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Tor Metrics
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Users

We estimate the number of users by analyzing the requests induced by clients to relays and bridges.

  • Relay users
  • Bridge users by country
  • Bridge users by transport
  • Bridge users by country and transport
  • Bridge users by IP version
  • BridgeDB requests by requested transport
  • BridgeDB requests by distributor
  • Top-10 countries by relay users
  • Top-10 countries by possible censorship events
  • Top-10 countries by bridge users
  • “The anonymous Internet”
Bridge users by transport graph

This graph shows the estimated number of clients connecting via bridges. These numbers are derived from directory requests counted on bridges. Bridges distinguish connecting clients by transport protocol, which may include pluggable transports, so that graphs are available for different transports. For further details check the documentation on Reproducible Metrics.

Source:

Download graph as PNG or PDF.

Download data as CSV.

Learn more about the CSV data format or how to reproduce the graph data.

Related events

The following events have been manually collected in the metrics-timeline Git repository and might be related to the displayed graph.

Dates Places/Protocols Description and Links
2017-07-31 to 2017-10-07 Netherlands <OR> Relays Unknown Increase of relay users in the Netherlands, from 50k to 100k. Stopped at the same time as increases in Romania, Lithuania, and the Seychelles.
relay graph post suggesting link to 2× dirauth bandwidth post about start post about end
2017-07-31 to 2017-10-07 Romania <OR> Relays Unknown Increase of relay users in Romania, from 10k to 40k. Bridge users not affected. Stopped at the same time as increases in the Netherlands, Lithuania, and the Seychelles. Another increase began immediately after.
relay graph post suggesting link to 2× dirauth bandwidth
2017-07-31 to 2017-08-28 Unknown Directory authorities using 2× bandwidth.
mailing list post for start mailing list post for end post suggesting link to nl, ro, lt, sc increases
2017-07-31 to 2017-08-17 Austria <OR> Relays Unknown Fluctuations of relay users in Austria. Bridge users not affected.
relay graph
2017-07-29 to 2017-08-17 meek Outage of meek-amazon bridge, caused by an expired certificate.
Relay Search expired certificate new certificate
2017-07-15 to 2017-07-22 Seychelles <OR> Relays Unknown Increase of relay users in the Seychelles, from 400 to 6000. Bridge users not affected.
relay graph
2017-07-07 ipv4 ipv6 geoip and geoip6 databases updated to "July 4 2017 Maxmind GeoLite2 Country" (geoip-db-digest 3D04F191098640F2E03B4D5F7800088D14B7EC30, geoip6-db-digest A3649B9E909C59942FB3D8F874AB4BEA36E8BEC1).
commit
2017-07-04 to 2017-07-21 obfs4 Outage of default obfs4 bridge frosty.
mailing list post
2017-07-04 to 2017-07-21 obfs4 Outage of default obfs4 bridge dragon.
mailing list post
2017-07-02 deb.torproject.org upgrades from tor 0.2.9 to tor 0.3.0
relay versions graph tweet
2017-07-01 United Arab Emirates <OR> Relays Unknown Sudden drop in relay users.
graph
2017-06-26 to 2017-07-02 obfs4 Outage of default obfs4 bridge dragon.
mailing list post
2017-06-26 to 2017-07-03 obfs4 Outage of default obfs4 bridge frosty.
mailing list post
2017-06-20 meek Outage of meek-azure bridge.
start end
2017-06-19 to 2017-06-23 obfs4 Outage of default obfs4 bridge dragon.
mailing list post
2017-06-18 to 2017-06-23 obfs4 Outage of default obfs4 bridge frosty.
mailing list post
2017-06-14 to 2017-07-06 Mali Unknown Sudden increase of direct and bridge users in Mali.
relay graph bridge graph
2017-06-13 Switzerland obfs4 Unknown Increase in obfs4 users in Switzerland, from 200 to 400.
bridge graph transport graph
