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volunteer.html     4) 

en/volunteer.wml   5) #include "head.wmi" TITLE="Tor: Volunteer"

volunteer.html     6) 
volunteer.html     7) <div class="main-column">
volunteer.html     8) 
volunteer.html     9) <!-- PUT CONTENT AFTER THIS TAG -->

en/volunteer.wml  10) <h2>A few things everyone can do now:</h2>

volunteer.html    11) <ol>

en/volunteer.wml  12) <li>Please consider <a href="<page docs/tor-doc-relay>">running
en/volunteer.wml  13) a relay</a> to help the Tor network grow.</li>
en/volunteer.wml  14) <li>Tell your friends! Get them to run relays. Get them to run hidden

volunteer.html    15) services. Get them to tell their friends.</li>

en/volunteer.wml  16) <li>If you like Tor's goals, please <a href="<page donate>">take a moment
en/volunteer.wml  17) to donate to support further Tor development</a>. We're also looking
en/volunteer.wml  18) for more sponsors &mdash; if you know any companies, NGOs, agencies,
en/volunteer.wml  19) or other organizations that want anonymity / privacy / communications
en/volunteer.wml  20) security, let them know about us.</li>
en/volunteer.wml  21) <li>We're looking for more <a href="<page torusers>">good examples of Tor
en/volunteer.wml  22) users and Tor use cases</a>. If you use Tor for a scenario or purpose not
en/volunteer.wml  23) yet described on that page, and you're comfortable sharing it with us,
en/volunteer.wml  24) we'd love to hear from you.</li>

volunteer.html    25) </ol>
volunteer.html    26) 

en/volunteer.wml  27) <a id="Usability"></a>

en/volunteer.wml  28) <h2><a class="anchor" href="#Usability">Supporting Applications</a></h2>

volunteer.html    29) <ol>

en/volunteer.wml  30) <li>We need more and better ways to intercept DNS requests so they don't "leak" their

en/volunteer.wml  31) request to a local observer while we're trying to be anonymous. (This
en/volunteer.wml  32) happens because the application does the DNS resolve before going to
en/volunteer.wml  33) the SOCKS proxy.)</li>

en/volunteer.wml  34) <li>Tsocks/dsocks items:

en/volunteer.wml  35) <ul>
en/volunteer.wml  36) <li>We need to <a

en/volunteer.wml  37) href="https://wiki.torproject.org/noreply/TheOnionRouter/TSocksPatches">apply

en/volunteer.wml  38) all our tsocks patches</a> and maintain a new fork. We'll host it if
en/volunteer.wml  39) you want.</li>
en/volunteer.wml  40) <li>We should patch Dug Song's "dsocks" program to use Tor's
en/volunteer.wml  41) <i>mapaddress</i> commands from the controller interface, so we
en/volunteer.wml  42) don't waste a whole round-trip inside Tor doing the resolve before
en/volunteer.wml  43) connecting.</li>
en/volunteer.wml  44) <li>We need to make our <i>torify</i> script detect which of tsocks or
en/volunteer.wml  45) dsocks is installed, and call them appropriately. This probably means
en/volunteer.wml  46) unifying their interfaces, and might involve sharing code between them
en/volunteer.wml  47) or discarding one entirely.</li>
en/volunteer.wml  48) </ul>

en/volunteer.wml  49) </li>

en/volunteer.wml  50) <li>People running relays tell us they want to have one BandwidthRate

en/volunteer.wml  51) during some part of the day, and a different BandwidthRate at other
en/volunteer.wml  52) parts of the day. Rather than coding this inside Tor, we should have a
en/volunteer.wml  53) little script that speaks via the <a href="<page gui/index>">Tor
en/volunteer.wml  54) Controller Interface</a>, and does a setconf to change the bandwidth

en/volunteer.wml  55) rate. There is one for Unix and Mac already (it uses bash and cron),

en/volunteer.wml  56) but Windows users still need a solution.

en/volunteer.wml  57) </li>

volunteer.html    58) <li>Speaking of geolocation data, somebody should draw a map of the Earth

en/volunteer.wml  59) with a pin-point for each Tor relay. Bonus points if it updates as the

en/volunteer.wml  60) network grows and changes. Unfortunately, the easy ways to do this involve
en/volunteer.wml  61) sending all the data to Google and having them draw the map for you. How
en/volunteer.wml  62) much does this impact privacy, and do we have any other good options?</li>

volunteer.html    63) </ol>
volunteer.html    64) 

en/volunteer.wml  65) <a id="Documentation"></a>
en/volunteer.wml  66) <h2><a class="anchor" href="#Documentation">Documentation</a></h2>

volunteer.html    67) <ol>

en/volunteer.wml  68) <li>Please help Matt Edman with the documentation and how-tos for his

en/volunteer.wml  69) Tor controller,
en/volunteer.wml  70) <a href="http://vidalia-project.net/">Vidalia</a>.</li>

en/volunteer.wml  71) <li>Evaluate and document

en/volunteer.wml  72) <a href="https://wiki.torproject.org/wiki/TheOnionRouter/TorifyHOWTO">our

en/volunteer.wml  73) list of programs</a> that can be configured to use Tor.</li>

volunteer.html    74) <li>We need better documentation for dynamically intercepting

en/volunteer.wml  75) connections and sending them through Tor. tsocks (Linux), dsocks (BSD),

en/volunteer.wml  76) and freecap (Windows) seem to be good candidates, as would better
en/volunteer.wml  77) use of our new TransPort feature.</li>

en/volunteer.wml  78) <li>We have a huge list of <a href="https://wiki.torproject.org/noreply/TheOnionRouter/SupportPrograms">potentially useful

volunteer.html    79) programs that interface to Tor</a>. Which ones are useful in which
volunteer.html    80) situations? Please help us test them out and document your results.</li>

en/volunteer.wml  81) <li>Help translate the web page and documentation into other
en/volunteer.wml  82) languages. See the <a href="<page translation>">translation

en/volunteer.wml  83) guidelines</a> if you want to help out. We especially need Arabic or
en/volunteer.wml  84) Farsi translations, for the many Tor users in censored areas.</li>

volunteer.html    85) </ol>
volunteer.html    86) 

en/volunteer.wml  87) <a id="Coding"></a>

en/volunteer.wml  88) <a id="Summer"></a>
en/volunteer.wml  89) <a id="Projects"></a>

en/volunteer.wml  90) <h2><a class="anchor" href="#Projects">Good Coding Projects</a></h2>

en/volunteer.wml  91) 
en/volunteer.wml  92) <p>

en/volunteer.wml  93) Here is a list of ideas that are proposed for the <a href="<page gsoc>">Google Summer of Code 2009</a>
en/volunteer.wml  94) Some of the <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/proposals/">current proposals</a> 

en/volunteer.wml  95) might also be short on developers. If you think you can help out, <a href="<page contact>"> let us know!</a> 

en/volunteer.wml  96) </p>
en/volunteer.wml  97) 

en/volunteer.wml  98) <ol>
en/volunteer.wml  99) 

en/volunteer.wml 100) <!-- Mike is already working on this.

en/volunteer.wml 101) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 102) <b>Tor Node Scanner improvements</b>

en/volunteer.wml 103) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 104) Similar to the SoaT exit scanner (or perhaps even during exit scanning),

en/volunteer.wml 105) statistics can be gathered about the reliability of nodes. Nodes that
en/volunteer.wml 106) fail too high a percentage of their circuits should not be given
en/volunteer.wml 107) Guard status. Perhaps they should have their reported bandwidth
en/volunteer.wml 108) penalized by some ratio as well, or just get marked as Invalid. In
en/volunteer.wml 109) addition, nodes that exhibit a very low average stream capacity but
en/volunteer.wml 110) advertise a very high node bandwidth can also be marked as Invalid.
en/volunteer.wml 111) Much of this statistics gathering is already done, it just needs to be
en/volunteer.wml 112) transformed into something that can be reported to the Directory
en/volunteer.wml 113) Authorities to blacklist/penalize nodes in such a way that clients
en/volunteer.wml 114) will listen.

