On the topic of whether allowing Tor users to edit is a concern, I believe so. Because of Tor blocks, it is sometimes extremely difficult, or even impossible altogether, to edit Wikipedia for some users. I believe we should give these users the opportunity to contribute rather than have them punished because of others who misuse Tor for spamming/sockpuppeting.
As far as a solution goes, I have a complete codebase for Extension:TokenAuth, which allows users to have MediaWiki sign a blinded token, which can then be used to bypass a specific IP block in order to log in and edit. It is almost ready; there are just a few functionality problems with the JavaScript crypto library. *--* *Tyler Romeo* Stevens Institute of Technology, Class of 2015 Major in Computer Science www.whizkidztech.com | [email protected] On Sat, Dec 29, 2012 at 7:12 PM, Platonides <[email protected]> wrote: > On 28/12/12 18:29, Tilman Bayer wrote: > > On Fri, Dec 28, 2012 at 1:26 AM, Sumana Harihareswara wrote: > >> I've floated this problem past Tor and privacy people, and here are a > >> few ideas: > >> > >> 1) Just use the existing mechanisms more leniently. Encourage the > >> communities (Wikimedia & Tor) to use > >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Request_an_account (to get an > >> account from behind Tor) and to let more people get IP block exemptions > >> even before they've made any edits (< 30 people have gotten exemptions > >> on en.wp in 2012). Add encouraging "get an exempt account" language to > >> the "you're blocked because you're using Tor" messaging. Then if > >> there's an uptick in vandalism from Tor then they can just tighten up > >> again. > > This seems the right approach. > > > >> 2) Encourage people with closed proxies to re-vitalize > >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WOCP . Problem: using closed > >> proxies is okay for people with some threat models but not others. > > > I didn't know about it. This is an interesting concept. It would be > possible to setup some 'public wikipedia proxys' (eg. by an European > chapter) and encourage its use. > It would still be possible to checkuser people going through that, but > a 2-tier process would be needed (wiki checkuser + proxy admin) thus > protecting from a “rogue checkuser” (Is that the primary concern of good > editors wishing to use proxys?). We could use that setup for gaining > information about usage (eg. it was 90% spam). > > > >> 3) Look at Nymble - http://freehaven.net/anonbib/#oakland11-formalizing > >> and http://cgi.soic.indiana.edu/~kapadia/nymble/overview.php . It > would > >> allow Wikimedia to distance itself from knowing people's identities, but > >> still allow admins to revoke permissions if people acted up. The user > >> shows a real identity, gets a token, and exchanges that token over tor > >> for an account. If the user abuses the site, Wikimedia site admins can > >> blacklist the user without ever being able to learn who they were or > >> what other edits they did. More: https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/~iang/ Ian > >> Golberg's, Nick Hopper's, and Apu Kapadia's groups are all working on > >> Nymble or its derivatives. It's not ready for production yet, I bet, > >> but if someone wanted a Big Project.... > > > > As Brad and Ariel point out, Nymble in the form described on the linked > > project page does not seem to allow long-term blocks, and cannot deal > with > > dynamic IPs. In other words, it would only provide the analogue of > > autoblock functionality for Tor users. The linked paper by Henry and > > Goldberg is more realistic about these limitations, discussing IP > addresses > > only as one of several possible "unique identifiers" (§V). From the > > concluding remarks to that chapter, it seems most likely that they would > > recommend "some form of PKI or government ID-based registration" for our > > purposes. > > Requiring a government ID for connecting through tor would be even worse > for privacy. > > I completely agree that matching with the IP address used to request the > nymble token is not enough. Maybe if the tokens were instead based in > ISP+zone geolocation, that could be a way. Still, that would still miss > linkability for vandals which use eg. both their home and work connections. > > > > 3a) A token authorization system (perhaps a MediaWiki extension) where > > the server blindly signs a token, and then the user can use that token > > to bypass the Tor blocks. (Tyler mentioned he saw this somewhere in a > > Bugzilla suggestion; I haven't found it.) > > Bug 3729 ? > > > >> Thoughts? Are any of you interested in working on this problem? #tor on > >> the OFTC IRC server is full of people who'd be interested in talking > >> about this. > > This is a social problem. We have the tools to fix it (account creation > + ip block exemption). If someone asked me for that (in a project where > I can) because they are censored by their government I would gladly > grant it. > That also means that when they replaced 'Jimbo' with 'penis', 5 minutes > after getting their account, I would notice and kick them out. > In my experience, far more people is trying to use tor in wikipedia for > vandalising than for doing constructive edits / due to local censorship. > Although I concede that it's probably the opposite on ‘certain wikis’ I > don't edit. > The problem with global solutions are vandals abusing it. > > "If I don't get caught on 10 edits I can edit through tor" is a candle > for vandals. Note that "I don't get caught" is different than "doing a > constructive edit". > > An idea would be to force some recaptcha-style work before giving such > tokens, so even though we know they will abuse the system, we are still > using them as improving force (although the following vandalism could > still be worse than what we gained). > > > I also wonder if we are not aiming too high, trying to solve the > anonimity and traceability problems on the internet, while we have for > instance captchas forced to anons and newbies on a couple wikis due to a > bot vandalism done years ago (bug 41745). > > > _______________________________________________ > Wikitech-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l > _______________________________________________ Wikitech-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