2017-06-12 obfs4 Increased the file descriptor limit on default obfs4 bridges ndnop3 and ndnop5 from 4096 to 32768. They had been failing bootstrap attempts from a test location in the U.S. about 40% of the time.
graph showing failed connections
2017-06-09 ipv4 ipv6 geoip and geoip6 databases updated to "June 8 2017 Maxmind GeoLite2 Country" (geoip-db-digest AFD609025B66305AD9FA8E0B15AF4F2BC82271F1, geoip6-db-digest A69FD14ACE46EE695F589ACE0EB7B915285B51B4).
commit
2017-06-07 to 2017-12-14 Brazil meek Unknown Sustained increase of meek users in Brazil, similar to the one that took place between 2016-07-21 and 2017-03-03.
graph
2017-06-07 ipv6 obfs4 Tor Browser 7.0 released. Adds an IPv6 address for default obfs4 bridge Lisbeth. Adds new default obfs4 bridges frosty and dragon.
blog post IPv6 ticket frosty and dragon ticket
2017-05-25 obfs4 Set AssumeReachable 1 on the default obfs4 bridges cymrubridge31 and cymrubridge33 in an attempt to make them publish statistics.
mailing list post
2017-05-23 to 2017-06-13 obfs4 Default obfs4 bridge LeifEricson rejects connections due to a broken firewall forwarding rule. This didn't affect the bridges "real" obfs4 port, but it did affect the port at that time configured in Tor Browser.
2017-05-16 Ukraine Ukraine blocks Russian-operated web services. Relay and bridge users increase over 5×. May be partly attributable to the FreeU Browser , a browser produced and advertised by Mail.ru that includes a tor client.
ticket news article Reddit post relay graph bridge graph news article on FreeU
2017-05-10 Egypt <OR> Relays Unknown Drop in direct users from Egypt.
tor-talk post graph
2017-05-09 to 2017-05-12 Macau <OR> Relays Unknown Sudden temporary peak of 3k direct users in Macau.
tor-talk post graph
2017-05-08 ipv4 ipv6 geoip and geoip6 databases updated to "May 2 2017 Maxmind GeoLite2 Country" (geoip-db-digest B2E5105287668771E34A66F90B34982D419727EF, geoip6-db-digest 8DA8AC3C8158CBFDF7DB53BBF73338246872371A).
commit
2017-05-06 snowflake Set AssumeReachable 1 on the Snowflake bridge 2B280B23E1107BB62ABFC40DDCC8824814F80A72 in an attempt to make it start publishing statistics.
mailing list post
2017-04-30 meek The meek-amazon bridge upgrades to meek-server 0.27.
2017-04-23 Taiwan <OR> Relays Unknown Relay users triple and begin to fluctuate in Taiwan.
tor-talk post graph
2017-04-20 meek obfs4 scramblesuit Tor Browser 7.0a3 is released. It changes the app.update.url. It removes the last remaining scramblesuit bridge. It changes the meek-amazon backend. It adds the new default obfs4 bridges cymrubridge31:80 and cymrubridge33:80.
blog post
2017-04-19 meek obfs4 Tor Browser 6.5.2 is released. It changes the app.update.url. It changes the meek-amazon backend. It adds the new default obfs4 bridges cymrubridge31:80 and cymrubridge33:80.
blog post comment about app.update.url
2017-04-17 to 2017-04-23 Israel <OR> Relays Unknown Another sudden increase of direct users in Israel. Bridge users not affected.
relay graph
2017-04-14 to 2017-08-20 <OR> Directory authority maatuska's bwscanner stops operating, leading to a drop in traffic on some relays.
tor-consensus-health post about start tor-consensus-health post about end tor-dev thread analysis
2017-04-06 ipv4 ipv6 geoip and geoip6 databases updated to "April 4 2017 Maxmind GeoLite2 Country" (geoip-db-digest 0F3D4A456E5078CC9E49398ADCB04C40EA49B793, geoip6-db-digest 04F41F05FA167EF6EEE3FE953404AB0BCCD33008).
commit
2017-04-05 to 2017-04-13 Israel <OR> Relays Unknown Sudden increase of direct users in Israel. Bridge users not affected.
relay graph
2017-03-22 meek Orbot 15.4.0 beta-2 multi is released, containing the new meek-azure CDN configuration.
mailing list post commit
2017-03-08 ipv4 ipv6 geoip and geoip6 databases updated to "March 7 2017 Maxmind GeoLite2 Country" (geoip-db-digest 63921843E3AAA632088D189D877F836A373CD40D, geoip6-db-digest 2B93B9C6679BB09E1746F212A6DCDC6E710F5F52).
commit