en/volunteer.wml 115) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 116) In addition, these same statistics can be gathered about the traffic
en/volunteer.wml 117) through a node. Events can be added to the <a

en/volunteer.wml 118) href="https://svn.torproject.org/svn/torctl/trunk/doc/howto.txt">Tor Control

en/volunteer.wml 119) Protocol</a> to
en/volunteer.wml 120) report if a circuit extend attempt through the node succeeds or fails, and
en/volunteer.wml 121) passive statistics can be gathered on both bandwidth and reliability
en/volunteer.wml 122) of other nodes via a node-based monitor using these events. Such a
en/volunteer.wml 123) scanner would also report information on oddly-behaving nodes to
en/volunteer.wml 124) the Directory Authorities, but a communication channel for this
en/volunteer.wml 125) currently does not exist and would need to be developed as well.
en/volunteer.wml 126) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 127) -->

en/volunteer.wml 128) 
en/volunteer.wml 129) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 130) <b>Help track the overall Tor Network status</b>

en/volunteer.wml 131) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 132) It would be great to set up an automated system for tracking network
en/volunteer.wml 133) health over time, graphing it, etc. Part of this project would involve
en/volunteer.wml 134) inventing better metrics for assessing network health and growth. Is the
en/volunteer.wml 135) average uptime of the network increasing? How many relays are qualifying
en/volunteer.wml 136) for Guard status this month compared to last month? What's the turnover
en/volunteer.wml 137) in terms of new relays showing up and relays shutting off? Periodically
en/volunteer.wml 138) people collect brief snapshots, but where it gets really interesting is
en/volunteer.wml 139) when we start tracking data points over time.
en/volunteer.wml 140) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 141) Data could be collected from the Tor Network Scanners in <a
en/volunteer.wml 142) href="https://svn.torproject.org/svn/torflow/trunk/README">TorFlow</a>, from

en/volunteer.wml 143) the server descriptors that each relay publishes, and from other
en/volunteer.wml 144) sources. Results over time could be integrated into one of the <a
en/volunteer.wml 145) href="https://torstatus.blutmagie.de/">Tor Status</a> web pages, or be
en/volunteer.wml 146) kept separate. Speaking of the Tor Status pages, take a look at Roger's
en/volunteer.wml 147) <a href="http://archives.seul.org/or/talk/Jan-2008/msg00300.html">Tor
en/volunteer.wml 148) Status wish list</a>.
en/volunteer.wml 149) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 150) 

en/volunteer.wml 151) <!-- Is this still a useful project? If so, move it to another section.

en/volunteer.wml 152) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 153) <b>Better Debian/Ubuntu Packaging for Tor+Vidalia</b>

en/volunteer.wml 154) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 155) Vidalia currently doesn't play nicely on Debian and Ubuntu with the
en/volunteer.wml 156) default Tor packages. The current Tor packages automatically start Tor
en/volunteer.wml 157) as a daemon running as the debian-tor user and (sensibly) do not have a

en/volunteer.wml 158) <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/control-spec.txt">ControlPort</a> defined
en/volunteer.wml 159) in the default torrc. Consequently, Vidalia will try

en/volunteer.wml 160) to start its own Tor process since it could not connect to the existing

en/volunteer.wml 161) Tor, and Vidalia's Tor process will then exit with an error message

en/volunteer.wml 162) the user likely doesn't understand since Tor cannot bind its listening

en/volunteer.wml 163) ports — they're already in use by the original Tor daemon.

en/volunteer.wml 164) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 165) The current solution involves either telling the user to stop the
en/volunteer.wml 166) existing Tor daemon and let Vidalia start its own Tor process, or
en/volunteer.wml 167) explaining to the user how to set a control port and password in their
en/volunteer.wml 168) torrc. A better solution on Debian would be to use Tor's ControlSocket,
en/volunteer.wml 169) which allows Vidalia to talk to Tor via a Unix domain socket, and could
en/volunteer.wml 170) possibly be enabled by default in Tor's Debian packages. Vidalia can

en/volunteer.wml 171) then authenticate to Tor using filesystem-based (cookie) authentication
en/volunteer.wml 172) if the user running Vidalia is also in the debian-tor group.

en/volunteer.wml 173) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 174) This project will first involve adding support for Tor's ControlSocket
en/volunteer.wml 175) to Vidalia. The student will then develop and test Debian and Ubuntu
en/volunteer.wml 176) packages for Vidalia that conform to Debian's packaging standards and

en/volunteer.wml 177) make sure they work well with the existing Tor packages. We can also

en/volunteer.wml 178) set up an apt repository to host the new Vidalia packages.
en/volunteer.wml 179) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 180) The next challenge would be to find an intuitive usable way for Vidalia
en/volunteer.wml 181) to be able to change Tor's configuration (torrc) even though it is
en/volunteer.wml 182) located in <code>/etc/tor/torrc</code> and thus immutable. The best
en/volunteer.wml 183) idea we've come up with so far is to feed Tor a new configuration via
en/volunteer.wml 184) the ControlSocket when Vidalia starts, but that's bad because Tor starts

en/volunteer.wml 185) each boot with a different configuration than the user wants. The second
en/volunteer.wml 186) best idea

en/volunteer.wml 187) we've come up with is for Vidalia to write out a temporary torrc file
en/volunteer.wml 188) and ask the user to manually move it to <code>/etc/tor/torrc</code>,
en/volunteer.wml 189) but that's bad because users shouldn't have to mess with files directly.
en/volunteer.wml 190) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 191) A person undertaking this project should have prior knowledge of

en/volunteer.wml 192) Debian package management and some C++ development experience. Previous
en/volunteer.wml 193) experience with Qt is helpful, but not required.
en/volunteer.wml 194) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 195) -->

en/volunteer.wml 196) 

en/volunteer.wml 197) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 198) <b>Improving Tor's ability to resist censorship</b>
en/volunteer.wml 199) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 200) The Tor 0.2.0.x series makes <a
en/volunteer.wml 201) href="<svnsandbox>doc/design-paper/blocking.html">significant
en/volunteer.wml 202) improvements</a> in resisting national and organizational censorship.
en/volunteer.wml 203) But Tor still needs better mechanisms for some parts of its
en/volunteer.wml 204) anti-censorship design.  For example, current Tors can only listen on a
en/volunteer.wml 205) single address/port combination at a time.  There's
en/volunteer.wml 206) <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/proposals/118-multiple-orports.txt">a
en/volunteer.wml 207) proposal to address this limitation</a> and allow clients to connect
en/volunteer.wml 208) to any given Tor on multiple addresses and ports, but it needs more
en/volunteer.wml 209) work.  Another anti-censorship project (far more difficult) is to try
en/volunteer.wml 210) to make Tor more scanning-resistant.  Right now, an adversary can identify
en/volunteer.wml 211) <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/proposals/125-bridges.txt">Tor bridges</a>
en/volunteer.wml 212) just by trying to connect to them, following the Tor protocol, and
en/volunteer.wml 213) seeing if they respond.  To solve this, bridges could
en/volunteer.wml 214) <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/design-paper/blocking.html#tth_sEc9.3">act like
en/volunteer.wml 215) webservers</a> (HTTP or HTTPS) when contacted by port-scanning tools,
en/volunteer.wml 216) and not act like bridges until the user provides a bridge-specific key.
en/volunteer.wml 217) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 218) This project involves a lot of research and design. One of the big
en/volunteer.wml 219) challenges will be identifying and crafting approaches that can still
en/volunteer.wml 220) resist an adversary even after the adversary knows the design, and
en/volunteer.wml 221) then trading off censorship resistance with usability and robustness.
en/volunteer.wml 222) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 223) 

en/volunteer.wml 224) <!-- This should be mostly done.

