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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 should patch Dug Song's "dsocks" program to use Tor's
en/volunteer.wml  37) <i>mapaddress</i> commands from the controller interface, so we
en/volunteer.wml  38) don't waste a whole round-trip inside Tor doing the resolve before
en/volunteer.wml  39) connecting.</li>
en/volunteer.wml  40) <li>We need to make our <i>torify</i> script detect which of tsocks or
en/volunteer.wml  41) dsocks is installed, and call them appropriately. This probably means
en/volunteer.wml  42) unifying their interfaces, and might involve sharing code between them
en/volunteer.wml  43) or discarding one entirely.</li>
en/volunteer.wml  44) </ul>

en/volunteer.wml  45) </li>

en/volunteer.wml  46) <li>People running relays tell us they want to have one BandwidthRate

en/volunteer.wml  47) during some part of the day, and a different BandwidthRate at other
en/volunteer.wml  48) parts of the day. Rather than coding this inside Tor, we should have a
en/volunteer.wml  49) little script that speaks via the <a href="<page gui/index>">Tor
en/volunteer.wml  50) Controller Interface</a>, and does a setconf to change the bandwidth

en/volunteer.wml  51) rate. There is one for Unix and Mac already (it uses bash and cron),

en/volunteer.wml  52) but Windows users still need a solution.

en/volunteer.wml  53) </li>

volunteer.html    54) <li>Speaking of geolocation data, somebody should draw a map of the Earth

en/volunteer.wml  55) with a pin-point for each Tor relay. Bonus points if it updates as the

en/volunteer.wml  56) network grows and changes. Unfortunately, the easy ways to do this involve
en/volunteer.wml  57) sending all the data to Google and having them draw the map for you. How
en/volunteer.wml  58) much does this impact privacy, and do we have any other good options?</li>

volunteer.html    59) </ol>
volunteer.html    60) 

en/volunteer.wml  61) <a id="Advocacy"></a>

en/volunteer.wml  62) <h2><a class="anchor" href="#Advocacy">Advocacy</a></h2>
en/volunteer.wml  63) <ol>

en/volunteer.wml  64) <li>Create a <a href="https://wiki.torproject.org/noreply/CommunityLogos">community logo</a> under a Creative Commons license that all can use and modify</li>

en/volunteer.wml  65) <li>Create a presentation that can be used for various user group meetings around the world</li>
en/volunteer.wml  66) <li>Create a video about your positive uses of Tor.  Some have already started on Seesmic.</li>
en/volunteer.wml  67) <li>Create a poster, or a set of posters, around a theme, such as "Tor for Freedom!"</li>
en/volunteer.wml  68) </ol>
en/volunteer.wml  69) 

en/volunteer.wml  70) <a id="Documentation"></a>
en/volunteer.wml  71) <h2><a class="anchor" href="#Documentation">Documentation</a></h2>

volunteer.html    72) <ol>

en/volunteer.wml  73) <li>Please help Matt Edman with the documentation and how-tos for his

en/volunteer.wml  74) Tor controller,

en/volunteer.wml  75) <a href="<page vidalia/index>">Vidalia</a>.</li>

en/volunteer.wml  76) <li>Evaluate and document

en/volunteer.wml  77) <a href="https://wiki.torproject.org/wiki/TheOnionRouter/TorifyHOWTO">our

en/volunteer.wml  78) list of programs</a> that can be configured to use Tor.</li>

volunteer.html    79) <li>We need better documentation for dynamically intercepting

en/volunteer.wml  80) connections and sending them through Tor. tsocks (Linux), dsocks (BSD),

en/volunteer.wml  81) and freecap (Windows) seem to be good candidates, as would better
en/volunteer.wml  82) use of our new TransPort feature.</li>

en/volunteer.wml  83) <li>We have a huge list of <a href="https://wiki.torproject.org/noreply/TheOnionRouter/SupportPrograms">potentially useful

volunteer.html    84) programs that interface to Tor</a>. Which ones are useful in which
volunteer.html    85) situations? Please help us test them out and document your results.</li>

en/volunteer.wml  86) <li>Help translate the web page and documentation into other
en/volunteer.wml  87) languages. See the <a href="<page translation>">translation

en/volunteer.wml  88) guidelines</a> if you want to help out. We especially need Arabic or
en/volunteer.wml  89) Farsi translations, for the many Tor users in censored areas.</li>

volunteer.html    90) </ol>
volunteer.html    91) 

en/volunteer.wml  92) <a id="Coding"></a>

en/volunteer.wml  93) <a id="Summer"></a>
en/volunteer.wml  94) <a id="Projects"></a>

en/volunteer.wml  95) <h2><a class="anchor" href="#Projects">Good Coding Projects</a></h2>

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

en/volunteer.wml  98) You may find some of these projects to be good <a href="<page

en/volunteer.wml  99) gsoc>">Google Summer of Code 2010</a> ideas. We have labelled each idea

en/volunteer.wml 100) with how useful it would be to the overall Tor project (priority), how
en/volunteer.wml 101) much work we expect it would be (effort level), how much clue you should
en/volunteer.wml 102) start with (skill level), and which of our <a href="<page
en/volunteer.wml 103) people>#Core">core developers</a> would be good mentors.
en/volunteer.wml 104) If one or more of these ideas looks promising to you, please <a
en/volunteer.wml 105) href="<page contact>">contact us</a> to discuss your plans rather than
en/volunteer.wml 106) sending blind applications. You may also want to propose your own project
en/volunteer.wml 107) idea which often results in the best applications.

en/volunteer.wml 108) </p>
en/volunteer.wml 109) 

en/volunteer.wml 110) <ol>
en/volunteer.wml 111) 

en/volunteer.wml 112) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 113) <b>Tor Browser Bundle for Linux/Mac OS X</b>

en/volunteer.wml 114) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 115) Priority: <i>High</i>

en/volunteer.wml 116) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 117) Effort Level: <i>High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 118) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 119) Skill Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 120) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 121) Likely Mentors: <i>Steven, Andrew</i>
en/volunteer.wml 122) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 123) The Tor Browser Bundle incorporates Tor, Firefox, Polipo, and the Vidalia user
en/volunteer.wml 124) interface (and optionally the <a href="http://pidgin.im/">Pidgin</a> Instant Messaging client). Components are pre-configured to operate in a secure way, and it has very few dependencies on the

en/volunteer.wml 125) installed operating system. It has therefore become one of the most
en/volunteer.wml 126) easy to use, and popular, ways to use Tor on Windows.
en/volunteer.wml 127) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 128) However, there is currently no working package for Linux and Mac OS

en/volunteer.wml 129) X, so this project would be to implement Tor Browser Bundle for these
en/volunteer.wml 130) platforms. This will involve modifications to Vidalia (C++), possibly
en/volunteer.wml 131) Firefox (C) then creating and testing the launcher on a range of

en/volunteer.wml 132) operating system versions and configurations to verify portability.  Some work on this was completed as part of the Google Summer of Code 2009.  