2017-03-07 meek scramblesuit Tor Browser 6.5.1 is released, containing the new meek-azure CDN configuration, and removing the last remaining scramblesuit bridge.
blog post meek ticket scramblesuit ticket
2017-03-03 meek Stopped the (unused) meek-azure CDN endpoint meek-reflect.azureedge.net.
mailing list post
2017-03-03 meek Stopped the meek-azure CDN endpoint az786092.vo.msecnd.net.
mailing list post
2017-03-03 meek Stopped the meek-azure CDN endpoint az668014.vo.msecnd.net.
mailing list post
2017-03-01 to 2018-11-12 United Arab Emirates <OR> Relays Unknown Another increase in relay users, slower and more sustained than the previous one.
graph ticket about end
2017-02-12 ipv4 ipv6 geoip and geoip6 databases updated to "February 8 2017 Maxmind GeoLite2 Country" (geoip-db-digest C0C6099CE335916862978F77756C0B42521A74B2, geoip6-db-digest A54B14B9D47584E010F763D3EAE23C4726F4A8D5).
commit
2017-02-10 to present <OR> exit Measurement error from bandwidth authority causes decrease in measured bandwidth in Europe.
mailing list post
2017-02-09 to 2017-08-01 India obfs3 Unknown Gradual but large increase of obfs3 users in India, followed by slow decay. Relay users and other transports seemingly not affected.
graph
2017-02-09 to 2017-03-21 Jordan obfs3 Unknown Abrupt increase and decrease in obfs3 users in Jordan. Relay users and other transports seemingly not affected.
graph
2017-02-06 to 2017-08-01 United Arab Emirates obfs3 Unknown Increase in obfs3 users from the UAE, from 5K to 100K. Other transports not affected.
transport graph UAE bridge graph ticket
2017-01-25 to 2017-04-05 webstats Tor Browser update pings roughly halve. The beginning corresponds with the release of Tor Browser 6.5.2, which changed the app.update.url. The end doesn't correspond to any release.
ticket
2017-01-24 Tor Browser 6.5 is released. It changes the app.update.url, which causes an apparent drop in update pings.
blog post graph ticket comment about app.update.url
2017-01-24 snowflake Tor Browser 7.0a1 released, including Snowflake for GNU/Linux only.
blog post
2017-01-22 meek 1.0-beta release of GAEuploader, a tool that automates the setting up of meek.
mailing list post
2017-01-16 to 2017-04-20 Cameroon Internet shutdown in parts of Cameroon.
article article
2017-01-15 to 2017-03-01 United Arab Emirates <OR> Relays Unknown Huge spike in relay users (400k+). An anonymous contributor suggests that it may be a botnet, based on the large number of hosts with an open SMB port in the UAE.
graph metrics-team thread Reddit thread comment about botnet
2017-01-09 meek Decreased the rate limit on the meek-azure bridge to 2.0 MB/s, from 3.0 MB/s.
2017-01-04 ipv4 ipv6 geoip and geoip6 databases updated to "January 4 2017 Maxmind GeoLite2 Country" (geoip-db-digest 672C29A4FA9BF81DE97CFE128741445E2BDE8097, geoip6-db-digest 81F380639A8E1000539204949A363FD3BFAFBA74).
commit
2016-07-21 to 2017-03-03 Brazil meek Unknown Sustained increase in meek users in Brazil. Locals believe that they are not actual users, rather bots or something like that. End date coincides with shutdown of meek-azure before migration. Would pick up again 2017-06-07.
graph
2015-12-31 to 2020-06-04 Mexico The Telmex ISP in Mexico blocks seven directory authorities.
mailing list post article

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This material is supported in part by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. CNS-0959138. Any opinions, finding, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation. "Tor" and the "Onion Logo" are registered trademarks of The Tor Project, Inc.. Data on this site is freely available under a CC0 no copyright declaration: To the extent possible under law, the Tor Project has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights in the data. Graphs are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License.