en/volunteer.wml 225) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 226) <b>Tor/Polipo/Vidalia Auto-Update Framework</b>
en/volunteer.wml 227) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 228) We're in need of a good authenticated-update framework.
en/volunteer.wml 229) Vidalia already has the ability to notice when the user is running an
en/volunteer.wml 230) outdated or unrecommended version of Tor, using signed statements inside
en/volunteer.wml 231) the Tor directory information. Currently, Vidalia simply pops
en/volunteer.wml 232) up a little message box that lets the user know they should manually
en/volunteer.wml 233) upgrade. The goal of this project would be to extend Vidalia with the
en/volunteer.wml 234) ability to also fetch and install the updated Tor software for the
en/volunteer.wml 235) user. We should do the fetches via Tor when possible, but also fall back
en/volunteer.wml 236) to direct fetches in a smart way. Time permitting, we would also like
en/volunteer.wml 237) to be able to update other
en/volunteer.wml 238) applications included in the bundled installers, such as Polipo and
en/volunteer.wml 239) Vidalia itself.
en/volunteer.wml 240) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 241) To complete this project, the student will first need to first investigate
en/volunteer.wml 242) the existing auto-update frameworks (e.g., Sparkle on OS X) to evaluate
en/volunteer.wml 243) their strengths, weaknesses, security properties, and ability to be
en/volunteer.wml 244) integrated into Vidalia. If none are found to be suitable, the student
en/volunteer.wml 245) will design their own auto-update framework, document the design, and
en/volunteer.wml 246) then discuss the design with other developers to assess any security
en/volunteer.wml 247) issues. The student will then implement their framework (or integrate
en/volunteer.wml 248) an existing one) and test it.
en/volunteer.wml 249) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 250) A person undertaking this project should have good C++ development
en/volunteer.wml 251) experience. Previous experience with Qt is helpful, but not required. One
en/volunteer.wml 252) should also have a good understanding of common security

en/volunteer.wml 253) practices, such as package signature verification. Good writing ability
en/volunteer.wml 254) is also important for this project, since a vital step of the project

en/volunteer.wml 255) will be producing a design document to review and discuss
en/volunteer.wml 256) with others prior to implementation.

en/volunteer.wml 257) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 258) -->

en/volunteer.wml 259) 

en/volunteer.wml 260) <!-- Matt already made good progress on this.

en/volunteer.wml 261) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 262) <b>An Improved and More Usable Network Map in Vidalia</b>
en/volunteer.wml 263) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 264) One of Vidalia's existing features is a network map that shows the user
en/volunteer.wml 265) the approximate geographic location of relays in the Tor network and
en/volunteer.wml 266) plots the paths the user's traffic takes as it is tunneled through the
en/volunteer.wml 267) Tor network. The map is currently not very interactive and has rather
en/volunteer.wml 268) poor graphics. Instead, we would like to leverage KDE's Marble widget
en/volunteer.wml 269) that gives us a better quality map and enables improved interactivity,
en/volunteer.wml 270) such as allowing the user to click on individual relays or circuits to
en/volunteer.wml 271) display additional information. We might also consider adding the ability
en/volunteer.wml 272) for users to click on a particular relay or a country containing one or
en/volunteer.wml 273) more Tor exit relays and say, "I want my connections to foo.com to exit
en/volunteer.wml 274) from here."
en/volunteer.wml 275) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 276) This project will first involve getting familiar with Vidalia
en/volunteer.wml 277) and the Marble widget's API. One will then integrate the widget

en/volunteer.wml 278) into Vidalia and customize Marble to be better suited for our application,
en/volunteer.wml 279) such as making circuits clickable, storing cached map data in Vidalia's
en/volunteer.wml 280) own data directory, and customizing some of the widget's dialogs.
en/volunteer.wml 281) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 282) A person undertaking this project should have good C++ development

en/volunteer.wml 283) experience. Previous experience with Qt and CMake is helpful, but not
en/volunteer.wml 284) required.
en/volunteer.wml 285) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 286) -->

en/volunteer.wml 287) 

en/volunteer.wml 288) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 289) <b>Tor Controller Status Event Interface</b>

en/volunteer.wml 290) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 291) There are a number of status changes inside Tor of which the user may need

en/volunteer.wml 292) to be informed. For example, if the user is trying to set up his Tor as a
en/volunteer.wml 293) relay and Tor decides that its ports are not reachable from outside

en/volunteer.wml 294) the user's network, we should alert the user. Currently, all the user

en/volunteer.wml 295) gets is a couple log messages in Vidalia's 'message log' window, which they

en/volunteer.wml 296) likely never see since they don't receive a notification that something
en/volunteer.wml 297) has gone wrong. Even if the user does actually look at the message log,
en/volunteer.wml 298) most of the messages make little sense to the novice user.
en/volunteer.wml 299) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 300) Tor has the ability to inform Vidalia of many such status changes, and
en/volunteer.wml 301) we recently implemented support for a couple of these events. Still,
en/volunteer.wml 302) there are many more status events the user should be informed of and we
en/volunteer.wml 303) need a better UI for actually displaying them to the user.
en/volunteer.wml 304) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 305) The goal of this project then is to design and implement a UI for
en/volunteer.wml 306) displaying Tor status events to the user. For example, we might put a
en/volunteer.wml 307) little badge on Vidalia's tray icon that alerts the user to new status
en/volunteer.wml 308) events they should look at. Double-clicking the icon could bring up a
en/volunteer.wml 309) dialog that summarizes recent status events in simple terms and maybe

en/volunteer.wml 310) suggests a remedy for any negative events if they can be corrected by

en/volunteer.wml 311) the user. Of course, this is just an example and one is free to

en/volunteer.wml 312) suggest another approach.
en/volunteer.wml 313) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 314) A person undertaking this project should have good UI design and layout

en/volunteer.wml 315) and some C++ development experience. Previous experience with Qt and

en/volunteer.wml 316) Qt's Designer will be very helpful, but are not required. Some

en/volunteer.wml 317) English writing ability will also be useful, since this project will
en/volunteer.wml 318) likely involve writing small amounts of help documentation that should
en/volunteer.wml 319) be understandable by non-technical users. Bonus points for some graphic
en/volunteer.wml 320) design/Photoshop fu, since we might want/need some shiny new icons too.
en/volunteer.wml 321) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 322) 

en/volunteer.wml 323) <!-- Jake already did most of this.

en/volunteer.wml 324) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 325) <b>Improvements on our active browser configuration tester</b> -

en/volunteer.wml 326) <a href="https://check.torproject.org/">https://check.torproject.org/</a>

en/volunteer.wml 327) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 328) We currently have a functional web page to detect if Tor is working. It

en/volunteer.wml 329) has a few places where it falls short. It requires improvements with

en/volunteer.wml 330) regard to default languages and functionality. It currently only responds
en/volunteer.wml 331) in English. In addition, it is a hack of a perl script that should have
en/volunteer.wml 332) never seen the light of day. It should probably be rewritten in python

en/volunteer.wml 333) with multi-lingual support in mind. It currently uses the <a
en/volunteer.wml 334) href="http://exitlist.torproject.org/">Tor DNS exit list</a>
en/volunteer.wml 335) and should continue to do so in the future. It currently result in certain

en/volunteer.wml 336) false positives and these should be discovered, documented, and fixed
en/volunteer.wml 337) where possible. Anyone working on this project should be interested in

en/volunteer.wml 338) DNS, basic perl or preferably python programming skills, and will have

en/volunteer.wml 339) to interact minimally with Tor to test their code.

en/volunteer.wml 340) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 341) If you want to make the project more exciting
en/volunteer.wml 342) and involve more design and coding, take a look at <a
en/volunteer.wml 343) href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/proposals/131-verify-tor-usage.txt">proposal
en/volunteer.wml 344) 131-verify-tor-usage.txt</a>.

en/volunteer.wml 345) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 346) -->

en/volunteer.wml 347) 

en/volunteer.wml 348) <!-- If we decide to switch to the exit list in TorStatus, this is obsolete.