en/volunteer.wml 133) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 134) Students should be familiar with application development on one or
en/volunteer.wml 135) preferably both of Linux and Mac OS X, and be comfortable with C/C++
en/volunteer.wml 136) and shell scripting.
en/volunteer.wml 137) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 138) Part of this project could be usability testing of Tor Browser Bundle,
en/volunteer.wml 139) ideally amongst our target demographic.
en/volunteer.wml 140) That would help a lot in knowing what needs to be done in terms of bug
en/volunteer.wml 141) fixes or new features. We get this informally at the moment, but a more
en/volunteer.wml 142) structured process would be better.
en/volunteer.wml 143) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 144) 

en/volunteer.wml 145) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 146) <b>Help track the overall Tor Network status</b>

en/volunteer.wml 147) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 148) Priority: <i>Medium to High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 149) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 150) Effort Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 151) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 152) Skill Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 153) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 154) Likely Mentors: <i>Karsten, Roger</i>

en/volunteer.wml 155) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 156) It would be great to set up an automated system for tracking network
en/volunteer.wml 157) health over time, graphing it, etc. Part of this project would involve
en/volunteer.wml 158) inventing better metrics for assessing network health and growth. Is the
en/volunteer.wml 159) average uptime of the network increasing? How many relays are qualifying
en/volunteer.wml 160) for Guard status this month compared to last month? What's the turnover
en/volunteer.wml 161) in terms of new relays showing up and relays shutting off? Periodically
en/volunteer.wml 162) people collect brief snapshots, but where it gets really interesting is
en/volunteer.wml 163) when we start tracking data points over time.
en/volunteer.wml 164) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 165) Data could be collected from the Tor Network Scanners in <a
en/volunteer.wml 166) href="https://svn.torproject.org/svn/torflow/trunk/README">TorFlow</a>, from

en/volunteer.wml 167) the server descriptors that each relay publishes, and from other
en/volunteer.wml 168) sources. Results over time could be integrated into one of the <a
en/volunteer.wml 169) href="https://torstatus.blutmagie.de/">Tor Status</a> web pages, or be
en/volunteer.wml 170) kept separate. Speaking of the Tor Status pages, take a look at Roger's
en/volunteer.wml 171) <a href="http://archives.seul.org/or/talk/Jan-2008/msg00300.html">Tor
en/volunteer.wml 172) Status wish list</a>.
en/volunteer.wml 173) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 174) 
en/volunteer.wml 175) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 176) <b>Improving Tor's ability to resist censorship</b>
en/volunteer.wml 177) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 178) Priority: <i>Medium to High</i>

en/volunteer.wml 179) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 180) Effort Level: <i>Medium</i>

en/volunteer.wml 181) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 182) Skill Level: <i>High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 183) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 184) Likely Mentors: <i>Nick, Roger, Steven</i>

en/volunteer.wml 185) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 186) The Tor 0.2.0.x series makes <a
en/volunteer.wml 187) href="<svnsandbox>doc/design-paper/blocking.html">significant
en/volunteer.wml 188) improvements</a> in resisting national and organizational censorship.
en/volunteer.wml 189) But Tor still needs better mechanisms for some parts of its
en/volunteer.wml 190) anti-censorship design.  For example, current Tors can only listen on a
en/volunteer.wml 191) single address/port combination at a time.  There's
en/volunteer.wml 192) <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/proposals/118-multiple-orports.txt">a
en/volunteer.wml 193) proposal to address this limitation</a> and allow clients to connect
en/volunteer.wml 194) to any given Tor on multiple addresses and ports, but it needs more
en/volunteer.wml 195) work.  Another anti-censorship project (far more difficult) is to try
en/volunteer.wml 196) to make Tor more scanning-resistant.  Right now, an adversary can identify
en/volunteer.wml 197) <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/proposals/125-bridges.txt">Tor bridges</a>
en/volunteer.wml 198) just by trying to connect to them, following the Tor protocol, and
en/volunteer.wml 199) seeing if they respond.  To solve this, bridges could
en/volunteer.wml 200) <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/design-paper/blocking.html#tth_sEc9.3">act like
en/volunteer.wml 201) webservers</a> (HTTP or HTTPS) when contacted by port-scanning tools,
en/volunteer.wml 202) and not act like bridges until the user provides a bridge-specific key.
en/volunteer.wml 203) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 204) This project involves a lot of research and design. One of the big
en/volunteer.wml 205) challenges will be identifying and crafting approaches that can still
en/volunteer.wml 206) resist an adversary even after the adversary knows the design, and
en/volunteer.wml 207) then trading off censorship resistance with usability and robustness.
en/volunteer.wml 208) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 209) 
en/volunteer.wml 210) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 211) <b>Tuneup Tor!</b>

en/volunteer.wml 212) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 213) Priority: <i>Medium to High</i>

en/volunteer.wml 214) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 215) Effort Level: <i>Medium to High</i>

en/volunteer.wml 216) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 217) Skill Level: <i>High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 218) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 219) Likely Mentors: <i>Nick, Roger, Mike, Karsten</i>
en/volunteer.wml 220) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 221) Right now, Tor relays measure and report their own bandwidth, and Tor
en/volunteer.wml 222) clients choose which relays to use in part based on that bandwidth.
en/volunteer.wml 223) This approach is vulnerable to
en/volunteer.wml 224) <a href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#bauer:wpes2007">attacks where
en/volunteer.wml 225) relays lie about their bandwidth</a>;
en/volunteer.wml 226) to address this, Tor currently caps the maximum bandwidth
en/volunteer.wml 227) it's willing to believe any relay provides.  This is a limited fix, and
en/volunteer.wml 228) a waste of bandwidth capacity to boot.  Instead,
en/volunteer.wml 229) Tor should possibly measure bandwidth in a more distributed way, perhaps
en/volunteer.wml 230) as described in the
en/volunteer.wml 231) <a href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/author.html#snader08">"A Tune-up for
en/volunteer.wml 232) Tor"</a> paper
en/volunteer.wml 233) by Snader and Borisov. One could use current testing code to
en/volunteer.wml 234) double-check this paper's findings and verify the extent to which they
en/volunteer.wml 235) dovetail with Tor as deployed in the wild, and determine good ways to
en/volunteer.wml 236) incorporate them into their suggestions Tor network without adding too
en/volunteer.wml 237) much communications overhead between relays and directory
en/volunteer.wml 238) authorities.

en/volunteer.wml 239) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 240) 
en/volunteer.wml 241) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 242) <b>Improving Polipo on Windows</b>

en/volunteer.wml 243) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 244) Priority: <i>Medium to High</i>

en/volunteer.wml 245) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 246) Effort Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 247) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 248) Skill Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 249) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 250) Likely Mentors: <i>Martin</i>

en/volunteer.wml 251) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 252) Help port <a
en/volunteer.wml 253) href="http://www.pps.jussieu.fr/~jch/software/polipo/">Polipo</a> to
en/volunteer.wml 254) Windows. Example topics to tackle include:
en/volunteer.wml 255) 1) the ability to asynchronously
en/volunteer.wml 256) query name servers, find the system nameservers, and manage netbios
en/volunteer.wml 257) and dns queries.
en/volunteer.wml 258) 2) manage events and buffers
en/volunteer.wml 259) natively (i.e. in Unix-like OSes, Polipo defaults to 25% of ram, in
en/volunteer.wml 260) Windows it's whatever the config specifies). 3) some sort of GUI config
en/volunteer.wml 261) and reporting tool, bonus if it has a systray icon with right clickable
en/volunteer.wml 262) menu options. Double bonus if it's cross-platform compatible.

