gives us something to think about. We are following a path that will lead us into very obscure times...

viraptor 5y ago
You're free to run tor nodes. You just have to accept the consequences of others not liking that. That's not impacting on your freedom, and it's also part of their freedom to not like you for running a node.
- booleandilemma 5y ago
  You’re free to do X, but your life as you know it is over if you do. Does that feel like freedom to you?
  - hatware 5y ago
    It's shocking how few understand the times we are living through.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- brigandish 5y ago
  There are consequences to everything and different consequences to the same actions in different places, to talk about “accept the consequences” without addressing that is not helpful nor insightful in any way. The real points to focus on are: - whether the consequences are appropriate - whether they are natural, a side effect of intervention, or direct consequence of intervention For example, if you criticise the king of Thailand while in Thailand or as a Thai person you will have committed the crime of lese-majesty and can get you 15 years per instance. If we apply your principle of that being an example of freedom for which "you just have to accept the consequences" then we have learnt nothing and provided nothing of worth. If, however we ask whether that is appropriate and whether it can change (it is a direct intervention so it can) then we can assess it. That clearly does impact freedom, as does the bank deciding not to serve a customer that is running a Tor node. How is it their business anyway? What impact does running a bridge have on them? Regardless, let's say it was an exit node and the OP was accessing bank services via their own exit node - do they not authenticate the customers accessing their accounts?

m-p-3 5y ago

I wished they'd only filter by exit nodes but they grab everything including the relay nodes. That's annoying, otherwise I'd run a relay node at home.

3np 5y ago
Bridge relays aren't. The person you're replying to was running a public relay, not a bridge. https://support.torproject.org/censorship/censorship-7/ https://support.torproject.org/censorship/censorship-7/
- m-p-3 5y ago
  I know, and I wish I could have run a public relay, as they're also important to the network. Sadly it was too penalizing to be automatically blocked from accessing some services.

bauruine 5y ago

This sounds like you where runnig a relay and not a bridge. Bridges are not public so your bank had to actively harvest them to block you which seems unlikely.

flatiron 5y ago
You are correct. I was running a relay.

jeroenhd 5y ago

It's sad to see incompetent IT block random bridges and relays. I would be stubborn and switch banks, to be honest. Your power company story is even worse, because the people who supposedly know how computers work couldn't be bothered to find out how running a bridge does has nothing to do with requests coming in. I wonder if these companies are so aggressive against things like cheap VPNs and Apple's private relays as they are against TOR.