The FBI used a vulnerability in Firefox 17, on which the Tor browser is based, to turn Freedom Hosting sites into malware spreading tracker tools. We’re investigating these bugs and will fix them if we can,” Tor said in a statement. The malware payload could be trying to exploit potential bugs in Firefox 17 ESR, on which our Tor browser is based. This exploit is used to load a malware payload to infect user’s computers. From what is known so far, the breach was used to configure the server in a way that it injects some sort of JavaScript exploit in the web pages delivered to users. The current news indicates that someone has exploited the software behind Freedom Hosting. Exploits for PHP, Apache, MySQL, and other software are far more common than exploits for Tor. In the past, adversarial organizations have skipped trying to break Tor hidden services and instead attacked the software running at the server behind the dot onion address. “The person, or persons, who run Freedom Hosting are in no way affiliated or connected to The Tor Project, Inc., the organization coordinating the development of the Tor software and research. It’s then impossible for law enforcement agencies to trace the original IP address.Įric Eoin Marques, a US-born 28-year-old living in Dublin, Ireland, is accused of being the chief architect behind Freedom Hosting, which is responsible for hosting child porn on 550 servers throughout Europe.įreedom Hosting is a major hidden services hosting provider that can only be accessed through the Tor network.įreedom Hosting and Marques have been associated with child pornography, so Tor released a statement claiming that they are in no way associated with the people running Freedom Hosting:

While many of these services are innocent and aimed at those concerned about human rights abuses, the anonymity naturally attracts those with criminal intent such as the distribution of child pornography. It does this by directing Internet traffic through a volunteer network of more than 3,000 relays to conceal the user’s location.

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