en/volunteer.wml 263) 4) allow the software to use the Windows Registry and handle proper
en/volunteer.wml 264) Windows directory locations, such as "C:\Program Files\Polipo"

en/volunteer.wml 265) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 266) 

en/volunteer.wml 267) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 268) <b>Tor Controller Status Event Interface</b>

en/volunteer.wml 269) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 270) Priority: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 271) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 272) Effort Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 273) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 274) Skill Level: <i>Low to Medium</i>

en/volunteer.wml 275) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 276) Likely Mentors: <i>Matt</i>
en/volunteer.wml 277) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 278) There are a number of status changes inside Tor of which the user may need

en/volunteer.wml 279) to be informed. For example, if the user is trying to set up his Tor as a
en/volunteer.wml 280) relay and Tor decides that its ports are not reachable from outside

en/volunteer.wml 281) the user's network, we should alert the user. Currently, all the user

en/volunteer.wml 282) gets is a couple log messages in Vidalia's 'message log' window, which they

en/volunteer.wml 283) likely never see since they don't receive a notification that something
en/volunteer.wml 284) has gone wrong. Even if the user does actually look at the message log,
en/volunteer.wml 285) most of the messages make little sense to the novice user.
en/volunteer.wml 286) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 287) Tor has the ability to inform Vidalia of many such status changes, and
en/volunteer.wml 288) we recently implemented support for a couple of these events. Still,
en/volunteer.wml 289) there are many more status events the user should be informed of and we
en/volunteer.wml 290) need a better UI for actually displaying them to the user.
en/volunteer.wml 291) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 292) The goal of this project then is to design and implement a UI for
en/volunteer.wml 293) displaying Tor status events to the user. For example, we might put a
en/volunteer.wml 294) little badge on Vidalia's tray icon that alerts the user to new status
en/volunteer.wml 295) events they should look at. Double-clicking the icon could bring up a
en/volunteer.wml 296) dialog that summarizes recent status events in simple terms and maybe

en/volunteer.wml 297) suggests a remedy for any negative events if they can be corrected by

en/volunteer.wml 298) the user. Of course, this is just an example and one is free to

en/volunteer.wml 299) suggest another approach.
en/volunteer.wml 300) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 301) A person undertaking this project should have good UI design and layout

en/volunteer.wml 302) and some C++ development experience. Previous experience with Qt and

en/volunteer.wml 303) Qt's Designer will be very helpful, but are not required. Some

en/volunteer.wml 304) English writing ability will also be useful, since this project will
en/volunteer.wml 305) likely involve writing small amounts of help documentation that should
en/volunteer.wml 306) be understandable by non-technical users. Bonus points for some graphic
en/volunteer.wml 307) design/Photoshop fu, since we might want/need some shiny new icons too.
en/volunteer.wml 308) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 309) 

en/volunteer.wml 310) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 311) <b>Improve our unit testing process</b>

en/volunteer.wml 312) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 313) Priority: <i>Medium</i>