en/volunteer.wml 349) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 350) <b>Improvements on our DNS Exit List service</b> -

en/volunteer.wml 351) <a href="http://exitlist.torproject.org/">http://exitlist.torproject.org/</a>

en/volunteer.wml 352) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 353) The <a href="http://p56soo2ibjkx23xo.onion/">exitlist software</a>
en/volunteer.wml 354) is written by our fabulous anonymous

en/volunteer.wml 355) contributer Tup. It's a DNS server written in Haskell that supports part of our <a

en/volunteer.wml 356) href="<svnsandbox>doc/contrib/torel-design.txt">exitlist

en/volunteer.wml 357) design document</a>. Currently, it is functional and it is used by

en/volunteer.wml 358) check.torproject.org and other users. The issues that are outstanding
en/volunteer.wml 359) are mostly aesthetic. This wonderful service could use a much better
en/volunteer.wml 360) website using the common Tor theme. It would be best served with better
en/volunteer.wml 361) documentation for common services that use an RBL. It could use more
en/volunteer.wml 362) publicity. A person working on this project should be interested in DNS,
en/volunteer.wml 363) basic RBL configuration for popular services, and writing documentation.
en/volunteer.wml 364) The person would require minimal Tor interaction — testing their
en/volunteer.wml 365) own documentation at the very least. Furthermore, it would be useful

en/volunteer.wml 366) if they were interested in Haskell and wanted to implement more of the

en/volunteer.wml 367) torel-design.txt suggestions.
en/volunteer.wml 368) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 369) -->

en/volunteer.wml 370) 

en/volunteer.wml 371) <!-- Nobody wanted to keep this.

en/volunteer.wml 372) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 373) <b>Testing integration of Tor with web browsers for our end users</b>

en/volunteer.wml 374) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 375) The Tor project currently lacks a solid test suite to ensure that a
en/volunteer.wml 376) user has a properly and safely configured web browser. It should test for as

en/volunteer.wml 377) many known issues as possible. It should attempt to decloak the

en/volunteer.wml 378) user in any way possible. Two current webpages that track these

en/volunteer.wml 379) kinds of issues are run by Greg Fleischer and HD Moore. Greg keeps a nice <a

en/volunteer.wml 380) href="http://pseudo-flaw.net/tor/torbutton/">list of issues along
en/volunteer.wml 381) with their proof of concept code, bug issues, etc</a>. HD Moore runs

en/volunteer.wml 382) the <a href="http://www.decloak.net/">metasploit

en/volunteer.wml 383) decloak website</a>. A person interested in defending Tor could start

en/volunteer.wml 384) by collecting as many workable and known methods for decloaking a

en/volunteer.wml 385) Tor user. (<a href="https://torcheck.xenobite.eu/">This page</a> may

en/volunteer.wml 386) be helpful as a start.) One should be familiar with the common pitfalls but

en/volunteer.wml 387) possibly have new methods in mind for implementing decloaking issues. The
en/volunteer.wml 388) website should ensure that it tells a user what their problem is. It
en/volunteer.wml 389) should help them to fix the problem or direct them to the proper support

en/volunteer.wml 390) channels. The person should also be closely familiar with using Tor and how

en/volunteer.wml 391) to prevent Tor information leakage.

en/volunteer.wml 392) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 393) -->

en/volunteer.wml 394) 

en/volunteer.wml 395) <!-- Nick did quite some work here. Is this project still required then?

en/volunteer.wml 396) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 397) <b>Libevent and Tor integration improvements</b>
en/volunteer.wml 398) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 399) Tor should make better use of the more recent features of Niels
en/volunteer.wml 400) Provos's <a href="http://monkey.org/~provos/libevent/">Libevent</a>

en/volunteer.wml 401) library.  Tor already uses Libevent for its low-level asynchronous IO

en/volunteer.wml 402) calls, and could also use Libevent's increasingly good implementations

en/volunteer.wml 403) of network buffers and of HTTP.  This wouldn't be simply a matter of

en/volunteer.wml 404) replacing Tor's internal calls with calls to Libevent: instead, we'll

en/volunteer.wml 405) need to refactor Tor to use Libevent calls that do not follow the

en/volunteer.wml 406) same models as Tor's existing backends. Also, we'll need to add
en/volunteer.wml 407) missing functionality to Libevent as needed — most difficult likely
en/volunteer.wml 408) will be adding OpenSSL support on top of Libevent's buffer abstraction.
en/volunteer.wml 409) Also tricky will be adding rate-limiting to Libevent.

en/volunteer.wml 410) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 411) -->

en/volunteer.wml 412) 
en/volunteer.wml 413) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 414) <b>Tuneup Tor!</b>
en/volunteer.wml 415) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 416) Right now, Tor relays measure and report their own bandwidth, and Tor
en/volunteer.wml 417) clients choose which relays to use in part based on that bandwidth.
en/volunteer.wml 418) This approach is vulnerable to
en/volunteer.wml 419) <a href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#bauer:wpes2007">attacks where
en/volunteer.wml 420) relays lie about their bandwidth</a>;
en/volunteer.wml 421) to address this, Tor currently caps the maximum bandwidth
en/volunteer.wml 422) it's willing to believe any relay provides.  This is a limited fix, and
en/volunteer.wml 423) a waste of bandwidth capacity to boot.  Instead,

en/volunteer.wml 424) Tor should possibly measure bandwidth in a more distributed way, perhaps
en/volunteer.wml 425) as described in the

en/volunteer.wml 426) <a href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/author.html#snader08">"A Tune-up for
en/volunteer.wml 427) Tor"</a> paper

en/volunteer.wml 428) by Snader and Borisov. One could use current testing code to

en/volunteer.wml 429) double-check this paper's findings and verify the extent to which they

en/volunteer.wml 430) dovetail with Tor as deployed in the wild, and determine good ways to
en/volunteer.wml 431) incorporate them into their suggestions Tor network without adding too

en/volunteer.wml 432) much communications overhead between relays and directory

en/volunteer.wml 433) authorities.

en/volunteer.wml 434) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 435) 

en/volunteer.wml 436) <!--

en/volunteer.wml 437) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 438) <b>Improving the Tor QA process: Continuous Integration for Windows builds</b>
en/volunteer.wml 439) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 440) It would be useful to have automated build processes for Windows and
en/volunteer.wml 441) probably other platforms. The purpose of having a continuous integration
en/volunteer.wml 442) build environment is to ensure that Windows isn't left behind for any of
en/volunteer.wml 443) the software projects used in the Tor project or its accompanying.<br />
en/volunteer.wml 444) Buildbot may be a good choice for this as it appears to support all of

en/volunteer.wml 445) the platforms Tor does. See the

en/volunteer.wml 446) <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BuildBot">wikipedia entry for

en/volunteer.wml 447) buildbot</a>.<br />
en/volunteer.wml 448) There may be better options and the person undertaking this task should
en/volunteer.wml 449) evaluate other options. Any person working on this automatic build
en/volunteer.wml 450) process should have experience or be willing to learn how to build all
en/volunteer.wml 451) of the respective Tor related code bases from scratch. Furthermore, the
en/volunteer.wml 452) person should have some experience building software in Windows
en/volunteer.wml 453) environments as this is the target audience we want to ensure we do not
en/volunteer.wml 454) leave behind. It would require close work with the Tor source code but

en/volunteer.wml 455) probably only in the form of building, not authoring.<br />
en/volunteer.wml 456) Additionally, we need to automate our performance testing for all platforms.

en/volunteer.wml 457) We've got buildbot (except on Windows — as noted above) to automate

en/volunteer.wml 458) our regular integration and compile testing already,
en/volunteer.wml 459) but we need to get our network simulation tests (as built in torflow)
en/volunteer.wml 460) updated for more recent versions of Tor, and designed to launch a test
en/volunteer.wml 461) network either on a single machine, or across several, so we can test

en/volunteer.wml 462) changes in performance on machines in different roles automatically.

