Exploring Tor: How ‘The Onion Router’ Ensures Online Anonymity

Tor, short for “The Onion Router,” is a free and open-source software project aimed at enabling anonymous communication. It directs Internet traffic through a worldwide volunteer overlay network consisting of thousands of relays to conceal a user’s location and usage from anyone conducting network surveillance or traffic analysis. The name “onion routing” refers to the layers of encryption used to ensure privacy.

Let’s understand how Onion Routing works. Here is the simple diagram representing the working of the Tor browser

The data packet we send from our computer is symbolized by the black dot. Each relay shares with us its own secret key symbolized by the color of its circle. A relay can only decrypt the data for which he has the key.

When the packet arrives at relay1, it decrypts the yellow layer with its own key from which he learns that it needs to forward the packet to relay2. It forwards the packet to relay2. When relay2 receives the packets, it proceeds exactly the same way. And finally, relay3 decrypts the last TOR encryption layer of the packet and forwards it to the website server.

When the website server replies to us, everything happens exactly the same way, but in reverse. Instead of peeling the onion, the onion is rebuilt.

How To install TOR

1. First, go to Tor Project’s website(https://www.torproject.org), and click on the Download Tor Browser button at the top right corner.

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3. Then, on the Download page, select from any of the major operating systems available (Windows, Linux, Mac, Android).

FOR WINDOWS

1. Click the “Download for Windows” button.

2. Launch the .exe file after it’s downloaded by double-clicking it.

3. Choose your language and click OK.

4. Follow the installation prompts.
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5. ClickFinishwhen the installation is complete. And you’re done!

6. Launch Tor Browser by clicking on the “Start Tor Browser” shortcut on your desktop

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8. Now Click on the Connect button to get connect to the tor network

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9. The Tor Browser homepage will open up in a new window. Now you can use Tor Browser

FOR LINUX

1. Click on the “Download for Linux” button.

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3. Wait for the setup file to download. After downloading, go to the directory, it was downloaded to.
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3. Right-click on the downloaded file and select Extract Here.

4. After Tor Browser setup files are extracted, double-click on Start-Tor-Browser.desktop.

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6. Congratulations! Tor Browser is installed, and you’re all set.

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7. Now Click on the Connect Button to get connect to the tor network.

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8. The Tor Browser homepage will open up in a new window. Now you can use Tor Browser

Start Browsing

1. You can now use Tor Browser to browse the internet anonymously.
2. Simply enter a website URL into the address bar and press Enter to visit the website (https://medium.com).

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4. Tor Browser will route your internet traffic through multiple relays, encrypting it along the way to protect your privacy and anonymity.
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Access Onion Services (Optional):

1. In addition to regular websites, Tor Browser allows you to access onion services, which are sites with .onion domains (http://p53lf57qovyuvwsc6xnrppyply3vtqm7l6pcobkmyqsiofyeznfu5uqd.onion/) that are only accessible through Tor.
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2. To access an onion service, enter its .onion URL into the address bar and press Enter.

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4. But we cannot access the .onion domain website on the other browsers like chrome,firefox, etc.
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