en/volunteer.wml 314) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 315) Effort Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 316) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 317) Skill Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 318) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 319) Likely Mentors: <i>Nick, Roger</i>
en/volunteer.wml 320) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 321) Tor needs to be far more tested. This is a multi-part effort. To start
en/volunteer.wml 322) with, our unit test coverage should rise substantially, especially in
en/volunteer.wml 323) the areas outside the utility functions. This will require significant
en/volunteer.wml 324) refactoring of some parts of Tor, in order to dissociate as much logic
en/volunteer.wml 325) as possible from globals.
en/volunteer.wml 326) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 327) Additionally, we need to automate our performance testing. We've got
en/volunteer.wml 328) buildbot to automate our regular integration and compile testing already
en/volunteer.wml 329) (though we need somebody to set it up on Windows),
en/volunteer.wml 330) but we need to get our network simulation tests (as built in <a
en/volunteer.wml 331) href="https://svn.torproject.org/svn/torflow/trunk/README">TorFlow</a>)
en/volunteer.wml 332) updated for more recent versions of Tor, and designed to launch a test
en/volunteer.wml 333) network either on a single machine, or across several, so we can test
en/volunteer.wml 334) changes in performance on machines in different roles automatically.
en/volunteer.wml 335) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 336) 
en/volunteer.wml 337) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 338) <b>Help revive an independent Tor client implementation</b>
en/volunteer.wml 339) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 340) Priority: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 341) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 342) Effort Level: <i>High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 343) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 344) Skill Level: <i>Medium to High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 345) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 346) Likely Mentors: <i>Karsten, Nick</i>
en/volunteer.wml 347) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 348) Reanimate one of the approaches to implement a Tor client in Java,
en/volunteer.wml 349) e.g. the <a href="http://onioncoffee.sourceforge.net/">OnionCoffee
en/volunteer.wml 350) project</a>, and make it run on <a
en/volunteer.wml 351) href="http://code.google.com/android/">Android</a>. The first step
en/volunteer.wml 352) would be to port the existing code and execute it in an Android
en/volunteer.wml 353) environment. Next, the code should be updated to support the newer Tor
en/volunteer.wml 354) protocol versions like the <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/dir-spec.txt">v3
en/volunteer.wml 355) directory protocol</a>. Further, support for requesting or even
en/volunteer.wml 356) providing Tor hidden services would be neat, but not required.
en/volunteer.wml 357) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 358) A prospective developer should be able to understand and write new Java
en/volunteer.wml 359) code, including
en/volunteer.wml 360) a Java cryptography API. Being able to read C code would be helpful,
en/volunteer.wml 361) too. One should be willing to read the existing documentation,
en/volunteer.wml 362) implement code based on it, and refine the documentation
en/volunteer.wml 363) when things are underdocumented. This project is mostly about coding and
en/volunteer.wml 364) to a small degree about design.
en/volunteer.wml 365) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 366) 
en/volunteer.wml 367) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 368) <b>New Torbutton Features</b>
en/volunteer.wml 369) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 370) Priority: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 371) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 372) Effort Level: <i>High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 373) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 374) Skill Level: <i>High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 375) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 376) Likely Mentors: <i>Mike</i>
en/volunteer.wml 377) <br/>
en/volunteer.wml 378) There are several <a
en/volunteer.wml 379) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?tasks=all&amp;project=5&amp;type=2">good
en/volunteer.wml 380) feature requests</a> on the Torbutton Flyspray section. In particular, <a
en/volunteer.wml 381) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&amp;id=523">Integrating
en/volunteer.wml 382) 'New Identity' with Vidalia</a>,
en/volunteer.wml 383) <a href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&amp;id=940">ways of
en/volunteer.wml 384) managing multiple cookie jars/identities</a>, <a
en/volunteer.wml 385) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&amp;id=637">preserving
en/volunteer.wml 386) specific cookies</a> when cookies are cleared,
en/volunteer.wml 387) <a
en/volunteer.wml 388) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&amp;id=524">better
en/volunteer.wml 389) referrer spoofing</a>, <a
en/volunteer.wml 390) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&amp;id=564">correct
en/volunteer.wml 391) Tor status reporting</a>, and <a
en/volunteer.wml 392) href="https://bugs.torproject.org/flyspray/index.php?do=details&amp;id=462">"tor://"
en/volunteer.wml 393) and "tors://" urls</a> are all interesting
en/volunteer.wml 394) features that could be added.
en/volunteer.wml 395) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 396) This work would be independent coding in Javascript and the fun world of <a
en/volunteer.wml 397) href="http://www.mozilla.org/keymaster/gatekeeper/there.is.only.xul">XUL</a>,
en/volunteer.wml 398) with not too much involvement in the Tor internals.
en/volunteer.wml 399) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 400) 
en/volunteer.wml 401) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 402) <b>New Thandy Features</b>
en/volunteer.wml 403) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 404) Priority: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 405) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 406) Effort Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 407) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 408) Skill Level: <i>Medium to High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 409) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 410) Likely Mentors: <i>Martin</i>
en/volunteer.wml 411) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 412) Additional capabilities are needed for assisted updates of all the Tor
en/volunteer.wml 413) related software for Windows and other operating systems. Some of the
en/volunteer.wml 414) features to consider include:
en/volunteer.wml 415) 1) Integration of the <a
en/volunteer.wml 416) href="http://chandlerproject.org/Projects/MeTooCrypto">MeTooCrypto
en/volunteer.wml 417) Python library</a>
en/volunteer.wml 418) for authenticated HTTPS downloads. 2) Adding a level of indirection
en/volunteer.wml 419) between the timestamp signatures and the package files included in an
en/volunteer.wml 420) update. See the "Thandy attacks / suggestions" thread on or-dev.
en/volunteer.wml 421) 3) Support locale specific installation and configuration of assisted
en/volunteer.wml 422) updates based on preference, host, or user account language settings.
en/volunteer.wml 423) Familiarity with Windows codepages, unicode, and other character sets
en/volunteer.wml 424) is helpful in addition to general win32 and posix API experience and
en/volunteer.wml 425) Python proficiency.
en/volunteer.wml 426) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 427) 
en/volunteer.wml 428) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 429) <b>Simulator for slow Internet connections</b>
en/volunteer.wml 430) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 431) Priority: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 432) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 433) Effort Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 434) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 435) Skill Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 436) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 437) Likely Mentors: <i>Steven</i>
en/volunteer.wml 438) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 439) Many users of Tor have poor-quality Internet connections, giving low
en/volunteer.wml 440) bandwidth, high latency, and high packet loss/re-ordering. User
en/volunteer.wml 441) experience is that Tor reacts badly to these conditions, but it is
en/volunteer.wml 442) difficult to improve the situation without being able to repeat the
en/volunteer.wml 443) problems in the lab.
en/volunteer.wml 444) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 445) This project would be to build a simulation environment which
en/volunteer.wml 446) replicates the poor connectivity so that the effect on Tor performance
en/volunteer.wml 447) can be measured. Other components would be a testing utility to
en/volunteer.wml 448) establish what are the properties of connections available, and to
en/volunteer.wml 449) measure the effect of performance-improving modifications to Tor.
en/volunteer.wml 450) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 451) The tools used would be up to the student, but dummynet (for FreeBSD)
en/volunteer.wml 452) and nistnet (for Linux) are two potential components on which this
en/volunteer.wml 453) project could be built. Students should be experienced with network
en/volunteer.wml 454) programming/debugging and TCP/IP, and preferably familiar with C and a
en/volunteer.wml 455) scripting language.
en/volunteer.wml 456) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 457) 
en/volunteer.wml 458) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 459) <b>An Improved and More Usable Network Map in Vidalia</b>
en/volunteer.wml 460) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 461) Priority: <i>Low to Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 462) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 463) Effort Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 464) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 465) Skill Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 466) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 467) Likely Mentors: <i>Matt</i>
en/volunteer.wml 468) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 469) One of Vidalia's existing features is a network map that shows the user
en/volunteer.wml 470) the approximate geographic location of relays in the Tor network and
en/volunteer.wml 471) plots the paths the user's traffic takes as it is tunneled through the
en/volunteer.wml 472) Tor network. The map is currently not very interactive and has rather
en/volunteer.wml 473) poor graphics. Instead, we implemented KDE's Marble widget such
en/volunteer.wml 474) that it gives us a better quality map and enables improved interactivity,
en/volunteer.wml 475) such as allowing the user to click on individual relays or circuits to
en/volunteer.wml 476) display additional information. We want to add the ability
en/volunteer.wml 477) for users to click on a particular relay or a country containing one or
en/volunteer.wml 478) more Tor exit relays and say, "I want my connections to exit
en/volunteer.wml 479) from here."
en/volunteer.wml 480) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 481) This project will first involve getting familiar with Vidalia
en/volunteer.wml 482) and the Marble widget's API. One will then integrate the widget
en/volunteer.wml 483) into Vidalia and customize Marble to be better suited for our application,
en/volunteer.wml 484) such as making circuits clickable, storing cached map data in Vidalia's
en/volunteer.wml 485) own data directory, and customizing some of the widget's dialogs.
en/volunteer.wml 486) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 487) A person undertaking this project should have good C++ development
en/volunteer.wml 488) experience. Previous experience with Qt and CMake is helpful, but not
en/volunteer.wml 489) required.
en/volunteer.wml 490) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 491) 
en/volunteer.wml 492) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 493) <b>Torbutton equivalent for Thunderbird</b>
en/volunteer.wml 494) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 495) Priority: <i>Low</i>
en/volunteer.wml 496) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 497) Effort Level: <i>High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 498) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 499) Skill Level: <i>High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 500) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 501) Likely Mentors: <i>Mike</i>
en/volunteer.wml 502) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 503) We're hearing from an increasing number of users that they want to use
en/volunteer.wml 504) Thunderbird with Tor. However, there are plenty of application-level
en/volunteer.wml 505) concerns, for example, by default Thunderbird will put your hostname in
en/volunteer.wml 506) the outgoing mail that it sends. At some point we should start a new
en/volunteer.wml 507) push to build a Thunderbird extension similar to Torbutton.
en/volunteer.wml 508) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 509) 
en/volunteer.wml 510) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 511) <b>Intermediate Level Network Device Driver</b>
en/volunteer.wml 512) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 513) Priority: <i>Low</i>
en/volunteer.wml 514) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 515) Effort Level: <i>High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 516) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 517) Skill Level: <i>High</i>
en/volunteer.wml 518) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 519) Likely Mentors: <i>Martin</i>
en/volunteer.wml 520) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 521) The WinPCAP device driver used by Tor VM for bridged networking does
en/volunteer.wml 522) not support a number of wireless and non-Ethernet network adapters.
en/volunteer.wml 523) Implementation of a intermediate level network device driver for win32
en/volunteer.wml 524) and 64bit would provide a way to intercept and route traffic over such
en/volunteer.wml 525) networks. This project will require knowledge of and experience with
en/volunteer.wml 526) Windows kernel device driver development and testing. Familiarity with
en/volunteer.wml 527) Winsock and Qemu would also be helpful.
en/volunteer.wml 528) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 529) 

