Re: William was raided for running a Tor exit node. Please help if you can.

[Owen DeLong <owen () delong com>]

On Nov 30, 2012, at 4:58 AM, Rich Kulawiec <rsk () gsp org> wrote:

> On Thu, Nov 29, 2012 at 08:04:02AM -0500, Chris quoted (William):
> > Yes, it happened to me now as well - Yesterday i got raided for
> > someone sharing child pornography over one of my Tor exits.
>
> Question: what evidence has been published -- that is, placed somewhere
> that we can all see it -- that substantiates the claim that child porn
> traversed the node in question?
>
> Followup question 1: if no such evidence has been produced, then
> why should we believe that it exists?  Extraordinary claims require
> extraordinary proof.

I don't find the claim all that extraordinary. I think it was only a
matter of time before the kiddie-pr0n distributors figured out TOR
as a perfect way to distribute anonymously.

> Followup question 2: if the goal is to identify and apprehend the
> perpetrators of child porn (and that's a good goal) then why would
> the police raid this operation?  Would it not make far more sense to
> take advantage of the operator's knowledge and experience and quietly
> ask for his/her cooperation *while leaving the node running*?

Sure, but law enforcement isn't exactly renowned for doing the smart
things in such situations. Especially during their rather extensive
learning curve.

> Followup question 3: what evidence in front of us allows us to clearly
> discern that this is what it purports to be and not simply an attempt
> to shut down a Tor node (and intimidate the operators of others)
> by using a plausible excuse based on a universal hot-button issue?

None whatsoever. It's an entirely plausible alternate explanation.
At this point, we can't rule either of them out. However, the basic
theory "Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained
by incompetence." says that the kiddie-pr0n story is more likely.

Owen