Pierluigi Paganini December 02, 2024

The Tor Project seeks help deploying 200 WebTunnel bridges by year-end to counter government censorship.

Recent reports from Russia show increased censorship targeting the Tor network, including blocking bridges, pluggable transports, and circumvention apps. Russian watchdog Roskomnadzor is making some bridges inaccessible, highlighting the urgent need for more WebTunnel bridges.

WebTunnel is a stealthy bridge that blends with web traffic, with a small download size and uTLS integration, making it safer and harder to detect for users.

“We are calling on the Tor community and the Internet freedom community to help us scale up WebTunnel bridges. If you’ve ever thought about running a Tor bridge, now is the time. Our goal is to deploy 200 new WebTunnel bridges by the end of this December (2024) to open secure access for users in Russia.” reads the announcement published by Tor Project.

Tor Project maintainers are urging users to deploy 200 WebTunnel bridges by year-end allow users in Russia to bypass government censorship.

Russia first blocked Tor in 2021, but at the time the censorship was bypassed via bridges. Tunnel bridges have grown from 60 to 143 since early 2024, but they are not enough.

To run a WebTunnel bridge, users will need a static IPv4 address, a self-hosted website, a valid SSL/TLS certificate, and at least 1 TB/month bandwidth.

Technical requirements are reported in the WebTunnel guide.

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Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, WebTunnel bridges)