en/volunteer.wml 463) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 464) -->

en/volunteer.wml 465) 

en/volunteer.wml 466) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 467) <b>Improve our unit testing process</b>
en/volunteer.wml 468) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 469) Tor needs to be far more tested. This is a multi-part effort. To start

en/volunteer.wml 470) with, our unit test coverage should rise substantially, especially in

en/volunteer.wml 471) the areas outside the utility functions. This will require significant

en/volunteer.wml 472) refactoring of some parts of Tor, in order to dissociate as much logic

en/volunteer.wml 473) as possible from globals.
en/volunteer.wml 474) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 475) Additionally, we need to automate our performance testing. We've got

en/volunteer.wml 476) buildbot to automate our regular integration and compile testing already
en/volunteer.wml 477) (though we need somebody to set it up on Windows),

en/volunteer.wml 478) but we need to get our network simulation tests (as built in <a
en/volunteer.wml 479) href="https://svn.torproject.org/svn/torflow/trunk/README">TorFlow</a>)

en/volunteer.wml 480) updated for more recent versions of Tor, and designed to launch a test
en/volunteer.wml 481) network either on a single machine, or across several, so we can test

en/volunteer.wml 482) changes in performance on machines in different roles automatically.

en/volunteer.wml 483) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 484) 

en/volunteer.wml 485) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 486) <b>Help revive an independent Tor client implementation</b>

en/volunteer.wml 487) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 488) Reanimate one of the approaches to implement a Tor client in Java,
en/volunteer.wml 489) e.g. the <a href="http://onioncoffee.sourceforge.net/">OnionCoffee
en/volunteer.wml 490) project</a>, and make it run on <a
en/volunteer.wml 491) href="http://code.google.com/android/">Android</a>. The first step
en/volunteer.wml 492) would be to port the existing code and execute it in an Android
en/volunteer.wml 493) environment. Next, the code should be updated to support the newer Tor
en/volunteer.wml 494) protocol versions like the <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/dir-spec.txt">v3
en/volunteer.wml 495) directory protocol</a>. Further, support for requesting or even

en/volunteer.wml 496) providing Tor hidden services would be neat, but not required.
en/volunteer.wml 497) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 498) A prospective developer should be able to understand and write new Java
en/volunteer.wml 499) code, including

en/volunteer.wml 500) a Java cryptography API. Being able to read C code would be helpful,

en/volunteer.wml 501) too. One should be willing to read the existing documentation,

en/volunteer.wml 502) implement code based on it, and refine the documentation
en/volunteer.wml 503) when things are underdocumented. This project is mostly about coding and

en/volunteer.wml 504) to a small degree about design.
en/volunteer.wml 505) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 506) 
en/volunteer.wml 507) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 508) <b>Bring moniTor to life</b>
en/volunteer.wml 509) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 510) Implement a <a href="http://www.ss64.com/bash/top.html">top-like</a>
en/volunteer.wml 511) management tool for Tor relays. The purpose of such a tool would be
en/volunteer.wml 512) to monitor a local Tor relay via its control port and include useful
en/volunteer.wml 513) system information of the underlying machine. When running this tool, it
en/volunteer.wml 514) would dynamically update its content like top does for Linux processes.
en/volunteer.wml 515) <a href="http://archives.seul.org/or/dev/Jan-2008/msg00005.html">This

en/volunteer.wml 516) or-dev post</a> might be a good first read.
en/volunteer.wml 517) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 518) A person interested in this should be familiar

en/volunteer.wml 519) with or willing to learn about administering a Tor relay and configuring
en/volunteer.wml 520) it via its control port. As an initial prototype is written in Python,
en/volunteer.wml 521) some knowledge about writing Python code would be helpful, too. This

en/volunteer.wml 522) project is one part about identifying requirements to such a
en/volunteer.wml 523) tool and designing its interface, and one part lots of coding.

en/volunteer.wml 524) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 525) 

en/volunteer.wml 526) <!-- Removed, unless Mike still wants this to be in.

en/volunteer.wml 527) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 528) <b>Torbutton improvements</b>
en/volunteer.wml 529) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 530) Torbutton has a number of improvements that can be made in the post-1.2
en/volunteer.wml 531) timeframe. Most of these are documented as feature requests in the <a

en/volunteer.wml 532) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?tasks=all&project=5">Torbutton

en/volunteer.wml 533) flyspray section</a>. Good examples include: stripping off node.exit on http
en/volunteer.wml 534) headers, more fine-grained control over formfill blocking, improved referrer

en/volunteer.wml 535) spoofing based on the domain of the site (a-la <a

en/volunteer.wml 536) href="https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/953">refcontrol extension</a>),

en/volunteer.wml 537) tighter integration with Vidalia for reporting Tor status, a New Identity
en/volunteer.wml 538) button with Tor integration and multiple identity management, and anything

en/volunteer.wml 539) else you might think of.

en/volunteer.wml 540) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 541) This work would be independent coding in Javascript and the fun world of <a
en/volunteer.wml 542) href="http://www.mozilla.org/keymaster/gatekeeper/there.is.only.xul">XUL</a>,
en/volunteer.wml 543) with not too much involvement in the Tor internals.

en/volunteer.wml 544) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 545) -->

en/volunteer.wml 546) 

en/volunteer.wml 547) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 548) <b>Porting Polipo to Windows</b>
en/volunteer.wml 549) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 550) Help port <a
en/volunteer.wml 551) href="http://www.pps.jussieu.fr/~jch/software/polipo/">Polipo</a> to

en/volunteer.wml 552) Windows. Example topics to tackle include:
en/volunteer.wml 553) 1) handle spaces in path names and understand the filesystem
en/volunteer.wml 554) namespace — that is, where application data, personal data,

en/volunteer.wml 555) and program data typically reside in various versions of Windows. 2) the
en/volunteer.wml 556) ability to handle ipv6 communications. 3) the ability to asynchronously
en/volunteer.wml 557) query name servers, find the system nameservers, and manage netbios
en/volunteer.wml 558) and dns queries. 4) use native regex capabilities of Windows, rather
en/volunteer.wml 559) than using 3rd party GNU regex libraries. 5) manage events and buffers
en/volunteer.wml 560) natively (i.e. in Unix-like OSes, Polipo defaults to 25% of ram, in
en/volunteer.wml 561) Windows it's whatever the config specifies). 6) some sort of GUI config
en/volunteer.wml 562) and reporting tool, bonus if it has a systray icon with right clickable
en/volunteer.wml 563) menu options. Double bonus if it's cross-platform compatible.
en/volunteer.wml 564) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 565) 

en/volunteer.wml 566) <!-- Is Blossom development still happening?

en/volunteer.wml 567) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 568) <b>Rework and extend Blossom</b>
en/volunteer.wml 569) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 570) Rework and extend Blossom (a tool for monitoring and
en/volunteer.wml 571) selecting appropriate Tor circuits based upon exit node requirements
en/volunteer.wml 572) specified by the user) to gather data in a self-contained way, with
en/volunteer.wml 573) parameters easily configurable by the user.  Blossom is presently
en/volunteer.wml 574) implemented as a single Python script that interfaces with Tor using the
en/volunteer.wml 575) Controller interface and depends upon metadata about Tor nodes obtained
en/volunteer.wml 576) via external processes, such as a webpage indicating status of the nodes
en/volunteer.wml 577) plus publically available data from DNS, whois, etc.  This project has
en/volunteer.wml 578) two parts: (1) Determine which additional metadata may be useful and
en/volunteer.wml 579) rework Blossom so that it cleanly obtains the metadata on its own rather
en/volunteer.wml 580) than depend upon external scripts (this may, for example, involve
en/volunteer.wml 581) additional threads or inter-process communication), and (2) develop a
en/volunteer.wml 582) means by which the user can easily configure Blossom, starting with a
en/volunteer.wml 583) configuration file and possibly working up to a web configuration engine.