en/volunteer.wml 530) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 531) <b>Improve Tor Weather</b>
en/volunteer.wml 532) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 533) Priority: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 534) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 535) Effort Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 536) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 537) Skill Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 538) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 539) Likely Mentors: <i>Christian, Roger</i>

en/volunteer.wml 540) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 541) <a href="https://weather.torproject.org/">Tor weather</a> is a tool
en/volunteer.wml 542) that allows signing up to receive notifications via email when the
en/volunteer.wml 543) tracked Tor relay is down. Currently, it isn't really useful for
en/volunteer.wml 544) people who use the hibernation feature of Tor, or for those who
en/volunteer.wml 545) have to shut down their relay regularly. During the project, Tor

en/volunteer.wml 546) weather could be extended to allow more flexible configurations.

en/volunteer.wml 547) Other enhancements are also possible: Weather could send out warnings

en/volunteer.wml 548) when your relay runs an out-of-date version of Tor, or when its

en/volunteer.wml 549) observed bandwith drops below a certain value. It might also be a
en/volunteer.wml 550) nice tool that allows for checking whether your relay has earned

en/volunteer.wml 551) you a <a href="<page tshirt>">T-Shirt</a>, or sending reminders to
en/volunteer.wml 552) directory authorities that
en/volunteer.wml 553) their keys are about to expire. Be creative, and consider how the
en/volunteer.wml 554) above project to track overall network status can help you get your job
en/volunteer.wml 555) done more quickly! See also its
en/volunteer.wml 556) <a href="https://svn.torproject.org/svn/weather/trunk/README">README</a>
en/volunteer.wml 557) and <a href="https://svn.torproject.org/svn/weather/trunk/TODO">TODO</a>.

en/volunteer.wml 558) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 559) 

en/volunteer.wml 560) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 561) <b>Bring up new ideas!</b>
en/volunteer.wml 562) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 563) Don't like any of these? Look at the <a
en/volunteer.wml 564) href="<svnsandbox>doc/roadmaps/2008-12-19-roadmap-full.pdf">Tor development
en/volunteer.wml 565) roadmap</a> for more ideas.
en/volunteer.wml 566) Some of the <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/proposals/">current proposals</a>
en/volunteer.wml 567) might also be short on developers.
en/volunteer.wml 568) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 569) 
en/volunteer.wml 570) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 571) <b>Better Debian/Ubuntu Packaging for Tor+Vidalia</b>
en/volunteer.wml 572) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 573) Vidalia currently doesn't play nicely on Debian and Ubuntu with the
en/volunteer.wml 574) default Tor packages. The current Tor packages automatically start Tor
en/volunteer.wml 575) as a daemon running as the debian-tor user and (sensibly) do not have a
en/volunteer.wml 576) <a href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/control-spec.txt">ControlPort</a> defined
en/volunteer.wml 577) in the default torrc. Consequently, Vidalia will try
en/volunteer.wml 578) to start its own Tor process since it could not connect to the existing
en/volunteer.wml 579) Tor, and Vidalia's Tor process will then exit with an error message
en/volunteer.wml 580) the user likely doesn't understand since Tor cannot bind its listening
en/volunteer.wml 581) ports &mdash; they're already in use by the original Tor daemon.
en/volunteer.wml 582) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 583) The current solution involves either telling the user to stop the
en/volunteer.wml 584) existing Tor daemon and let Vidalia start its own Tor process, or
en/volunteer.wml 585) explaining to the user how to set a control port and password in their
en/volunteer.wml 586) torrc. A better solution on Debian would be to use Tor's ControlSocket,
en/volunteer.wml 587) which allows Vidalia to talk to Tor via a Unix domain socket, and could
en/volunteer.wml 588) possibly be enabled by default in Tor's Debian packages. Vidalia can
en/volunteer.wml 589) then authenticate to Tor using filesystem-based (cookie) authentication
en/volunteer.wml 590) if the user running Vidalia is also in the debian-tor group.
en/volunteer.wml 591) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 592) This project will first involve adding support for Tor's ControlSocket
en/volunteer.wml 593) to Vidalia. The student will then develop and test Debian and Ubuntu
en/volunteer.wml 594) packages for Vidalia that conform to Debian's packaging standards and
en/volunteer.wml 595) make sure they work well with the existing Tor packages. We can also
en/volunteer.wml 596) set up an apt repository to host the new Vidalia packages.
en/volunteer.wml 597) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 598) The next challenge would be to find an intuitive usable way for Vidalia
en/volunteer.wml 599) to be able to change Tor's configuration (torrc) even though it is
en/volunteer.wml 600) located in <code>/etc/tor/torrc</code> and thus immutable. The best
en/volunteer.wml 601) idea we've come up with so far is to feed Tor a new configuration via
en/volunteer.wml 602) the ControlSocket when Vidalia starts, but that's bad because Tor starts
en/volunteer.wml 603) each boot with a different configuration than the user wants. The second
en/volunteer.wml 604) best idea
en/volunteer.wml 605) we've come up with is for Vidalia to write out a temporary torrc file
en/volunteer.wml 606) and ask the user to manually move it to <code>/etc/tor/torrc</code>,
en/volunteer.wml 607) but that's bad because users shouldn't have to mess with files directly.
en/volunteer.wml 608) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 609) A person undertaking this project should have prior knowledge of
en/volunteer.wml 610) Debian package management and some C++ development experience. Previous
en/volunteer.wml 611) experience with Qt is helpful, but not required.
en/volunteer.wml 612) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 613) 
en/volunteer.wml 614) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 615) <b>Tor/Polipo/Vidalia Auto-Update Framework</b>
en/volunteer.wml 616) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 617) We're in need of a good authenticated-update framework.
en/volunteer.wml 618) Vidalia already has the ability to notice when the user is running an
en/volunteer.wml 619) outdated or unrecommended version of Tor, using signed statements inside
en/volunteer.wml 620) the Tor directory information. Currently, Vidalia simply pops
en/volunteer.wml 621) up a little message box that lets the user know they should manually
en/volunteer.wml 622) upgrade. The goal of this project would be to extend Vidalia with the
en/volunteer.wml 623) ability to also fetch and install the updated Tor software for the
en/volunteer.wml 624) user. We should do the fetches via Tor when possible, but also fall back
en/volunteer.wml 625) to direct fetches in a smart way. Time permitting, we would also like
en/volunteer.wml 626) to be able to update other
en/volunteer.wml 627) applications included in the bundled installers, such as Polipo and
en/volunteer.wml 628) Vidalia itself.
en/volunteer.wml 629) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 630) To complete this project, the student will first need to first investigate
en/volunteer.wml 631) the existing auto-update frameworks (e.g., Sparkle on OS X) to evaluate
en/volunteer.wml 632) their strengths, weaknesses, security properties, and ability to be
en/volunteer.wml 633) integrated into Vidalia. If none are found to be suitable, the student
en/volunteer.wml 634) will design their own auto-update framework, document the design, and
en/volunteer.wml 635) then discuss the design with other developers to assess any security
en/volunteer.wml 636) issues. The student will then implement their framework (or integrate
en/volunteer.wml 637) an existing one) and test it.
en/volunteer.wml 638) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 639) A person undertaking this project should have good C++ development
en/volunteer.wml 640) experience. Previous experience with Qt is helpful, but not required. One
en/volunteer.wml 641) should also have a good understanding of common security
en/volunteer.wml 642) practices, such as package signature verification. Good writing ability
en/volunteer.wml 643) is also important for this project, since a vital step of the project
en/volunteer.wml 644) will be producing a design document to review and discuss
en/volunteer.wml 645) with others prior to implementation.
en/volunteer.wml 646) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 647) 

