Harvard University went on lockdown Monday after administrators received emails claiming bomb threats against four campus buildings. Turns out, there were no bombs – thankfully. Instead, the threats were allegedly sent out by Harvard sophomore Eldo Kim, who The Crimson reports was apparently trying to avoid taking a final exam.
As PJ Vogt at On The Media’s TLDR blog points out, the FBI was able to identify Kim despite the fact that he sent the emails after connecting to Tor, a network that anonymizes users’ IP addresses to make it look like online activity is coming from somewhere else.
Seeing as Tor is often used to access the “deep Web” – content and websites not included in “clear Web” search results from Google or other search engines – where many nefarious communities reside, the network’s ability (or inability) to keep its users anonymous is a hot talking point.
Kim’s problem was not with Tor, but with the way he apparently used it. As the FBI affidavit explains (pdf), Harvard’s IT staff “was able to determine that, in the several hours leading up to the receipt of the e-mail messages described above, Eldo Kim accessed Tor using Harvard’s wireless network.” The administrators were probably able to pinpoint Kim because he was likely one of the few people accessing Tor on Harvard’s Wi-Fi, if not the only one.
Which brings us to this tale’s takeaway: Just because Tor can anonymize your online actives and make them difficult to track doesn’t mean it will – especially not when you’re using a monitored Internet connection. There are ways to use Tor to remain nearly untraceable, as this in-depth slideshow details. Kim, it would seem, did none of it.
Because of this oversight, Kim has been arrested and faces up to five years in prison for his bomb threat hoax. We all know finals suck – but wouldn’t it be easier to take the test?
A virtual private network (VPN) encrypts your internet traffic and routes it through a server run by the VPN provider. Websites see the VPN server’s IP address instead of yours, and you can get around geo-blocks, censorship, and ISP throttling. The best VPN services are paid, but there are still a handful of free options that do the job well.
Most free VPNs come with a hidden cost, because running servers isn’t cheap and a company that doesn’t charge you has to make its money somewhere else. Many do so by logging your browsing activity and selling it to advertisers, while others flood you with ads and track you across apps.
A stocked computer cache may be convenient for logging into and out of go-to sites in seconds flat, but a major buildup of these tracking codes could significantly impact your PC’s performance. If you’ve noticed that your PC has been running rather slow of late, or you’re using a new browser and don’t know how to clear its cache, we’ve got you covered with the following guide.
If you’re looking to clean up your Gmail inbox, but you don’t want to delete anything permanently, then choosing the archive option is your best bet. Whenever you archive an email, it is removed from your inbox folder while still remaining accessible. Here’s how to access any emails you have archived previously, as well as how to move such messages back to your regular inbox for fast access.