I have been using TOR without Whonix for a few months and recently got the courage together to also try Whonix. I am aware that when using TOR you must not open pdfs or play videos or connect to the clearnet at the same time or your identity might be compromised. Is the general idea behind Whonix that because it is running in a virtual machine, that you can surf the internet on the clearnet as per usual on your machine while still using TOR anonymously on Whonix? Or for safetyâs sake should we still avoid the clearnet on our regular machine session while Whonix / Tor is functioning?
And this is a secondary general TOR question somewhat related to above: if there are two computers connected to the same internet connection, and one is browsing on Tor (without Whonix), should the other computer avoid browsing the clearnet to avoid an identity leak, or does it not matter?
Second question, I am trying to use a bridge in TOR, in my Whonix session, but I notice the browser is different. I cannot see a list of IP addresses, or countries the IPs are coming from, whereas normally using Tor I can, by clicking on the green onion. There is also a list of options I can normally access, but not in Whonix, where I can enable a bridge with the tick of a box. So for a novice, how is the simplest way to connect through a bridge to TOR using Whonix?
Regarding connecting to Tor via a bridge, I have entered the appropriate line item as per the instructions you linked to. In the TBB it shows when clicking the green onion a confirmation of using an obfs3 bridge. Is there any way to confirm within the Whonix Workstation or Tor browser, or even Gateway, that the connection is indeed through the bridge? Just in case of a typo on my behalf when entering the data. Due to the fact that I had to browse to the bridge data in Workstation and make the torrc entry in Gateway, I could not copy and paste between the two. Given that, it would be helpful to have a way of quickly confirming that the bridge setting is actually working.
Ego, I just tried that using Arm in Whonix Gateway, and there is no information on bridges even though in my new session, in torrc it kept the bridge entry I put in the other day.
On the second line of my Arm screen it says (in blue) âRelaying Disabledâ. Not sure if that relates to bridges or not. Also not sure if we need to use a new bridge every time we connect. In any case, it is not critical that I use a bridge, I just prefer the extra layer of anonymity by not advertising that I am using Tor.
You have to change to the connections tab, which you may do by either opening the menu and selecting the connections under the view tab or pressing the right arrow key once. There you get a detailed breakdown of any connection made, including bridges, etc.
Good day Ego, on p. 2 of 5 (the Connections tab), I cannot discern what any of it means, it says Connections (5 circuit) at the top, not sure why there are 5, and I cannot see the IP address of my bridge listed anywhere on that page. Not sure if thatâs what I am meant to be looking for. Looks above my level of understanding at this point.
On p. 3 of 5, I can see one of the rows is âBridgeâ, then obfs3 and an IP address in the next column, then a few rows below, âUseBridgesâ, and âTrueâ. But thatâs on a different page from the one you say should confirm the use of the bridge.
Hi, I am trying to make whonix use bridges, I copied bridges addresses from torproject site,
put them in conf file in Gateway, using tutorial,
is this OK? should I put all lines or just one?
Is it enought to have obfs4, or it needs obfs3 adressess?
The result was that it worked with bridges for one time. Today I started gateway and WS wont connect to tor. Do I have to change bridges that often?
Is there something wrong in config?
Trying it with âfreshâ bridges can often be the solution, occasionally a few of them get offline. You may find new ones here: https://bridges.torproject.org
