The internet is many things, but for many of us, it is far from private. By choosing to engage with the digital world, you often must give up your anonymity: trackers watch your every move as your surf the web and scroll on social media sites, and they use that information to build profiles of who (and where) you are and deliver you more “relevant” ads.
It doesn’t have to be this way. There are a number of tactics that can help keep your browsing private. You can use a VPN to make it look like your internet activity is coming from somewhere else; if you use Safari, you can take advantage of Private Relay to hide your IP address from websites you visit; or, you can connect the internet across a different network altogether: Tor.
What is Tor?
The whole idea behind Tor (which is short for The Onion Router) is to anonymize your internet browsing so that no one can tell that it is you visiting any particular website. Tor started out as a project of the U.S. Naval Research Lab in the 1990s, but developed into a nonprofit organization in 2006. Ever since, the network has been popular with users who want to privatize their web activity, whether they’re citizens of countries with strict censorship laws, journalists working on sensitive stories, or simply privacy-focused individuals.
Tor is a network, but it’s commonly conflated with the project’s official browser, also known as Tor. The Tor Browser is a modified version of Firefox that connects to the Tor network. The browser removes many of the technical barriers to entry for the Tor network: You can still visit your desired URLs as you would in Chrome or Edge, but the browser will connect you to them automatically via the Tor network automatically. But what does that mean?
How does Tor work?
Traditionally, when you visit a website, your data is sent directly to that site, complete with your identifying information (i.e. your device’s IP address). That website, your internet service provider, and any other entities that might be privy to your internet traffic can all see that it is your device making the request, and can collect that information accordingly. This can be as innocent as the website in question storing your details for your next visit, or as scummy as the site following you around the internet.
Tor flips the script on this internet browsing model. Rather than connect your device directly to the website you’re visiting, Tor runs your connection through a number of different servers, known as “nodes.” These nodes are hosted by volunteers all over the world, so there’s no telling which nodes your request will go through when you initiate a connection.
But Tor would not be known for its privacy if it only relied on multiple nodes to bounce your traffic around. In addition to the nodes, Tor adds layers of encryption your request. When the request passes from one node to another, each node is only able to decrypt one layer of the encryption, just enough to learn where to send the next request to. This method ensures that no one node in the system knows too much: Each only knows where the request came from one step before, and where it is sending the request to in the following step. It’s like peeling back layers of an onion, hence the platform’s name.
Here’s a simplified example of how it works: Let’s say you want to visit Lifehacker.com through Tor. You initiate the request as you normally would, by typing the URL into Tor’s address bar and hitting enter. When you do, Tor adds layered encryption to your request. The first node it sends it to, perhaps based in, say, the U.S., can unlock one layer of that encryption, which tells the node which node to send it to next. The next node, based perhaps in Japan, decrypts another layer of that encryption, which tells it to send it to a third node in Germany. That third node (known as the exit node) decrypts the final layer of encryption, which tells the node to connect to Lifehacker.com. Once Lifehacker receives the request, the reverse happens: Lifehacker sends the request to the node in Germany, which adds back its layer of encryption. It then sends it back to the node in Japan, which adds a second layer of encryption. It sends it back to the node in the U.S., which adds the final layer of encryption, before sending the fully encrypted request back to your browser, which can decrypt the entire request on your behalf. Congratulations: You have just visited Lifehacker.com, without revealing your identity.
Tor isn’t perfect for privacy
While Tor goes a long way to anonymizing your internet activity, it won’t protect you entirely. One of the network’s biggest weaknesses is in the exit node: Since the final node in the chain carries the decrypted request, it can see where you’re going, and, potentially, what you’re doing when you get there. It won’t be able to know where the request originated, but it can see that you’re trying to access Lifehacker. Depending on what sites you’re accessing, you might give enough information away to reveal yourself.
This was especially an issue when websites were largely using the unencrypted HTTP protocol. If you connected to an unencrypted website, that final node might be able to see your activity on the site itself, including login information, messages, or financial data. But now that most sites have switched to the encrypted HTTPS protocol, there’s less concern with third-parties being able to access the contents of your traffic. Still, even if trackers can’t see exactly what you’re doing or saying on these sites, they can see you visited the site itself, which is why Tor is still useful in today’s encrypted internet.
Who should use Tor?
If you’ve heard anything about Tor, you might know it as the go-to service for accessing the dark web. That is true, but that doesn’t make Tor bad. The dark web is not inherently bad, either: It’s simply a network of sites that cannot be accessed by standard web browsers. That includes a number of very bad sites filled with very bad stuff, to be sure. But it also encompasses a number of perfectly legal activities as well. Chrome or Firefox cannot see dark web sites, but Tor browser can.
But you don’t need to visit the dark web in order for Tor to be useful. Anyone who wants to keep their internet traffic private from the world can benefit. You might have a serious need for this, such as if you live in a country that won’t let you access certain websites, or if you’re a reporter working on a story that could have ramifications should the information leak. But you don’t need to have a specialized case to benefit. Tor can help reduce anyone’s digital footprint, and keep trackers from following you around the internet.
One big drawback
If you do decide to use Tor, understand that it won’t be as fast as other modern browsers. Running your traffic through multiple international nodes takes a toll on performance, so you may be waiting a bit longer for your websites to load than you’re used to. However, it won’t cost you anything to try it, as the browser is completely free to download and use on Mac, Windows, Linux, and Android. (Sorry, iOS fans.) If you’re worried about what you’ve heard about the dark web, don’t be: The only way to access that material it is to seek it out directly. Otherwise, using Tor will feel just like using any other browser—albeit just a tad slower.
