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Man Found Guilty of Child Porn, Because He Ran a Tor Exit Node (The Story of William Weber) - LowEndBox (lowendbox.com)
submitted 3 years ago by to c/technology@beehaw.org
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William Weber, a LowEndTalk member, was raided by Austrian police in 2012 for operating a Tor exit node that was allegedly used to distribute child pornography. While he was not arrested, many of his computers and devices were confiscated. He was later found guilty of supporting the distribution of child pornography through his Tor exit node, though he claims it was unintentional and he was simply supporting free speech and anonymity. He was given a 5 year probation sentence but left Austria shortly after. Though some articles portray him negatively, it is debatable whether he intentionally supported child pornography distribution or simply operated in the legal grey area of Tor exit nodes.

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[–] 10 points 3 years ago (1 child)

I hate this analogy. Its more like you parked it in a very public space and said "free to use" and someone who had been to jail used it. There are all kinds of legitimate reasons to use TOR that aren't child porn, and acting like because it can be used to view child porn makes it truly horrible and hosting hardware to use it makes you part of the problem shows a misunderstanding of what its for.

Let me pose it to you this way. Do you use a VPN? Do you know someone who has used a VPN? Have you watched a YouTube video that was sponsored by a VPN? Do you remember the reasons to use a VPN? Those are all things Tor does well. Better even. And for free. Meanwhile, hosting VPN hardware comes with all the same "people could use it to host child porn" downsides as TOR exit nodes

In my personal life, I use Orbot all the time for things like keeping my Syncthing traffic secure and quickly anonymizing my traffic. I also host a relay because Iranian women and Ukrainian soldiers are currently using the Tor network for life and death circumstances.

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  • [–] 3 points 3 years ago (2 children)

    Its more like you parked it in a very public space and said "free to use" and someone who had been to jail used it.

    Iranian women and Ukrainian soldiers

    As much as I sympathize and approve of that... try to take a step back and look at it from the side: you're still saying you do it to help others "break the law", it's just someone else's law that you don't agree with, and hopefully it doesn't break the law where you live (stay safe, although running a relay is not the same as running an exit node... but still). My analogy tried to capture that.

    BTW, I do use Tor, and may also host a relay or two, but still no exit nodes.

    Orbot all the time for things like keeping my Syncthing traffic secure

    I thought Syncthing already used encryption with a dual public key system to do the syncing? Is there an extra reason to add Orbot to it?

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  • [–] 2 points 3 years ago (1 child)

    you’re still saying you do it to help others “break the law”, it’s just someone else’s law that you don’t agree with

    I don't quite understand this. How is this different from this case: a substance is prohibited in a country X, but not in yours. You sell the produce in your country, and people from country X come to visit your store and buy the produce. They might take it back home, and hence, break the law. Or they might use it down the street.

    How are you to blame for this? Though in OPs case the produce is given away.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 years ago (1 child)

    It's not different, and many countries have established laws against "drug tourism", "sex tourism", "abortion tourism", or other stuff punishable under their law that people would seek to do in other more permissive countries.

    Those laws often include punishments for the enablers, so while Iran may not be able to punish you in your own country, beware of ever visiting Iran, or any other country whose laws you may be helping people to break... or getting doxxed for some "extreme law defending enthusiast" to pay you a visit (see cases like Charlie Hebdo).

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  • [–] 1 point 3 years ago

    Those laws often include punishments for the enablers

    I did not know this but I guess it makes sense. But yes many countries do have these kinds of laws. Then sure, it is a good idea to know the laws regarding this of the country you are visiting.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    And you'd rather have Iranian women and Ukranian men not being able to voice their opinions because you don't agree with helping them "break" laws?

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    Did you create a new account just to misinterprete a year old comment of mine? That's amazing.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago* (1 child)

    Pray tell me how I misinterpreted it? If running an exit node is going to help marginalized communities bring forth their voice (even the fringe cases that I don't agree with, because I believe technology should be accessible to everyone), why shouldn't one do it? Other than mortal risks like jail time because stupid senators can't be bothered to get their heads out of each others asses.

    The reason to use Orbot is to obfuscate the IP

    Edit: I'm a different guy from the one you responded to earlier

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    You keep focusing on exit nodes, and your favorite groups of people... while missing that relay nodes still help, and in either case you don't get to choose whom you're helping.

    Laughing off the risk of actually getting killed, is also too naive, in a world with zealots just too happy to travel anywhere you might be.

    In any case, I don't feel like risking even jail time for maybe helping some people I might like, while most likely helping people I definitely don't. If you do find that risk acceptable, then go for it.

    Orbot, aka Tor, doesn't just obfuscate the source IP, it hides it. What does that bring to the table with Syncthing?

    PS: I don't know who you are, other than you created a new account just to have this conversation, which strikes me as a bit odd.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    And I'm running 2 relay nodes. The TOR network desperately needs exit nodes to relieve the bottleneck at the exits, and that's where I want to help.

    Of course, it's not for everyone, which is why one could just donate to the TOR foundation (or whatever they are called) and that money goes into infrastructure.

    I'm not a native speaker, I assumed obfuscate meant hiding the IP address. I mentioned it because you asked.

    I didn't make a new account just for this lol, it's just that I'm passionate about it.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago*

    The Tor network was designed for spies. In particular, for US&friends spies to have a plausible deniability when "phoning home". It is pretty much guaranteed to have exit nodes with a traffic capacity of "whatever spies need × whatever amount is needed to preserve plausible deniability".

    That means it doesn't "desperately need" exit nodes, the required amount of exit nodes keeps being financed by the spy agencies involved. Overhead capacity just happens to be a nice thing for everyone, but is not a goal, so non-sponsored exit nodes that provide extra capacity, run all the risks, without any of the protections of some higher-ups waving any denounces away.

    If you think you can run an exit node as a non-sponsored/protected individual, go for it... but the chances are not in your favor. Donating to the Tor foundation is much safer, buy I don't think they host exit nodes either, they just develop the software (which is also important).

    Relay nodes are mostly safe, since there is no way for you to know any of the traffic, and they don't link your IP to any of it, while they do help with the overall robustness and capacity of the network. Relay nodes also add capacity when accessing hidden sites, without running any of the risks.

    "Obfuscating" means to make it hard to find out, while "hiding" means there is no way to find it out, at all.

    And you did make a new account, it's visible in the "about" info. The account hasn't had any other interactions either... but whatever.

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