[LUGSB] Tor at sunysb.edu

[Josef Sipek]

On Wed, Sep 26, 2007 at 06:16:50PM -0400, Benjamin Bannier wrote:
> Josef Sipek wrote:
> > You'd be surprised. The university has a rather picky firewall that does
> > packet inspection and if it sees something it considers bad, it blocks it
> > (try downloading any file via http with the .torrent extension, or watch
> > some commands to get to an server while others don't when you try to
> > connect to IRC).
> 
> Hmm. Difficult to do quick checks with a crippled ping ... maybe I'll
> check this on a deeper level later.
> 
> Aside: Since tor uses encrypted packages they shouldn't be able to check
> on package contents. If these packages are really filtered, the firewall
> should use lists of tor nodes.

I'm not familiar with inner workings of tor, does it use a specific port? If
it does, it's really easy to drop all the packets that match.

> And just in case they are really blocked: blocking traffic just because it
> goes to tor nodes ... well ... anybody sure this is not China?

Just remember that every ISP (be it Cablevision, or the Uni) has some kind
of "terms" which you have to follow if you want to keep your service.

Jeff.

-- 
You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the
freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.
		- Abbie Hoffman