en/volunteer.wml 584) Knowledge of Tor and Python are important; knowledge of
en/volunteer.wml 585) TCP, interprocess communication, and Perl will also be helpful.  An
en/volunteer.wml 586) interest in network neutrality is important as well, since the
en/volunteer.wml 587) principles of evaluating and understanding internet inconsistency are at
en/volunteer.wml 588) the core of the Blossom effort.

en/volunteer.wml 589) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 590) 
en/volunteer.wml 591) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 592) <b>Improve Blossom: Allow users to qualitatively describe exit nodes they desire</b>
en/volunteer.wml 593) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 594) Develop and implement a means of affording Blossom
en/volunteer.wml 595) users the ability to qualitatively describe the exit node that they
en/volunteer.wml 596) want.  The Internet is an inconsistent place: some Tor exit nodes see
en/volunteer.wml 597) the world differently than others.  As presently implemented, Blossom (a
en/volunteer.wml 598) tool for monitoring and selecting appropriate Tor circuits based upon
en/volunteer.wml 599) exit node requirements specified by the user) lacks a sufficiently rich
en/volunteer.wml 600) language to describe how the different vantage points are different.
en/volunteer.wml 601) For example, some exit nodes may have an upstream network that filters
en/volunteer.wml 602) certain kinds of traffic or certain websites.  Other exit nodes may
en/volunteer.wml 603) provide access to special content as a result of their location, perhaps
en/volunteer.wml 604) as a result of discrimination on the part of the content providers
en/volunteer.wml 605) themselves.  This project has two parts: (1) develop a language for
en/volunteer.wml 606) describing characteristics of networks in which exit nodes reside, and
en/volunteer.wml 607) (2) incorporate this language into Blossom so that users can select Tor
en/volunteer.wml 608) paths based upon the description.

en/volunteer.wml 609) Knowledge of Tor and Python are important; knowledge of
en/volunteer.wml 610) TCP, interprocess communication, and Perl will also be helpful.  An
en/volunteer.wml 611) interest in network neutrality is important as well, since the
en/volunteer.wml 612) principles of evaluating and understanding internet inconsistency are at
en/volunteer.wml 613) the core of the Blossom effort.

en/volunteer.wml 614) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 615) -->

en/volunteer.wml 616) 

en/volunteer.wml 617) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 618) <b>Implement a torrent-based scheme for downloading Thandy packages</b>
en/volunteer.wml 619) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 620) <a
en/volunteer.wml 621) href="http://git.torproject.org/checkout/thandy/master/specs/thandy-spec.txt">Thandy</a>
en/volunteer.wml 622) is a relatively new software to allow automatic updates of Tor and related
en/volunteer.wml 623) software. Currently, there are very few users, but we expect Thandy to be
en/volunteer.wml 624) used by almost every Tor user in the future. To avoid crashing servers on
en/volunteer.wml 625) the day of a Tor update, we need new ways to distribute new packages
en/volunteer.wml 626) efficiently, and using libtorrent seems to be a possible solution. If you
en/volunteer.wml 627) think of other good ideas, great - please do let us know!<br />
en/volunteer.wml 628) We also need to investigate how to include our mirrors better. If possible,
en/volunteer.wml 629) there should be an easy way for them to help distributing the packages.
en/volunteer.wml 630) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 631) 

en/volunteer.wml 632) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 633) <b>Torbutton equivalent for Thunderbird</b>
en/volunteer.wml 634) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 635) We're hearing from an increasing number of users that they want to use
en/volunteer.wml 636) Thunderbird with Tor. However, there are plenty of application-level
en/volunteer.wml 637) concerns, for example, by default Thunderbird will put your hostname in
en/volunteer.wml 638) the outgoing mail that it sends. At some point we should start a new
en/volunteer.wml 639) push to build a Thunderbird extension similar to Torbutton.
en/volunteer.wml 640) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 641) 

en/volunteer.wml 642) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 643) <b>New Torbutton Features</b>
en/volunteer.wml 644) <br/>
en/volunteer.wml 645) There are several <a
en/volunteer.wml 646) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?tasks=all&project=5&type=2">good
en/volunteer.wml 647) feature requests</a> on the Torbutton Flyspray section. In particular, <a
en/volunteer.wml 648) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&id=523">Integrating
en/volunteer.wml 649) 'New Identity' with Vidalia</a>, 
en/volunteer.wml 650) <a href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&id=940">ways of
en/volunteer.wml 651) managing multiple cookie jars/identities</a>, <a
en/volunteer.wml 652) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&id=637">preserving
en/volunteer.wml 653) specific cookies</a> when
en/volunteer.wml 654) cookies are cleared, 
en/volunteer.wml 655) <a
en/volunteer.wml 656) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&id=524">better
en/volunteer.wml 657) referrer spoofing</a>, <a
en/volunteer.wml 658) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&id=564">correct
en/volunteer.wml 659) Tor status reporting</a>, and <a
en/volunteer.wml 660) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&id=462">"tor://"
en/volunteer.wml 661) and "tors://" urls</a> are all interesting
en/volunteer.wml 662) features that could be added.
en/volunteer.wml 663) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 664) This work would be independent coding in Javascript and the fun world of <a
en/volunteer.wml 665) href="http://www.mozilla.org/keymaster/gatekeeper/there.is.only.xul">XUL</a>,
en/volunteer.wml 666) with not too much involvement in the Tor internals.
en/volunteer.wml 667) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 668) 

en/volunteer.wml 669) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 670) <b>Usability testing of Tor</b>
en/volunteer.wml 671) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 672) Especially the browser bundle, ideally amongst our target demographic.
en/volunteer.wml 673) That would help a lot in knowing what needs to be done in terms of bug
en/volunteer.wml 674) fixes or new features. We get this informally at the moment, but a more
en/volunteer.wml 675) structured process would be better.
en/volunteer.wml 676) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 677) 

en/volunteer.wml 678) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 679) <b>Bring up new ideas!</b>
en/volunteer.wml 680) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 681) Don't like any of these? Look at the <a

en/volunteer.wml 682) href="<svnsandbox>doc/roadmaps/2008-12-19-roadmap-full.pdf">Tor development

en/volunteer.wml 683) roadmap</a> for more ideas.
en/volunteer.wml 684) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 685) 

en/volunteer.wml 686) </ol>
en/volunteer.wml 687) 

en/volunteer.wml 688) <a id="OtherCoding"></a>
en/volunteer.wml 689) <h2><a class="anchor" href="#OtherCoding">Other Coding and Design related ideas</a></h2>

volunteer.html   690) <ol>

en/volunteer.wml 691) <li>Tor relays don't work well on Windows XP. On

en/volunteer.wml 692) Windows, Tor uses the standard <tt>select()</tt> system

en/volunteer.wml 693) call, which uses space in the non-page pool. This means

en/volunteer.wml 694) that a medium sized Tor relay will empty the non-page pool, <a

en/volunteer.wml 695) href="https://wiki.torproject.org/noreply/TheOnionRouter/WindowsBufferProblems">causing

en/volunteer.wml 696) havoc and system crashes</a>. We should probably be using overlapped IO

en/volunteer.wml 697) instead. One solution would be to teach <a
en/volunteer.wml 698) href="http://www.monkey.org/~provos/libevent/">libevent</a> how to use
en/volunteer.wml 699) overlapped IO rather than select() on Windows, and then adapt Tor to

en/volunteer.wml 700) the new libevent interface. Christian King made a

en/volunteer.wml 701) <a href="https://svn.torproject.org/svn/libevent-urz/trunk/">good

en/volunteer.wml 702) start</a> on this in the summer of 2007.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 703) 

en/volunteer.wml 704) <li>We need to actually start building our <a href="<page
en/volunteer.wml 705) documentation>#DesignDoc">blocking-resistance design</a>. This involves

