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The number of directly connecting users from Russia does appear to have doubled [1], but this can also be seen in UK user numbers [2]. For such an increase to b

The number of directly connecting users from Russia does appear to have doubled [1], but this can also be seen in UK user numbers [2]. For such an increase to be seen globally my hunch is that this is down to either the Pirate Browser [3] or some other software release - not necessarily a response to a particular law being passed, NSA leak etc. [1] https://metrics.torproject.org/direct-users.png?start=2013-05-31&events=off&end=2013-08-29&country=ru https://metrics.torproject.org/direct-users.png?start=2013-0... [2] https://metrics.torproject.org/direct-users.png?start=2013-05-31&events=off&end=2013-08-29&country=gb https://metrics.torproject.org/direct-users.png?start=2013-0... [3] http://piratebrowser.com/ http://piratebrowser.com/

MacsHeadroom 13y ago
Russia went up 15,000 in two weeks. But the world went up from 600k to 1.2M in the same two weeks. https://metrics.torproject.org/users.html?graph=direct-users&start=2013-05-29&end=2013-08-27&country=all&events=off#direct-users https://metrics.torproject.org/users.html?graph=direct-users...
zorked 13y ago
Interesting, similar jumps happened in every country I tried: Brazil, Vietnam, US, Argentina, South Africa. I can't imaging the Pirate Browser thing would be immediately so popular across so many different cultures, even in countries without net censorship.
- mattkirman 13y ago
  Maybe a botnet has started using Tor for connecting to a central command server? Might help explain a doubling of nodes but minimal traffic increase.
anonymous 13y ago
And usage from Bulgaria increased seven to eight times [1]. This is really strange, I don't know anybody who uses tor on purpose. My money is on a bittorrent client connecting automatically. [1] https://metrics.torproject.org/direct-users.png?start=2013-05-31&events=off&end=2013-08-29&country=bg https://metrics.torproject.org/direct-users.png?start=2013-0...

MacsHeadroom 13y ago

Russia went up 15,000 in two weeks. But the world went up from 600k to 1.2M in the same two weeks. https://metrics.torproject.org/users.html?graph=direct-users&start=2013-05-29&end=2013-08-27&country=all&events=off#direct-users https://metrics.torproject.org/users.html?graph=direct-users...

zorked 13y ago

Interesting, similar jumps happened in every country I tried: Brazil, Vietnam, US, Argentina, South Africa. I can't imaging the Pirate Browser thing would be immediately so popular across so many different cultures, even in countries without net censorship.

mattkirman 13y ago
Maybe a botnet has started using Tor for connecting to a central command server? Might help explain a doubling of nodes but minimal traffic increase.

anonymous 13y ago

And usage from Bulgaria increased seven to eight times [1]. This is really strange, I don't know anybody who uses tor on purpose. My money is on a bittorrent client connecting automatically. [1] https://metrics.torproject.org/direct-users.png?start=2013-05-31&events=off&end=2013-08-29&country=bg https://metrics.torproject.org/direct-users.png?start=2013-0...