Tor in Ubuntu 14.04

Earlier I had written how to use tor with Ubuntu 12.04 and 11.10 . Those methods have become pretty outdated. With the recent versions of tor browser bundle the process of setting up tor is simpler. But to use use tor with other applications you need to still a bit of tweaking.

1. Set up tor browser bundle

         The first step is to download tor browser bundle and extract  it. Tor can be launched by running start-tor-browser script in extracted directory. If permission is denied then run "chmod -R a+x * in a terminal to add executable bit to the files. During first run, set the proxy  settings and exit tor. Start tor again. Once the connection is established tor browser will come automatically. This is a tweaked version of firefox. By default, add-ons and other extensions are disabled.  If you want to use tor just for browsing rest of the steps are irrelevant for you.

2. Find out the Control and Socks Port

          Inside the tor browser bundle directory  there is a Data/Tor directory which contains the torrc-defaults file. The Control and SocksPort are present in the file. In my case it is as follows :

SocksPort 9150
ControlPort 9151

3. Socks proxy

      

        Your socks proxy will be 127.0.0.1:SocksPort. In my case it is 127.0.0.1:9151. This can be set as the proxy in any application to use it under socks proxy provided by tor.

4.  Setting up http and https proxy for tor

     4.1 For this install polipo and make sure that privoxy is not installed.

            sudo apt-get install polipo sudo apt-get remove privoxy

     4.2 Use  sudo visudo and add the following lines at the end of file:

          myUserName ALL= NOPASSWD: /usr/bin/polipo 

    4.3 Using editor command sudo gedit /etc/polipo/config replace the contents of /etc/polipo/config with the following content. Make sure that 9150 is replaced with your Socks Port found in step 3.

        ### Basic configuration ### ******************* logSyslog = true logFile = /var/log/polipo/polipo.log # Uncomment one of these if you want to allow remote clients to # connect: # proxyAddress = "::0" # both IPv4 and IPv6 # proxyAddress = "0.0.0.0" # IPv4 only proxyAddress = "127.0.0.1" proxyPort = 8118 # If you do that, you'll want to restrict the set of hosts allowed to # connect: # allowedClients = "127.0.0.1, 134.157.168.57" # allowedClients = "127.0.0.1, 134.157.168.0/24" allowedClients = 127.0.0.1 allowedPorts = 1-65535 # Uncomment this if you want your Polipo to identify itself by # something else than the host name: proxyName = "localhost" # Uncomment this if there's only one user using this instance of Polipo: cacheIsShared = false # Uncomment this if you want to use a parent proxy: # parentProxy = "squid.example.org:3128" # Uncomment this if you want to use a parent SOCKS proxy: socksParentProxy = "localhost:9150" socksProxyType = socks5 ### Memory ### ****** # Uncomment this if you want Polipo to use a ridiculously small amount # of memory (a hundred C-64 worth or so): # chunkHighMark = 819200 # objectHighMark = 128 # Uncomment this if you've got plenty of memory: # chunkHighMark = 50331648 # objectHighMark = 16384 chunkHighMark = 67108864 ### On-disk data ### ************ # Uncomment this if you want to disable the on-disk cache: diskCacheRoot = "" # Uncomment this if you want to put the on-disk cache in a # non-standard location: # diskCacheRoot = "~/.polipo-cache/" # Uncomment this if you want to disable the local web server: localDocumentRoot = "" # Uncomment this if you want to enable the pages under /polipo/index? # and /polipo/servers?. This is a serious privacy leak if your proxy # is shared. # disableIndexing = false # disableServersList = false disableLocalInterface = true disableConfiguration = true ### Domain Name System ### ****************** # Uncomment this if you want to contact IPv4 hosts only (and make DNS # queries somewhat faster): # # dnsQueryIPv6 = no # Uncomment this if you want Polipo to prefer IPv4 to IPv6 for # double-stack hosts: # # dnsQueryIPv6 = reluctantly # Uncomment this to disable Polipo's DNS resolver and use the system's # default resolver instead. If you do that, Polipo will freeze during # every DNS query: dnsUseGethostbyname = yes ### HTTP ### **** # Uncomment this if you want to enable detection of proxy loops. # This will cause your hostname (or whatever you put into proxyName # above) to be included in every request: disableVia = true # Uncomment this if you want to slightly reduce the amount of # information that you leak about yourself: # censoredHeaders = from, accept-language # censorReferer = maybe censoredHeaders = from,accept-language,x-pad,link censorReferer = maybe # Uncomment this if you're paranoid. This will break a lot of sites, # though: # censoredHeaders = set-cookie, cookie, cookie2, from, accept-language # censorReferer = true # Uncomment this if you want to use Poor Man's Multiplexing; increase # the sizes if you're on a fast line. They should each amount to a few # seconds' worth of transfer; if pmmSize is small, you'll want # pmmFirstSize to be larger. # Note that PMM is somewhat unreliable. # pmmFirstSize = 16384 # pmmSize = 8192 # Uncomment this if your user-agent does something reasonable with # Warning headers (most don't): # relaxTransparency = maybe # Uncomment this if you never want to revalidate instances for which # data is available (this is not a good idea): # relaxTransparency = yes # Uncomment this if you have no network: # proxyOffline = yes # Uncomment this if you want to avoid revalidating instances with a # Vary header (this is not a good idea): # mindlesslyCacheVary = true # Suggestions from Incognito configuration maxConnectionAge = 5m maxConnectionRequests = 120 serverMaxSlots = 8 serverSlots = 2 tunnelAllowedPorts = 1-65535 

   4.4 Restart polipo.

          sudo service polipo restart 

   4.5 Set polipo not to start by default

        We have to remove the polipo service from startup. For that sudo apt-get install sysv-rc-conf. After installation run sudo sysv-rc-conf. It will display a table , scroll down by the use of arrow key to the line with polipo and disable all selections by the use of space key.  sysv-rc-conf  can be quit by using the key q.

 

Now u can use the proxy 127.0.0.1:8118 as http, https and ftp proxies under tor. After tor connects run 'sudo service polipo start' to start the polipo service.

5.  To use tor in firefox follow either steps

 

a) Set the proxy to

http , https and ftp 127.0.0.1:8118

socks host 127.0.0.1:9150

bc) Use foxyproxy for custom proxy management

use 27.0.0.1:8118 and other proxies in a mixed manner specifying custom patterns in urls. (I prefer this method ).

6.  For torrent use the client vuze. and set the http or socks proxy.

7. Using tor from Virtual machine.

 If you are using virtualbox then we can use the host tor network in the guest os. For that set all proxy in guest OS as : 10.0.2.2:8188