en/volunteer.wml 706) fleshing out the design, modifying many different pieces of Tor, adapting
en/volunteer.wml 707) <a href="http://vidalia-project.net/">Vidalia</a> so it supports the
en/volunteer.wml 708) new features, and planning for deployment.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 709) 

en/volunteer.wml 710) <li>We need a flexible simulator framework for studying end-to-end
en/volunteer.wml 711) traffic confirmation attacks. Many researchers have whipped up ad hoc
en/volunteer.wml 712) simulators to support their intuition either that the attacks work
en/volunteer.wml 713) really well or that some defense works great. Can we build a simulator
en/volunteer.wml 714) that's clearly documented and open enough that everybody knows it's
en/volunteer.wml 715) giving a reasonable answer? This will spur a lot of new research.
en/volunteer.wml 716) See the entry <a href="#Research">below</a> on confirmation attacks for
en/volunteer.wml 717) details on the research side of this task &mdash; who knows, when it's
en/volunteer.wml 718) done maybe you can help write a paper or three also.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 719) 

en/volunteer.wml 720) <li>Tor 0.1.1.x and later include support for hardware crypto accelerators

en/volunteer.wml 721) via OpenSSL. Nobody has ever tested it, though. Does somebody want to get

volunteer.html   722) a card and let us know how it goes?</li>

en/volunteer.wml 723) 

volunteer.html   724) <li>Perform a security analysis of Tor with <a
volunteer.html   725) href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuzz_testing">"fuzz"</a>. Determine

en/volunteer.wml 726) if there are good fuzzing libraries out there for what we want. Win fame by

volunteer.html   727) getting credit when we put out a new release because of you!</li>

en/volunteer.wml 728) 

volunteer.html   729) <li>Tor uses TCP for transport and TLS for link
volunteer.html   730) encryption. This is nice and simple, but it means all cells
volunteer.html   731) on a link are delayed when a single packet gets dropped, and
volunteer.html   732) it means we can only reasonably support TCP streams. We have a <a

en/volunteer.wml 733) href="https://wiki.torproject.org/noreply/TheOnionRouter/TorFAQ#TransportIPnotTCP">list

en/volunteer.wml 734) of reasons why we haven't shifted to UDP transport</a>, but it would
en/volunteer.wml 735) be great to see that list get shorter. We also have a proposed <a

en/volunteer.wml 736) href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/proposals/100-tor-spec-udp.txt">specification
en/volunteer.wml 737) for Tor and

en/volunteer.wml 738) UDP</a> &mdash; please let us know what's wrong with it.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 739) 

volunteer.html   740) <li>We're not that far from having IPv6 support for destination addresses
volunteer.html   741) (at exit nodes). If you care strongly about IPv6, that's probably the
volunteer.html   742) first place to start.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 743) 
en/volunteer.wml 744) <li>We need a way to generate the website diagrams (for example, the "How
en/volunteer.wml 745) Tor Works" pictures on the <a href="<page overview>">overview page</a>
en/volunteer.wml 746) from source, so we can translate them as UTF-8 text rather than edit
en/volunteer.wml 747) them by hand with Gimp. We might want to
en/volunteer.wml 748) integrate this as an wml file so translations are easy and images are
en/volunteer.wml 749) generated in multiple languages whenever we build the website.</li>
en/volunteer.wml 750) 
en/volunteer.wml 751) <li>How can we make the <a
en/volunteer.wml 752) href="http://anonymityanywhere.com/incognito/">Incognito LiveCD</a>
en/volunteer.wml 753) easier to maintain, improve, and document?</li>

volunteer.html   754) </ol>
volunteer.html   755) 

en/volunteer.wml 756) <a id="Research"></a>
en/volunteer.wml 757) <h2><a class="anchor" href="#Research">Research</a></h2>

volunteer.html   758) <ol>

volunteer.html   759) <li>The "website fingerprinting attack": make a list of a few
volunteer.html   760) hundred popular websites, download their pages, and make a set of
volunteer.html   761) "signatures" for each site. Then observe a Tor client's traffic. As
volunteer.html   762) you watch him receive data, you quickly approach a guess about which
volunteer.html   763) (if any) of those sites he is visiting. First, how effective is
volunteer.html   764) this attack on the deployed Tor codebase? Then start exploring
volunteer.html   765) defenses: for example, we could change Tor's cell size from 512
volunteer.html   766) bytes to 1024 bytes, we could employ padding techniques like <a
volunteer.html   767) href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#timing-fc2004">defensive dropping</a>,
volunteer.html   768) or we could add traffic delays. How much of an impact do these have,
volunteer.html   769) and how much usability impact (using some suitable metric) is there from
volunteer.html   770) a successful defense in each case?</li>

volunteer.html   771) <li>The "end-to-end traffic confirmation attack":
volunteer.html   772) by watching traffic at Alice and at Bob, we can <a
volunteer.html   773) href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#danezis:pet2004">compare
volunteer.html   774) traffic signatures and become convinced that we're watching the same
volunteer.html   775) stream</a>. So far Tor accepts this as a fact of life and assumes this
volunteer.html   776) attack is trivial in all cases. First of all, is that actually true? How
volunteer.html   777) much traffic of what sort of distribution is needed before the adversary
volunteer.html   778) is confident he has won? Are there scenarios (e.g. not transmitting much)
volunteer.html   779) that slow down the attack? Do some traffic padding or traffic shaping
volunteer.html   780) schemes work better than others?</li>

en/volunteer.wml 781) <li>A related question is: Does running a relay/bridge provide additional
en/volunteer.wml 782) protection against these timing attacks? Can an external adversary that can't

en/volunteer.wml 783) see inside TLS links still recognize individual streams reliably?

en/volunteer.wml 784) Does the amount of traffic carried degrade this ability any? What if the
en/volunteer.wml 785) client-relay deliberately delayed upstream relayed traffic to create a queue
en/volunteer.wml 786) that could be used to mimic timings of client downstream traffic to make it
en/volunteer.wml 787) look like it was also relayed? This same queue could also be used for masking
en/volunteer.wml 788) timings in client upstream traffic with the techniques from <a
en/volunteer.wml 789) href="http://www.freehaven.net/anonbib/#ShWa-Timing06">adaptive padding</a>,
en/volunteer.wml 790) but without the need for additional traffic. Would such an interleaving of
en/volunteer.wml 791) client upstream traffic obscure timings for external adversaries? Would the
en/volunteer.wml 792) strategies need to be adjusted for asymmetric links? For example, on
en/volunteer.wml 793) asymmetric links, is it actually possible to differentiate client traffic from
en/volunteer.wml 794) natural bursts due to their asymmetric capacity? Or is it easier than
en/volunteer.wml 795) symmetric links for some other reason?</li>

en/volunteer.wml 796) <li>Repeat Murdoch and Danezis's <a
en/volunteer.wml 797) href="http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~sjm217/projects/anon/#torta">attack from
en/volunteer.wml 798) Oakland 05</a> on the current Tor network. See if you can learn why it
en/volunteer.wml 799) works well on some nodes and not well on others. (My theory is that the
en/volunteer.wml 800) fast nodes with spare capacity resist the attack better.) If that's true,
en/volunteer.wml 801) then experiment with the RelayBandwidthRate and RelayBandwidthBurst
en/volunteer.wml 802) options to run a relay that is used as a client while relaying the
en/volunteer.wml 803) attacker's traffic: as we crank down the RelayBandwidthRate, does the
en/volunteer.wml 804) attack get harder? What's the right ratio of RelayBandwidthRate to
en/volunteer.wml 805) actually capacity? Or is it a ratio at all? While we're at it, does a
en/volunteer.wml 806) much larger set of candidate relays increase the false positive rate
en/volunteer.wml 807) or other complexity for the attack? (The Tor network is now almost two
en/volunteer.wml 808) orders of magnitude larger than it was when they wrote their paper.) Be
en/volunteer.wml 809) sure to read <a href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#clog-the-queue">Don't
en/volunteer.wml 810) Clog the Queue</a> too.</li>

