Download of the Week: BitBlinder
PrintAnonymous BitTorrent? Sign me up! Literally--a new-to-the-popular-vernacular freeware application called BitBlinder is making waves for its ability to conceal your BitTorrent downloading behind a Tor-styled "onion proxy." What you sacrifice in download speeds, you make up for in raw anonymity. Simply put, you'll have a host of new protections in place that will bounce your location from system to system, creating a giant, untraceable mesh that routes your Linux downloads from an exit node all the way back to your lil' system at-home.
The downside? You can't actually download BitBlinder yet. The program's still in beta, which will necessitate that you sign up for a waiting list and cross your fingers that you'll get a chance to check it out. Nevertheless, it could be worth your while if you're extremely concerned about others' ability to figure out what kind of free, legal software you'll pulling down through your peers.
What's the catch? Although you, yourself, will be able to use an anonymous guide to snake your way through this digital maze of BitTorrent connections... you have to allow others to use your computer as their own privacy-shielding exit node as well. And, in doing so, you could become liable for the data that's requested. After all, the setup of the location concealment is such that requests using you as an exit out of the confusion will appear to originate from you directly.
You can pull yourself out of the "exit node" feature if you so desire, but it will make it increasingly difficult to operate your BitTorrent client of choice. That's because BitBlinder operates on a credit system. Or, to put it simply, you have to contribute to the system in order to reap its benefits. Block off your own involvement in the Tor-like network and you won't be having anonymous downloads for very long.
It's an interesting concept, to say the very least. What about you? Are you willing to trade in speeds for a little more security, or is BitBlinder's trade-off just too much of an eye for an eye?
Each week, Maximum PC picks a new free or shareware download as its favorite of... the week. Have a nifty application that you can't live without? Twitter David Murphy @acererak with your latest suggestions.
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FRAGaLOT
April 03, 2010 at 7:25am
While downlods might slow down, your bandwidth usage will go up since you're traffiking everyone elses packets around. So if you're on comcast (or any other ISP with bandwith usage caps of some kind) you'll likely use up your 250gb limit pretty DAMN quick. So.. seems pointless to me.
maddingo
April 03, 2010 at 1:53am
aweful
really wow.... so instead of getting sue for something i downloaded I can get sued a dozen times for what other people download...
supposedly it ****s with the tor network some but why not just run bt over tor?
justchad
April 02, 2010 at 9:56pm
as long as you just grab one part of the file and then switch to a new link each time it might work but other wise its just a lot of excuses for who ever to subpoena for more than just one person
-Chad
sirphunkee
April 02, 2010 at 9:42am
This is like using powerful antibacterial soap to wash your hands before a meal...but then using somebody else's hands to eat with
Daemon
April 02, 2010 at 6:50am
Then the last leg of the download trip is through your own ISP who will of course have a record of it. We also know of download caps and deep packet inspection (DPI), so really in the end you're still traceable and there ARE records regardless.
thegamepro
April 02, 2010 at 6:37am
I think the idea is that if you are all in it together, nobody can track anything that any of you could be downloading. I don't think I want to be in any part of this.
BrandNewJesus
April 02, 2010 at 6:00am
Not to mention that the other person may be downloading something much worse than movies and music. Anyone remember the guy running tor that had his door busted in for child porn. He then had to explain to a judge what the hell tor is, and wheather or not that worked idk, I have not heard a conclusion.
Vano
April 02, 2010 at 5:52am
Wow. other words, while you rissking downloading one song, thousand other people will download thousand songs through your computer - brilliant! Yes, that is much better, and much more secure/safe...
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