Likely someone was doing credit card fraud/hacking type stuff and
choosing Tor as the way to connect for it. That stuff is a pain in the
ass for online stores when it happens. Not surprised that outfits
handling online payments don't want Tor connections, and I can't blame
them tbh.
It shouldn't be hard to find a workaround if your purchases are
infrequent and anonymity in that particular connection isn't an issue
(cell phones have internet these days, 'net from a friend's house,
whatever).
Not sure where you live but, I read that these days, USA is
photographing the fronts of all postal mail. So, mailed merchandise
isn't exactly a win on privacy anyway.
On Sunday 25/08/2013 at 4:23 pm, David Carlson wrote:
On 8/25/2013 2:41 PM, Dave Lahr wrote:
I'm in the same boat: for example yelp.com and TDBank North
are blocking us.
On Sun, Aug 25, 2013 at 2:30 PM, David Carlson
<david.carlson....@gmail.com> wrote:
It seems that at least two 'normal' online store websites
that I visit
from time to time have apparently decided to block my IP
address which I
am also using for a non-exit Tor relay. I have had extended
discussions
with one of them and they considered unblocking my IP
address to be a
risk greater than the lost income (US $160/year revenue) was
worth.
They suggested switching to a different IP address, which
was like
pulling hens' teeth from my ISP. To do that, I had to have
a technician
visit my house and install a new modem because they do not
have a person
who understands tech talk available for ordinary users, and
I couldn't
get sufficiently elevated in their support hierarchy. The
supposedly
dynamic IP address that I get from them hardly ever changes,
probably
because I am buying U-verse television service from them.
Now, after a couple of months, the "new" IP address is also
blocked.
My question is this. What if it becomes common practice for
commercial
entities such as online stores to block all IP addresses
that they find
on lists of Tor relays such as <https://www.dan.me.uk/tornodes>
or the
official Tor metrics data?
That list is updated every half hour, includes all nodes,
and is not
limited to exit nodes. It currently lists 4438 nodes. That
is a
manageable size for a blacklist, but it could represent tens
or hundreds
of thousands of clients.
Wouldn't this eventually either cripple the Tor network or
generally
discourage Tor clients that can no longer buy products
online from store
XYZ through the Tor network?
David C
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In the short term, it is possible to to circumvent these practices
by using one or more of several different methods, but informing the
online store that they are shooting themselves in the foot is not
one of them. After all, they are experts and we are just
ignoramuses, even if we know what an IP address is.
Also, client tactics like going to a public hotspot is either not an
option for someone who wants the Tor anonymity, or problematic at
best if all or nearly all Tor node IP addresses are blocked at the
vendor end.
That is why I asked the general question.
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