So curiostiy got the better of me when I discovered Tor. After reading a few sites on how to browse the the dark web safely, I thought I was prepared to explore the dark web without fear of consequence. However, I came across some posts on reddit that said their ISP removed their router’s access to the their network and refused to provide them wifi, internet, the whole shebang.
So I’m a little scared now, I know there are safe links on the dark web, but I don’t want to lose my internet. How do I know if I’ll be banned for using TOR?
For just using Tor, it’s unlikely they’d notice or care.
If you’re running an entry node, you might wind up blacklisted from services like Hulu. That happened to me. But I never got in trouble with my ISP
If you run an exit node, you’re probably going to get some letters in the mail as that generates a ton of suspicious looking traffic.
You can’t run either of those accidentally. So if you’re just looking to fire up the Tor browser and go exploring, there shouldn’t be a problem with your ISP
Nah, your ISP won’t outright stop your service just because you’re using Tor. Using Tor itself is not illegal in the U.S., and it’s actually used for legitimate reasons like privacy, bypassing censorship, or even just wanting to be anonymous while browsing. However, ISPs can get a little jumpy when they see Tor traffic, mainly because it’s often linked to shady activities.
What might be happening to those people on Reddit is that their ISPs notice weird or high-volume encrypted traffic and might take some measures—like throttling bandwidth, flagging your account for suspicious activity, or even contacting you if they think you’re doing something against their terms of service. But just “bricking” your router and cutting you off entirely sounds extreme. That’s not typical.
Your ISP has a way to block you from accessing to a entry node(connecting to tor) but this is mostly for a obvious reason since people think badly of the darkweb, your only way to prevent your ISP from finding out and restricting your access or connecting to the internet or Tor you can use a Bridge so this will help cover up that you are connecting to a entry node
Yeah never heard of that before. You could be a researcher, or a journalist, or a cybersecurity professional , or even in law enforcement. There are reasons why private citizens need to use Tor.
You should be fine. Just don’t do any dumb shit on there haha.
Hello everyone! All of you have super helpful! I’ve gathered the impression that as long as I browse the dark web responsibly, I won’t simply lose my services immedietely for using it. And I can use Tails OS or a bridge if I need to. Thank you all for providing so much information!
Only if criminal activity had been conducted, in which case, you would get a notification from the feds. The activity would have to be tied to patterns, significant enough to get on their radar.
It’s generally not a good idea to use TOR. Only use it if you really understand the risks, and are getting a very specific and worthwhile reward.
In the US, simply using the TOR network permanently removes your right to not get wiretapped without warrant. (thanks Freedom Act!)
I won’t get into exactly how they will know that you’ve used TOR, because that gets even more political, but let’s just say that you can’t tell who is running nodes, and if you run most of the nodes you can do some statistics and such and figure out who is who and where everything is going.
And no, VPNs commercially available in most countries do not actually provide security from your ISP or government. In fact they may reduce it, so TOR over VPN is not necessarily safe. Everyone forgets that ISPs are in the perfect situation to do whatever MitM attacks they want.
That sounds great, but I’m a bit uncomfortable with switching my OS. I’d like to keep windows 10. I’d don’t suppose there are any alternatives? Tbh, I’ve never heard of Tails and I’m not sure how it would work.
Yes, you’re right. Straight up bricking without any warning is impossible and silly. I feel kind of ignorant, I should’ve worded this post better, haha. I guess a better question is: am I going to get a call from my ISP that I am violating their terms of service just for using Tor? And is there a way to check if my ISP is against this sort of thing?