en/volunteer.wml 648) <li>

en/volunteer.wml 649) <b>Improving the Tor QA process: Continuous Integration for builds</b>

en/volunteer.wml 650) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 651) It would be useful to have automated build processes for Windows and
en/volunteer.wml 652) probably other platforms. The purpose of having a continuous integration
en/volunteer.wml 653) build environment is to ensure that Windows isn't left behind for any of
en/volunteer.wml 654) the software projects used in the Tor project or its accompanying.<br />
en/volunteer.wml 655) Buildbot may be a good choice for this as it appears to support all of

en/volunteer.wml 656) the platforms Tor does. See the

en/volunteer.wml 657) <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BuildBot">wikipedia entry for

en/volunteer.wml 658) buildbot</a>.<br />
en/volunteer.wml 659) There may be better options and the person undertaking this task should

en/volunteer.wml 660) evaluate other options. Any person working on this automatic build
en/volunteer.wml 661) process should have experience or be willing to learn how to build all
en/volunteer.wml 662) of the respective Tor related code bases from scratch. Furthermore, the
en/volunteer.wml 663) person should have some experience building software in Windows
en/volunteer.wml 664) environments as this is the target audience we want to ensure we do not
en/volunteer.wml 665) leave behind. It would require close work with the Tor source code but
en/volunteer.wml 666) probably only in the form of building, not authoring.<br />
en/volunteer.wml 667) Additionally, we need to automate our performance testing for all platforms.
en/volunteer.wml 668) We've got buildbot (except on Windows &mdash; as noted above) to automate
en/volunteer.wml 669) our regular integration and compile testing already,
en/volunteer.wml 670) but we need to get our network simulation tests (as built in torflow)
en/volunteer.wml 671) updated for more recent versions of Tor, and designed to launch a test
en/volunteer.wml 672) network either on a single machine, or across several, so we can test
en/volunteer.wml 673) changes in performance on machines in different roles automatically.

en/volunteer.wml 674) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 675) 

en/volunteer.wml 676) <li>
en/volunteer.wml 677) <b>Usability testing of Tor</b>
en/volunteer.wml 678) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 679) Priority: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 680) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 681) Effort Level: <i>Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 682) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 683) Skill Level: <i>Low to Medium</i>
en/volunteer.wml 684) <br />
en/volunteer.wml 685) Likely Mentors: <i>Andrew</i>
en/volunteer.wml 686) <br />

en/volunteer.wml 687) Especially the browser bundle, ideally amongst our target demographic.
en/volunteer.wml 688) That would help a lot in knowing what needs to be done in terms of bug
en/volunteer.wml 689) fixes or new features. We get this informally at the moment, but a more
en/volunteer.wml 690) structured process would be better.
en/volunteer.wml 691) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 692) </ol>
en/volunteer.wml 693) 

en/volunteer.wml 694) <a id="OtherCoding"></a>
en/volunteer.wml 695) <h2><a class="anchor" href="#OtherCoding">Other Coding and Design related ideas</a></h2>

volunteer.html   696) <ol>

en/volunteer.wml 697) <li>Tor relays don't work well on Windows XP. On

en/volunteer.wml 698) Windows, Tor uses the standard <tt>select()</tt> system

en/volunteer.wml 699) call, which uses space in the non-page pool. This means

en/volunteer.wml 700) that a medium sized Tor relay will empty the non-page pool, <a

en/volunteer.wml 701) href="https://wiki.torproject.org/noreply/TheOnionRouter/WindowsBufferProblems">causing

en/volunteer.wml 702) havoc and system crashes</a>. We should probably be using overlapped IO

en/volunteer.wml 703) instead. One solution would be to teach <a
en/volunteer.wml 704) href="http://www.monkey.org/~provos/libevent/">libevent</a> how to use
en/volunteer.wml 705) overlapped IO rather than select() on Windows, and then adapt Tor to

en/volunteer.wml 706) the new libevent interface. Christian King made a

en/volunteer.wml 707) <a href="https://svn.torproject.org/svn/libevent-urz/trunk/">good

en/volunteer.wml 708) start</a> on this in the summer of 2007.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 709) 

en/volunteer.wml 710) <li>We need to actually start building our <a href="<page
en/volunteer.wml 711) documentation>#DesignDoc">blocking-resistance design</a>. This involves

en/volunteer.wml 712) fleshing out the design, modifying many different pieces of Tor, adapting

en/volunteer.wml 713) <a href="<page vidalia/index>">Vidalia</a> so it supports the

en/volunteer.wml 714) new features, and planning for deployment.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 715) 

en/volunteer.wml 716) <li>We need a flexible simulator framework for studying end-to-end
en/volunteer.wml 717) traffic confirmation attacks. Many researchers have whipped up ad hoc
en/volunteer.wml 718) simulators to support their intuition either that the attacks work
en/volunteer.wml 719) really well or that some defense works great. Can we build a simulator
en/volunteer.wml 720) that's clearly documented and open enough that everybody knows it's
en/volunteer.wml 721) giving a reasonable answer? This will spur a lot of new research.
en/volunteer.wml 722) See the entry <a href="#Research">below</a> on confirmation attacks for
en/volunteer.wml 723) details on the research side of this task &mdash; who knows, when it's
en/volunteer.wml 724) done maybe you can help write a paper or three also.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 725) 

en/volunteer.wml 726) <li>Tor 0.1.1.x and later include support for hardware crypto accelerators

en/volunteer.wml 727) via OpenSSL. It has been lightly tested and is possibly very buggy.  We're looking for more rigorous testing, performance analysis, and optimally, code fixes to openssl and Tor if needed.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 728) 

volunteer.html   729) <li>Perform a security analysis of Tor with <a
volunteer.html   730) href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuzz_testing">"fuzz"</a>. Determine

en/volunteer.wml 731) if there are good fuzzing libraries out there for what we want. Win fame by

volunteer.html   732) getting credit when we put out a new release because of you!</li>

en/volunteer.wml 733) 

volunteer.html   734) <li>Tor uses TCP for transport and TLS for link
volunteer.html   735) encryption. This is nice and simple, but it means all cells
volunteer.html   736) on a link are delayed when a single packet gets dropped, and
volunteer.html   737) it means we can only reasonably support TCP streams. We have a <a

