https://blog.torproject.org/the-value-of-anonymous-contributions-wikipedia Skip to main content Home The Tor Project Toggle navigation Search [ ]Search Enter the terms you wish to search for. Main menu * About Tor * Donate The value of Tor and anonymous contributions to Wikipedia by antonela | June 25, 2020 [wikipedia_] Tor users are conscientious about the tools they pick to do what they do online. Often, discussions of controversial topics need a different level of privacy depending on a user's threat models. An activist in the Middle East can provide a different perspective on an article about politics in their own country than a collaborator in northern Europe. And they deserve to add their voices to the conversation safely. There are many reasons a person might want to be anonymous when they write, edit, or share information. But some web services, including Wikipedia, ban (or have banned) Tor users from participating, effectively banning anonymous contributors. According to a recently published research paper co-authored by researchers from Drexel, NYU, and the University of Washington, Tor users make high-quality contributions to Wikipedia. And, when they are blocked, as doctoral candidate Chau Tran, the lead author describes, "the collateral damage in the form of unrealized valuable contributions from anonymity seekers is invisible." The authors of the paper include Chau Tran (NYU), Kaylea Champion (UW & CDSC), Andrea Forte (Drexel), Benjamin Mako Hill (UW & CDSC), and Rachel Greenstadt (NYU). The paper was published at the 2020 IEEE Symposium on Security & Privacy between May 18 and 20. By examining more than 11,000 Wikipedia edits made by Tor users able to bypass Wikipedia's Tor ban between 2007 and 2018, the research team found that Tor users made similar quality edits to those of IP editors, who are non-logged-in users identified by their IP addresses, and first-time editors. The paper notes that Tor users, on average, contributed higher-quality changes to articles than non-logged-in IP editors. The study also finds that Tor-based editors are more likely than other users to focus on topics that may be considered controversial, such as politics, technology, and religion. Related research implies Tor users are quite similar to other internet users, and Tor users frequently visit websites in the Alexa top one million. The new study findings make clear how anonymous users are raising the bar on community discussions and how valuable anonymity is to avoid self-censorship. Anonymity and privacy can help protect users from consequences that may prevent them from interacting with the Wikipedia community. Wikipedia has tried to block users coming from the Tor network since 2007, alleging vandalism, spam, and abuse. This research tells a different story: that people use Tor to make meaningful contributions to Wikipedia, and Tor may allow some users to add their voice to conversations in which they may not otherwise be safely able to participate. Freedom on the internet is diminishing globally, and surveillance and censorship are on the rise. Now is the time to finally allow private users to safely participate in building collective knowledge for all humanity. More info: * Are anonymity-seekers just like everybody else? An analysis of contributions to Wikipedia from Tor * Forensic Qualitative Analysis of Contributions to Wikipedia from Anonymity Seeking Users * Chau's presentation at the IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy * Community Data Science Article by Benjamin Mako Hill: "Tor users: An untapped resource for Wikipedia?" * Community Data Science Article by kaylea: "What do people do when they edit Wikipedia through Tor?" * NYU's press release * Previous Tor's discussions: + Tor at the Heart: Online Collaborative Projects + A call to arms: Helping Internet services accept anonymous users Tags online anonymity wikipedia users * Join the discussion... Anonymous Anonymous (not verified) said: June 26, 2020 Permalink But what is the point of... But what is the point of anonymous contributions, when those contributions are removed or held up in moderation for an unlimited time? The above is what is happening now at the Tor Blog. Users are able to contribute here anonymously as well, but those contributions are very often suppressed, deleted or ignored and not published. Days, weeks often go by until the contribution might be 'approved', if at all. Its good to focus on the value of Tor and its impact on Wikipedia contributions, an important discussion. But I think Tor needs to get its own house in order first before it passes judgment on someone else's. * Reply Anonymous Anonymous (not verified) said: June 26, 2020 Permalink Thanks for having us in your... Thanks for having us in your interest <3 * Reply Anonymous Timothy (not verified) said: June 26, 2020 Permalink I strongly believe that... I strongly believe that Media drives society. And in the importance of progressive moral and civic values. I use Tor. But my comments are being rejected, with reasons like: "Your computer or network may be sending automated queries. To protect our users, we can't process your request right now. For more details visit our help page[https://developers.google.com/recaptcha/ docs/faq#my-computer-or-network... ] Can that be avoided? Thank you for your attention, and please be safe. * Reply Anonymous Anonymous (not verified) said: June 26, 2020 Permalink TP urgently needs to address... TP urgently needs to address the existential threat to Tor and Tails posed by the LAEDA bill just introduced by a trio of notably brutal senators (Graham, Cotton, and Blackburn). Salon.com has published an excellent analysis which quotes people like Brian Krebs (author of the standard book on Linux security) who all agree that the bill would be a disaster. See the link to the pdf with the text of the bill which Tor users can DL (we are of course blocked from the Senate website) and note that the definition of the "services" and "operating systems" which would be required to break their own encryption absolutely include both Tor and Tails. If any version of this bill became law, Tails would become illegal in the US and Tor Project would have to either move overseas or shut down. IMO it is impossible to regard this bill as anything other than as an existential threat to Tor Browser, Tails, OnionShare, Secure Drop, Signal, and Telegram. So, PLEASE, Isabela, address the LAEDA threat in a post in this blog, and PLEASE reach out to Washington State legislators because Tor Project is among their constituents. I am perhaps uniquely qualified to speak toward the WP issue and if the moderators permit perhaps I will do so. This topic is so complex and fraught with so many dangers that I would prefer to share by strong encryption with Isabela before deciding what if anything to post here. * Reply Anonymous Anonymous (not verified) said: June 26, 2020 Permalink I think it'd be interesting... I think it'd be interesting to have a system where Tor users who want to edit Wikipedia have their first edits require admin approval. I think this would deter at least some of the purported abuse. After a few edits, those users would be allowed to edit freely. These initial edits should contribute a substantial amount of content, or else vandals will simply fix a few typos and get admin approval. That being said, the Tor network is one of many ways one could abuse Wikipedia editing. Tor gets the spotlight because it's popular and requires minimal technical knowledge. * Reply Join the discussion... We encourage respectful, on-topic comments. Comments that violate our Code of Conduct will be deleted. Off-topic comments may be deleted at the discretion of the post moderator. Please do not comment as a way to receive support or report bugs on a post unrelated to a release. If you are looking for support, please see our support portal or ways to get in touch with us. 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Save Open Technology Fund, #SaveInternetFreedom by isabela | June 24, 2020 The Tor Project has joined the voices around the world from the internet freedom community and in the U.S. New release: Tor 0.4.4.1-alpha by nickm | June 16, 2020 There's a new alpha release available for download. If you build Tor from source, you can download the source code for 0.4.4.1-alpha from the download page. Packages should be available over the coming weeks, with a new alpha Tor Browser release by early July. Remember, this is an alpha release: you should only run this if you'd like to find and report more bugs than usual. This is the first alpha release in the 0.4.4.x series. It improves our guard selection algorithms, improves the amount of code that can be disabled when running without relay support, and includes numerous small bugfixes and enhancements. It also lays the ground for some IPv6 features that we'll be developing more in the next (0.4.5) series. Here are the changes since 0.4.3.5. Changes in version 0.4.4.1-alpha - 2020-06-16 * Major features (Proposal 310, performance + security): + Implements Proposal 310, "Bandaid on guard selection". Proposal 310 solves load-balancing issues with older versions of the guard selection algorithm, and improves its security. Under this new algorithm, a newly selected guard never becomes Primary unless all previously sampled guards are unreachable. Implements recommendation from 32088. (Proposal 310 is linked to the CLAPS project researching optimal client location-aware path selections. This project is a collaboration between the UCLouvain Crypto Group, the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, and Princeton University.) * Major features (IPv6, relay): + Consider IPv6-only EXTEND2 cells valid on relays. Log a protocol warning if the IPv4 or IPv6 address is an internal address, and internal addresses are not allowed. But continue to use the other address, if it is valid. Closes ticket 33817 . + If a relay can extend over IPv4 and IPv6, and both addresses are provided, it chooses between them uniformly at random. Closes ticket 33817. + Re-use existing IPv6 connections for circuit extends. Closes ticket 33817. + Relays may extend circuits over IPv6, if the relay has an IPv6 ORPort, and the client supplies the other relay's IPv6 ORPort in the EXTEND2 cell. IPv6 extends will be used by the relay IPv6 ORPort self-tests in 33222. Closes ticket 33817. GSoC and Outreachy 2020 Projects by pili | June 10, 2020 (c) 2020 The Tor Project Footer * The Tor Project * RSS * Donate