volunteer.html   811) <li>The "routing zones attack": most of the literature thinks of
volunteer.html   812) the network path between Alice and her entry node (and between the
volunteer.html   813) exit node and Bob) as a single link on some graph. In practice,
volunteer.html   814) though, the path traverses many autonomous systems (ASes), and <a
volunteer.html   815) href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#feamster:wpes2004">it's not uncommon
volunteer.html   816) that the same AS appears on both the entry path and the exit path</a>.
volunteer.html   817) Unfortunately, to accurately predict whether a given Alice, entry,
volunteer.html   818) exit, Bob quad will be dangerous, we need to download an entire Internet
volunteer.html   819) routing zone and perform expensive operations on it. Are there practical
volunteer.html   820) approximations, such as avoiding IP addresses in the same /8 network?</li>

en/volunteer.wml 821) <li>Other research questions regarding geographic diversity consider
en/volunteer.wml 822) the tradeoff between choosing an efficient circuit and choosing a random

en/volunteer.wml 823) circuit. Look at Stephen Rollyson's <a

en/volunteer.wml 824) href="http://swiki.cc.gatech.edu:8080/ugResearch/uploads/7/ImprovingTor.pdf">position
en/volunteer.wml 825) paper</a> on how to discard particularly slow choices without hurting

en/volunteer.wml 826) anonymity "too much". This line of reasoning needs more work and more
en/volunteer.wml 827) thinking, but it looks very promising.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 828) <li>Tor doesn't work very well when relays have asymmetric bandwidth

volunteer.html   829) (e.g. cable or DSL). Because Tor has separate TCP connections between
volunteer.html   830) each hop, if the incoming bytes are arriving just fine and the outgoing
volunteer.html   831) bytes are all getting dropped on the floor, the TCP push-back mechanisms
volunteer.html   832) don't really transmit this information back to the incoming streams.
volunteer.html   833) Perhaps Tor should detect when it's dropping a lot of outgoing packets,
volunteer.html   834) and rate-limit incoming streams to regulate this itself? I can imagine
volunteer.html   835) a build-up and drop-off scheme where we pick a conservative rate-limit,
volunteer.html   836) slowly increase it until we get lost packets, back off, repeat. We
volunteer.html   837) need somebody who's good with networks to simulate this and help design
volunteer.html   838) solutions; and/or we need to understand the extent of the performance
volunteer.html   839) degradation, and use this as motivation to reconsider UDP transport.</li>
volunteer.html   840) <li>A related topic is congestion control. Is our
volunteer.html   841) current design sufficient once we have heavy use? Maybe
volunteer.html   842) we should experiment with variable-sized windows rather
volunteer.html   843) than fixed-size windows? That seemed to go well in an <a
volunteer.html   844) href="http://www.psc.edu/networking/projects/hpn-ssh/theory.php">ssh
volunteer.html   845) throughput experiment</a>. We'll need to measure and tweak, and maybe
volunteer.html   846) overhaul if the results are good.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 847) <li>Our censorship-resistance goals include preventing
en/volunteer.wml 848) an attacker who's looking at Tor traffic on the wire from <a

en/volunteer.wml 849) href="<svnsandbox>doc/design-paper/blocking.html#sec:network-fingerprint">distinguishing

en/volunteer.wml 850) it from normal SSL traffic</a>. Obviously we can't achieve perfect
en/volunteer.wml 851) steganography and still remain usable, but for a first step we'd like to
en/volunteer.wml 852) block any attacks that can win by observing only a few packets. One of
en/volunteer.wml 853) the remaining attacks we haven't examined much is that Tor cells are 512
en/volunteer.wml 854) bytes, so the traffic on the wire may well be a multiple of 512 bytes.
en/volunteer.wml 855) How much does the batching and overhead in TLS records blur this on the
en/volunteer.wml 856) wire? Do different buffer flushing strategies in Tor affect this? Could
en/volunteer.wml 857) a bit of padding help a lot, or is this an attack we must accept?</li>

volunteer.html   858) <li>Tor circuits are built one hop at a time, so in theory we have the
volunteer.html   859) ability to make some streams exit from the second hop, some from the
volunteer.html   860) third, and so on. This seems nice because it breaks up the set of exiting

en/volunteer.wml 861) streams that a given relay can see. But if we want each stream to be safe,

volunteer.html   862) the "shortest" path should be at least 3 hops long by our current logic, so
volunteer.html   863) the rest will be even longer. We need to examine this performance / security
volunteer.html   864) tradeoff.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 865) <li>It's not that hard to DoS Tor relays or directory authorities. Are client

volunteer.html   866) puzzles the right answer? What other practical approaches are there? Bonus
volunteer.html   867) if they're backward-compatible with the current Tor protocol.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 868) <li>Programs like <a

en/volunteer.wml 869) href="<page torbutton/index>">Torbutton</a> aim to hide

en/volunteer.wml 870) your browser's UserAgent string by replacing it with a uniform answer for
en/volunteer.wml 871) every Tor user. That way the attacker can't splinter Tor's anonymity set
en/volunteer.wml 872) by looking at that header. It tries to pick a string that is commonly used
en/volunteer.wml 873) by non-Tor users too, so it doesn't stand out. Question one: how badly
en/volunteer.wml 874) do we hurt ourselves by periodically updating the version of Firefox
en/volunteer.wml 875) that Torbutton claims to be? If we update it too often, we splinter the
en/volunteer.wml 876) anonymity sets ourselves. If we don't update it often enough, then all the
en/volunteer.wml 877) Tor users stand out because they claim to be running a quite old version
en/volunteer.wml 878) of Firefox. The answer here probably depends on the Firefox versions seen
en/volunteer.wml 879) in the wild. Question two: periodically people ask us to cycle through N
en/volunteer.wml 880) UserAgent strings rather than stick with one. Does this approach help,
en/volunteer.wml 881) hurt, or not matter? Consider: cookies and recognizing Torbutton users
en/volunteer.wml 882) by their rotating UserAgents; malicious websites who only attack certain
en/volunteer.wml 883) browsers; and whether the answers to question one impact this answer.
en/volunteer.wml 884) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 885) <li>Right now Tor clients are willing to reuse a given circuit for ten
en/volunteer.wml 886) minutes after it's first used. The goal is to avoid loading down the
en/volunteer.wml 887) network with too many circuit extend operations, yet to also avoid having
en/volunteer.wml 888) clients use the same circuit for so long that the exit node can build a
en/volunteer.wml 889) useful pseudonymous profile of them. Alas, ten minutes is probably way
en/volunteer.wml 890) too long, especially if connections from multiple protocols (e.g. IM and
en/volunteer.wml 891) web browsing) are put on the same circuit. If we keep fixed the overall
en/volunteer.wml 892) number of circuit extends that the network needs to do, are there more
en/volunteer.wml 893) efficient and/or safer ways for clients to allocate streams to circuits,
en/volunteer.wml 894) or for clients to build preemptive circuits? Perhaps this research item
en/volunteer.wml 895) needs to start with gathering some traces of what connections typical
en/volunteer.wml 896) clients try to launch, so you have something realistic to try to optimize.
en/volunteer.wml 897) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 898) <li>How many bridge relays do you need to know to maintain
en/volunteer.wml 899) reachability? We should measure the churn in our bridges. If there is
en/volunteer.wml 900) lots of churn, are there ways to keep bridge users more likely to stay
en/volunteer.wml 901) connected?
en/volunteer.wml 902) </li>

volunteer.html   903) </ol>
volunteer.html   904) 

en/volunteer.wml 905) <p>

en/volunteer.wml 906) <a href="<page contact>">Let us know</a> if you've made progress on any
en/volunteer.wml 907) of these!

en/volunteer.wml 908) </p>

volunteer.html   909) 

en/volunteer.wml 910)   </div><!-- #main -->

volunteer.html   911) 

en/volunteer.wml 912) #include <foot.wmi>