en/volunteer.wml 738) href="https://wiki.torproject.org/noreply/TheOnionRouter/TorFAQ#TransportIPnotTCP">list

en/volunteer.wml 739) of reasons why we haven't shifted to UDP transport</a>, but it would
en/volunteer.wml 740) be great to see that list get shorter. We also have a proposed <a

en/volunteer.wml 741) href="<svnsandbox>doc/spec/proposals/100-tor-spec-udp.txt">specification
en/volunteer.wml 742) for Tor and

en/volunteer.wml 743) UDP</a> &mdash; please let us know what's wrong with it.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 744) 

volunteer.html   745) <li>We're not that far from having IPv6 support for destination addresses
volunteer.html   746) (at exit nodes). If you care strongly about IPv6, that's probably the
volunteer.html   747) first place to start.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 748) 
en/volunteer.wml 749) <li>We need a way to generate the website diagrams (for example, the "How
en/volunteer.wml 750) Tor Works" pictures on the <a href="<page overview>">overview page</a>
en/volunteer.wml 751) from source, so we can translate them as UTF-8 text rather than edit
en/volunteer.wml 752) them by hand with Gimp. We might want to
en/volunteer.wml 753) integrate this as an wml file so translations are easy and images are
en/volunteer.wml 754) generated in multiple languages whenever we build the website.</li>
en/volunteer.wml 755) 
en/volunteer.wml 756) <li>How can we make the <a
en/volunteer.wml 757) href="http://anonymityanywhere.com/incognito/">Incognito LiveCD</a>
en/volunteer.wml 758) easier to maintain, improve, and document?</li>

volunteer.html   759) </ol>
volunteer.html   760) 

en/volunteer.wml 761) <a id="Research"></a>
en/volunteer.wml 762) <h2><a class="anchor" href="#Research">Research</a></h2>

volunteer.html   763) <ol>

volunteer.html   764) <li>The "website fingerprinting attack": make a list of a few
volunteer.html   765) hundred popular websites, download their pages, and make a set of
volunteer.html   766) "signatures" for each site. Then observe a Tor client's traffic. As
volunteer.html   767) you watch him receive data, you quickly approach a guess about which
volunteer.html   768) (if any) of those sites he is visiting. First, how effective is
volunteer.html   769) this attack on the deployed Tor codebase? Then start exploring
volunteer.html   770) defenses: for example, we could change Tor's cell size from 512
volunteer.html   771) bytes to 1024 bytes, we could employ padding techniques like <a
volunteer.html   772) href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#timing-fc2004">defensive dropping</a>,
volunteer.html   773) or we could add traffic delays. How much of an impact do these have,
volunteer.html   774) and how much usability impact (using some suitable metric) is there from
volunteer.html   775) a successful defense in each case?</li>

volunteer.html   776) <li>The "end-to-end traffic confirmation attack":
volunteer.html   777) by watching traffic at Alice and at Bob, we can <a
volunteer.html   778) href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#danezis:pet2004">compare
volunteer.html   779) traffic signatures and become convinced that we're watching the same
volunteer.html   780) stream</a>. So far Tor accepts this as a fact of life and assumes this
volunteer.html   781) attack is trivial in all cases. First of all, is that actually true? How
volunteer.html   782) much traffic of what sort of distribution is needed before the adversary
volunteer.html   783) is confident he has won? Are there scenarios (e.g. not transmitting much)
volunteer.html   784) that slow down the attack? Do some traffic padding or traffic shaping
volunteer.html   785) schemes work better than others?</li>

en/volunteer.wml 786) <li>A related question is: Does running a relay/bridge provide additional
en/volunteer.wml 787) protection against these timing attacks? Can an external adversary that can't

en/volunteer.wml 788) see inside TLS links still recognize individual streams reliably?

en/volunteer.wml 789) Does the amount of traffic carried degrade this ability any? What if the
en/volunteer.wml 790) client-relay deliberately delayed upstream relayed traffic to create a queue
en/volunteer.wml 791) that could be used to mimic timings of client downstream traffic to make it
en/volunteer.wml 792) look like it was also relayed? This same queue could also be used for masking
en/volunteer.wml 793) timings in client upstream traffic with the techniques from <a
en/volunteer.wml 794) href="http://www.freehaven.net/anonbib/#ShWa-Timing06">adaptive padding</a>,
en/volunteer.wml 795) but without the need for additional traffic. Would such an interleaving of
en/volunteer.wml 796) client upstream traffic obscure timings for external adversaries? Would the
en/volunteer.wml 797) strategies need to be adjusted for asymmetric links? For example, on
en/volunteer.wml 798) asymmetric links, is it actually possible to differentiate client traffic from
en/volunteer.wml 799) natural bursts due to their asymmetric capacity? Or is it easier than
en/volunteer.wml 800) symmetric links for some other reason?</li>

en/volunteer.wml 801) <li>Repeat Murdoch and Danezis's <a
en/volunteer.wml 802) href="http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~sjm217/projects/anon/#torta">attack from
en/volunteer.wml 803) Oakland 05</a> on the current Tor network. See if you can learn why it
en/volunteer.wml 804) works well on some nodes and not well on others. (My theory is that the
en/volunteer.wml 805) fast nodes with spare capacity resist the attack better.) If that's true,
en/volunteer.wml 806) then experiment with the RelayBandwidthRate and RelayBandwidthBurst
en/volunteer.wml 807) options to run a relay that is used as a client while relaying the
en/volunteer.wml 808) attacker's traffic: as we crank down the RelayBandwidthRate, does the
en/volunteer.wml 809) attack get harder? What's the right ratio of RelayBandwidthRate to
en/volunteer.wml 810) actually capacity? Or is it a ratio at all? While we're at it, does a
en/volunteer.wml 811) much larger set of candidate relays increase the false positive rate
en/volunteer.wml 812) or other complexity for the attack? (The Tor network is now almost two
en/volunteer.wml 813) orders of magnitude larger than it was when they wrote their paper.) Be
en/volunteer.wml 814) sure to read <a href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#clog-the-queue">Don't
en/volunteer.wml 815) Clog the Queue</a> too.</li>

volunteer.html   816) <li>The "routing zones attack": most of the literature thinks of
volunteer.html   817) the network path between Alice and her entry node (and between the
volunteer.html   818) exit node and Bob) as a single link on some graph. In practice,
volunteer.html   819) though, the path traverses many autonomous systems (ASes), and <a
volunteer.html   820) href="http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#feamster:wpes2004">it's not uncommon
volunteer.html   821) that the same AS appears on both the entry path and the exit path</a>.
volunteer.html   822) Unfortunately, to accurately predict whether a given Alice, entry,
volunteer.html   823) exit, Bob quad will be dangerous, we need to download an entire Internet
volunteer.html   824) routing zone and perform expensive operations on it. Are there practical
volunteer.html   825) approximations, such as avoiding IP addresses in the same /8 network?</li>

en/volunteer.wml 826) <li>Other research questions regarding geographic diversity consider
en/volunteer.wml 827) the tradeoff between choosing an efficient circuit and choosing a random

