These instructions are a part of a workshop on the dark web, Tor, and the role of art on the dark web. See slides here.
Install the Tor Browser by downloading here: https://www.torproject.org/download/
2. Download a text editor (Sublime Text, Atom, etc.)
a. Install Homebrew:
Homebrew helps you easily install software packages on your computer. For more info: (https://brew.sh/)
For Mac OSX:
/usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"
For Linux:
sh -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Linuxbrew/install/master/install.sh)"
b. Make sure you have Python installed
You can check if you already have it by running python, otherwise you can run brew install python ).
c. Install Tor
brew install tor
a. Download example code here (https://github.com/jlliu/dark_site) to your computer.
This will download a folder called dark_site-master, containing an HTML file. Unzip the folder to somewhere you can find easily.
b. In the terminal, navigate to within the dark_site-master folder.
c. While inside that directory, start a local server by running:
python -m SimpleHTTPServer 8080
Depending on the python version you have installed, you might need to run
python -m http.server 8080
instead.
You can choose a different port number than 8080, but you should remember it for later!
d. Check whether your local server is running by opening your favorite web browser and going to localhost:8080.
a. Locate the Tor configuration file:
cd /usr/local/etc/tor
(Note: This path might look different depending on how you install Tor). Try inspecting the contents of the folder with the following command:
ls
This tells you the contents of the /tor folder. You should see a file called torrc.sample. This is a sample Tor configuration file.
b. Edit the torrc configuration file.
i. Open the torrc.sample file with a text editor (here, we will use vim, a way of editing files on the command line).
vim torrc.sample
ii. Search for the section that says “This section is just for location-hidden services”. Find the following lines:
#HiddenServiceDir /usr/local/var/lib/tor/hidden_service/
#HiddenServicePort 80 127.0.0.1:80
iii. Remove the “#” to uncomment both of these lines, and modify them as follows:
HiddenServiceDir /Users/YOUR_ACCOUNT_NAME/Documents/hidden_service
HiddenServicePort 80 127.0.0.1:8080
The path corresponding to HiddenServiceDir will hold the things needed to get your hidden service working, i.e., a public key, a private key, and a hostname (your very own onion site).
It should NOT be the directory where you are hosting your website files, as HiddenServiceDir contains secret information. The port number (in this case, 8080) on the line with HiddenServicePort should correspond with the port that you are using with your python server.
Above, we are saying that our HiddenServiceDir should be in a folder called hidden_service in your Documents folder. But this can be anywhere on your computer, as long as it's not your website directory! Remember to change YOUR_ACCOUNT_NAME to your computer username.
iv. Save your file. In vim, you can do this by hitting esc and then typing :wq.
v. Remove the .sample extension to the file to make the configuration file effective. While in the directory where torrc.sample is located, you can rename this file with the mv command, which can move a file from an old location to a new location (as well as rename it from an original name to a new name).
mv torrc.sample torrc
c. Run Tor to make your settings take effect.
Run Tor to configure your Onion service according to your torrc file.
tor
If you encounter an error in the terminal, you may have typed something wrong in the torrc file. Anytime you make changes to the torrc file, you have to rerun this command by stopping tor using cmd+C, and rerunning tor.
If done successfully, this command should automatically make a folder called hidden_service at the path you specified in the torrc file!
a. To get the .onion address of your site, run the following:
cat /Users/YOUR_ACCOUNT_NAME/Documents/hidden_service/hostname
This should give you a long, gibberish address ending in .onion.
b. Open the Tor browser, and copy and paste this address into the address bar.
You should be able to see the website you’re hosting at that address. You can continue to make changes to your locally-hosted website and see them reflected in the Tor browser without having to re-run Tor, as long as your local server keeps running.
In the Tor browser, you may also notice that inspecting the Tor circuit reveals that your traffic goes through three unknown relays before your onion service. This is because creating an onion service is effectively using Tor’s anonymizing capabilities to mask your identity as a webhost.
*** After your .onion site is working, please DO NOT close the terminal window where you are running Tor. It will stop your onion service, and re-running it will generate a different .onion site name for you.
Please also keep your local web server (the one you created with the command "Python -m SimpleHTTPServer..." running as well - you don't need to restart it for changes you make to the site's HTML to come into effect. ***
1. Install the Tor Browser by downloading here.
2. Download a text editor (Sublime Text, Atom, etc.)
You can check if you already have it by running python in the Command Prompt, otherwise you can download it from here.
a. Download example code here (https://github.com/jlliu/dark_site) to your computer.
This will download a folder called dark_site-master, containing an HTML file. Unzip the folder to somewhere you can find easily.
b. In the Command Prompt, navigate to within the dark_site-master folder. (There may be two folders called dark_site-master nested in each other, make sure you enter the deepest one.)
cd C:\Users\YOUR_ACCOUNT_NAME_HERE\Downloads\dark_site-master\dark_site-master
The above command assumes the folder is in your Downloads, and assumes you should look into the second dark_site-master folder nested in the first one. Remember to change YOUR_ACCOUNT_NAME to your computer username.
c. While inside that directory, start a local server by running:
python -m SimpleHTTPServer 8080
Depending on the python version you have installed, you might need to run
python -m http.server 8080
instead.
You can choose a different port number than 8080, but you should remember it for later!
d. Check whether your local server is running by opening your favorite web browser and going to localhost:8080.
a. Locate the Tor configuration file called torrc.
First, find where you downloaded the Tor Browser bundle. Once in that folder, navigate to Browser\TorBrowser\Data\Tor\torrc. Or just look up the torrc filename using the Windows search.
b. Edit the torrc configuration file.
i. Open the torrc file with your favorite text editor.
ii. Add the following lines at the end (and make sure to replace YOUR_USERNAME):
HiddenServiceDir C:\Users\YOUR_USERNAME\Documents\tor\hidden_service
HiddenServicePort 80 127.0.0.1:8080
The path corresponding to HiddenServiceDir holds the things needed to get your hidden service working, i.e., a public key, a private key, and a hostname (your very own onion site). It should NOT be the directory where you are hosting your website files, as HiddenServiceDir contains secret information. The port number (in this case, 8080) on the line with HiddenServicePort should correspond with the port that you are using with your python server.
iii. Save and close the torrc file.
iv. Create the tor folder inside C:\Users\YOUR_USERNAME\Documents, and the hidden_service folder inside C:\Users\YOUR_USERNAME\Documents\tor, if they don't already exist.
c. Re-open the Tor browser in order for changes to take effect!
Every time you open the Tor browser, the Tor software starts running, and will make any changes in your configuration file take effect.
a. To get the .onion address of your site, open the file located at C:\Users\YOUR_USERNAME\Documents\tor\hidden_service\hostname.
You can use any text editor. This should give you a long, gibberish address ending in .onion.
b. Open the Tor browser, and copy and paste this address into the address bar.
You should be able to see the website you’re hosting at that address. You can continue to make changes to your locally-hosted website and see them reflected in the Tor browser without having to re-run Tor, as long as your local server keeps running.
In the Tor browser, you may also notice that inspecting the Tor circuit reveals that your traffic goes through three unknown relays before your onion service. This is because creating an onion service is effectively using Tor’s anonymizing capabilities to mask your identity as a webhost.
** After your .onion site is working, please keep your local web server running (the one you created with the command python -m SimpleHTTPServer... running – you don't need to restart it for changes you make to the site's HTML to come into effect. **