What are some good cases to use Tor for?

What are some good use cases for TOR? I see they have projects where it's embedded into the browser for secure browsing. But is that really a secure network to trust?

One use for TOR might be "secure" browsing in a hostile environment, ie hotel networks. Another might be to bypass content filtering restrictions as TOR connections are "encrypted." I would not recommend performing any kind of secure transactions (online banking, etc.) via TOR though as endpoints may capture your traffic. While they *may* not be able to decode whose credentials they are capturing, they can grab the credentials and the site potentially, which is really what is most important. To answer your last question, no I do not trust the TOR network, but it has its uses.

Reverse SSH over TOR on the Pwnie Express

ThePwnie Express (PwnPlug) is a great little tool for hackers, pentesters and social engineers alike. Out of the box the Pwnie allows you to configure reverse SSH connections, exfiltrated over a number of different protocols including HTTP, SSL, ICMP and DNS.

While these are great for getting out of controlled networks, they all require the Pwnie to be configured with the IP address of your SSH server, which could potentially be traced back to you. It also requires your SSH server to be able to directly receive connections at the IP/hostname configured on the Pwnie. While you can run an SSH server on a proxy box somewhere, you can also go for TOR installed on your Pwnie and configured a Tor Hidden Service on your SSH server. See detailed instructions here.

(U) 1. Blogger Alice, who wants to be able to write to a blog in an anonymous way.

(U) 2. 8 yr. old Alice, who wants to be able to post to sites for children in a way insuring her true name and location are not discovered.

(U) 3. Sick Alice, who want to research information on her illness on the Internet while not enabling anyone to determine her true name and location.

(U) 4. Consumer Alice, who wants to research possible purchases without having a database of her marketing habits being built without (or with her weak) consent.

(U) 5. Oppressed Alice, who lives in a repressive country (no or limited free speech) and wants to talk about things contrary to her governments positions. The countries he used as examples were France, Germany (prohibitions on fascist writings?) and the US.

(U) 6. Turning to “Business Alice”, we had examples of companies not wanting to give up their business secrets to competitors via their Internet usage patterns. An anecdote was given of some business getting a different HTML page displayed when the same URL was accessed with and without TOR.

(U) 7. “Law Enforcement Alice” was concerned with the ability of anonymous agents/informants to really main anonymous when contacting their law enforcement ties.

I wonder if you can help me - I am trying to find people (not just journos like me) who use TOR for legitimate reasons. There are a lot of scare stories around about the darker stuff out there (a child abuse images, drugs, weapons, credit card thefts etc.) but it's an essential tool for activists working within oppressive regimes and whistleblowers. Difficult, I know, but if anyone is willing to talk publicly on the radio about using TOR, can they contact me, either here, or at ravi.naik@bbc.co.uk.