en/volunteer.wml 828) circuit. Look at Stephen Rollyson's <a

en/volunteer.wml 829) href="http://swiki.cc.gatech.edu:8080/ugResearch/uploads/7/ImprovingTor.pdf">position
en/volunteer.wml 830) paper</a> on how to discard particularly slow choices without hurting

en/volunteer.wml 831) anonymity "too much". This line of reasoning needs more work and more
en/volunteer.wml 832) thinking, but it looks very promising.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 833) <li>Tor doesn't work very well when relays have asymmetric bandwidth

volunteer.html   834) (e.g. cable or DSL). Because Tor has separate TCP connections between
volunteer.html   835) each hop, if the incoming bytes are arriving just fine and the outgoing
volunteer.html   836) bytes are all getting dropped on the floor, the TCP push-back mechanisms
volunteer.html   837) don't really transmit this information back to the incoming streams.
volunteer.html   838) Perhaps Tor should detect when it's dropping a lot of outgoing packets,
volunteer.html   839) and rate-limit incoming streams to regulate this itself? I can imagine
volunteer.html   840) a build-up and drop-off scheme where we pick a conservative rate-limit,
volunteer.html   841) slowly increase it until we get lost packets, back off, repeat. We
volunteer.html   842) need somebody who's good with networks to simulate this and help design
volunteer.html   843) solutions; and/or we need to understand the extent of the performance
volunteer.html   844) degradation, and use this as motivation to reconsider UDP transport.</li>
volunteer.html   845) <li>A related topic is congestion control. Is our
volunteer.html   846) current design sufficient once we have heavy use? Maybe
volunteer.html   847) we should experiment with variable-sized windows rather
volunteer.html   848) than fixed-size windows? That seemed to go well in an <a
volunteer.html   849) href="http://www.psc.edu/networking/projects/hpn-ssh/theory.php">ssh
volunteer.html   850) throughput experiment</a>. We'll need to measure and tweak, and maybe
volunteer.html   851) overhaul if the results are good.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 852) <li>Our censorship-resistance goals include preventing
en/volunteer.wml 853) an attacker who's looking at Tor traffic on the wire from <a

en/volunteer.wml 854) href="<svnsandbox>doc/design-paper/blocking.html#sec:network-fingerprint">distinguishing

en/volunteer.wml 855) it from normal SSL traffic</a>. Obviously we can't achieve perfect
en/volunteer.wml 856) steganography and still remain usable, but for a first step we'd like to
en/volunteer.wml 857) block any attacks that can win by observing only a few packets. One of
en/volunteer.wml 858) the remaining attacks we haven't examined much is that Tor cells are 512
en/volunteer.wml 859) bytes, so the traffic on the wire may well be a multiple of 512 bytes.
en/volunteer.wml 860) How much does the batching and overhead in TLS records blur this on the
en/volunteer.wml 861) wire? Do different buffer flushing strategies in Tor affect this? Could
en/volunteer.wml 862) a bit of padding help a lot, or is this an attack we must accept?</li>

volunteer.html   863) <li>Tor circuits are built one hop at a time, so in theory we have the
volunteer.html   864) ability to make some streams exit from the second hop, some from the
volunteer.html   865) third, and so on. This seems nice because it breaks up the set of exiting

en/volunteer.wml 866) streams that a given relay can see. But if we want each stream to be safe,

volunteer.html   867) the "shortest" path should be at least 3 hops long by our current logic, so
volunteer.html   868) the rest will be even longer. We need to examine this performance / security
volunteer.html   869) tradeoff.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 870) <li>It's not that hard to DoS Tor relays or directory authorities. Are client

volunteer.html   871) puzzles the right answer? What other practical approaches are there? Bonus
volunteer.html   872) if they're backward-compatible with the current Tor protocol.</li>

en/volunteer.wml 873) <li>Programs like <a

en/volunteer.wml 874) href="<page torbutton/index>">Torbutton</a> aim to hide

en/volunteer.wml 875) your browser's UserAgent string by replacing it with a uniform answer for
en/volunteer.wml 876) every Tor user. That way the attacker can't splinter Tor's anonymity set
en/volunteer.wml 877) by looking at that header. It tries to pick a string that is commonly used
en/volunteer.wml 878) by non-Tor users too, so it doesn't stand out. Question one: how badly
en/volunteer.wml 879) do we hurt ourselves by periodically updating the version of Firefox
en/volunteer.wml 880) that Torbutton claims to be? If we update it too often, we splinter the
en/volunteer.wml 881) anonymity sets ourselves. If we don't update it often enough, then all the
en/volunteer.wml 882) Tor users stand out because they claim to be running a quite old version
en/volunteer.wml 883) of Firefox. The answer here probably depends on the Firefox versions seen
en/volunteer.wml 884) in the wild. Question two: periodically people ask us to cycle through N
en/volunteer.wml 885) UserAgent strings rather than stick with one. Does this approach help,
en/volunteer.wml 886) hurt, or not matter? Consider: cookies and recognizing Torbutton users
en/volunteer.wml 887) by their rotating UserAgents; malicious websites who only attack certain
en/volunteer.wml 888) browsers; and whether the answers to question one impact this answer.
en/volunteer.wml 889) </li>

en/volunteer.wml 890) <li>Right now Tor clients are willing to reuse a given circuit for ten
en/volunteer.wml 891) minutes after it's first used. The goal is to avoid loading down the
en/volunteer.wml 892) network with too many circuit extend operations, yet to also avoid having
en/volunteer.wml 893) clients use the same circuit for so long that the exit node can build a
en/volunteer.wml 894) useful pseudonymous profile of them. Alas, ten minutes is probably way
en/volunteer.wml 895) too long, especially if connections from multiple protocols (e.g. IM and
en/volunteer.wml 896) web browsing) are put on the same circuit. If we keep fixed the overall
en/volunteer.wml 897) number of circuit extends that the network needs to do, are there more
en/volunteer.wml 898) efficient and/or safer ways for clients to allocate streams to circuits,
en/volunteer.wml 899) or for clients to build preemptive circuits? Perhaps this research item
en/volunteer.wml 900) needs to start with gathering some traces of what connections typical
en/volunteer.wml 901) clients try to launch, so you have something realistic to try to optimize.
en/volunteer.wml 902) </li>
en/volunteer.wml 903) <li>How many bridge relays do you need to know to maintain
en/volunteer.wml 904) reachability? We should measure the churn in our bridges. If there is
en/volunteer.wml 905) lots of churn, are there ways to keep bridge users more likely to stay
en/volunteer.wml 906) connected?
en/volunteer.wml 907) </li>

volunteer.html   908) </ol>
volunteer.html   909) 

en/volunteer.wml 910) <p>

en/volunteer.wml 911) <a href="<page contact>">Let us know</a> if you've made progress on any
en/volunteer.wml 912) of these!

en/volunteer.wml 913) </p>

volunteer.html   914) 

en/volunteer.wml 915)   </div><!-- #main -->

volunteer.html   916) 

en/volunteer.wml 917) #include <foot.wmi>