docs/en/pluggable-transports.wml (b52347792) - tor-webwml.git

pluggable-transports.wml

## translation metadata
# Revision: $Revision$
# Translation-Priority: 3-low

#include "head.wmi" TITLE="Tor Project: Pluggable Transports" CHARSET="UTF-8"
<div id="content" class="clearfix">
  <div id="breadcrumbs">
    <a href="<page index>">Home &raquo; </a>
    <a href="<page docs/documentation>">Documentation &raquo; </a>
    <a href="<page docs/pluggable-transports>">Pluggable Transports</a>
  </div>
  <div id="maincol">
    <h2>Tor: Pluggable Transports</h2>
    <hr>

<p>
    An increasing number of censoring countries are using Deep Packet
    Inspection (DPI) to classify Internet traffic flows by protocol.
    While Tor uses <a href="<page docs/bridges>">bridge relays</a> to
    get around a censor that blocks by IP address, the censor can use
    DPI to recognize and filter Tor traffic flows even when they connect
    to unexpected IP addresses.
    </p>

<p>
    Pluggable Transports (PT) transform the Tor traffic flow between the client
    and the bridge. This way, censors who monitor traffic between the
    client and the bridge will see innocent-looking transformed traffic
    instead of the actual Tor traffic.
    External programs can talk to Tor clients and Tor bridges using the <a
href="https://gitweb.torproject.org/torspec.git/tree/pt-spec.txt">pluggable
transport API</a>, to make it easier to build interoperable programs.
    </p>

<hr>

<h3>Currently deployed PTs</h3>
    <p>
      These Pluggable Transports are currently deployed in Tor Browser, and you can start using them by <a href="<page download/download-easy>">downloading and using Tor Browser</a>.
    </p>

<ul>

<li><a href="https://github.com/Yawning/obfs4/blob/master/doc/obfs4-spec.txt"><b>obfs4</b></a>
        is a transport with the same features as <a href="http://www.cs.kau.se/philwint/scramblesuit/"><b>ScrambleSuit</b></a>
        but utilizing Dan Bernstein's <a href="http://elligator.cr.yp.to/elligator-20130828.pdf">elligator2</b></a>
        technique for public key obfuscation, and the
        <a href="https://gitweb.torproject.org/torspec.git/tree/proposals/216-ntor-handshake.txt">ntor protocol</a>
        for one-way authentication. This results in a faster protocol. Written in Go.
        Maintained by Yawning Angel.
        </li>

<li><a href="https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/meek"><b>meek</b></a>
        is a transport that uses HTTP for carrying bytes and TLS for
        obfuscation. Traffic is relayed through a third-party server
        (Google App Engine). It uses a trick to talk to the third party so
        that it looks like it is talking to an unblocked server.
        Maintained by David Fifield.
        </li>

<li><a href="https://fteproxy.org/"><b>Format-Transforming
        Encryption</b></a> (FTE) transforms Tor traffic to arbitrary
        formats using their language descriptions. See the <a
        href="https://kpdyer.com/publications/ccs2013-fte.pdf">research
        paper</a>.</li>

<li><a href="http://www.cs.kau.se/philwint/scramblesuit/"><b>ScrambleSuit</b></a>
        is a pluggable transport that protects
        against follow-up probing attacks and is also capable of changing
        its network fingerprint (packet length distribution,
        inter-arrival times, etc.). It's part of the Obfsproxy framework.
        Maintained by Philipp Winter.
        </li>

</ul>

<hr>

<h3>Deprecated PTs; Removed from Tor Browser</h3>

<ul>
        
        <li><a href="<page projects/obfsproxy>"><b>Obfsproxy</b></a> is a Python framework for implementing new
        pluggable transports. It uses Twisted for its networking needs, and
        <a href="https://gitweb.torproject.org/pluggable-transports/pyptlib.git/tree/README.rst">pyptlib</a>
        for some pluggable transport-related features. It supports the
        <a href="https://gitweb.torproject.org/pluggable-transports/obfsproxy.git/tree/doc/obfs2/obfs2-protocol-spec.txt">obfs2</a>
        and
        <a href="https://gitweb.torproject.org/pluggable-transports/obfsproxy.git/tree/doc/obfs3/obfs3-protocol-spec.txt">obfs3</a>
        pluggable transports. Maintained by asn.
        </li>

<li><a href="https://crypto.stanford.edu/flashproxy/"><b>Flashproxy</b></a> turns ordinary web browsers into bridges using
        websockets, and has a little python stub to hook Tor clients to the
        websocket connection. See its
        <a href="https://gitweb.torproject.org/flashproxy.git">git repository</a>,
        and
        <a href="https://crypto.stanford.edu/flashproxy/flashproxy.pdf">design paper</a>.
        Maintained by David Fifield.
        
        </li>

</ul>

<hr>

<h3>Undeployed PTs</h3>
      
      
    <ul>

<li><b>StegoTorus</b> is an Obfsproxy fork that extends it to a)
    split Tor streams across multiple connections to avoid packet size
    signatures, and b) embed the traffic flows in traces that look like
    html, javascript, or pdf. See its
    <a href="https://gitweb.torproject.org/stegotorus.git">git repository</a>.
    Maintained by Zack Weinberg. <br>
    </li>

<li><b>SkypeMorph</b> transforms Tor traffic flows so they look like
    Skype Video. See its
    <a href="http://crysp.uwaterloo.ca/software/SkypeMorph-0.5.1.tar.gz">source code</a>
    and
    <a href="http://cacr.uwaterloo.ca/techreports/2012/cacr2012-08.pdf">design paper</a>.
    Maintained by Ian Goldberg. <br>
    </li>

<li><b>Dust</b> aims to provide a packet-based (rather than
    connection-based) DPI-resistant protocol. See its
    <a href="https://github.com/blanu/Dust">git repository</a>.
    Maintained by Brandon Wiley. <br>
    </li>

</ul>

<p> Also see the <emph>unofficial</emph> pluggable transports <a
    href="https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/PluggableTransports">wiki
    page</a> for more pluggable transport information.</p>

<hr>

<p>
    Our goal is to have a wide variety of Pluggable Transport designs.
    Many are at the research phase now, so it's a perfect time to play
    with them or suggest new designs. Please let us know if you find or
    start other projects that could be useful for making Tor's traffic
    flows more DPI-resistant!
    </p>

</div>
  
  <div id = "sidecol">
#include "side.wmi"
#include "info.wmi"
  </div>
  
</div>

#include <foot.wmi>

tor-webwml.git

Various changes on Pluggable Transports page: