TorChat
Encyclopedia
TorChat is a decentral anonymous instant messenger that uses Tor hidden services as its underlying Network. It can be used for text messaging and to transfer files to other users. The characteristics of Tor's hidden services take care that all traffic between the clients is encrypted and that it is extremely difficult (if not impossible) to tell who is communicating with whom and where a given client is physically located.
In TorChat every user has a unique alphanumeric ID consisting of 16 characters. This ID will be randomly created by Tor when the client is started the first time, it is basically the .onion
address of a hidden service. TorChat clients communicate with each other by using Tor to contact the other's hidden service (derived from his ID) and exchanging status information, chat messages and other data over this connections. Since Tor hidden services can receive incoming connections even if they are behind a router doing Network Address Translation
, TorChat does not need any Port Forwarding
to work.
TorChat is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License
(GPL). The first public version of TorChat was released in November 2007 by Bernd Kreuß and has since then been constantly developed further. It is written in Python
and uses the cross-platform
GUI toolkit wxPython
which makes it possible to support a wide range of platforms and operating system
s. At the moment there are versions available for Microsoft Windows
and Linux
.
The older windows versions of TorChat were built with py2exe
(since 0.9.9.292 replaced with pyinstaller) and comes bundled with a copy of the Tor onion router readily configured so that it can be run as a portable application
right off an USB flash drive
without any installation, configuration or account creation.
Between 2008 and 2010 there have not been any updated packages, resulting in the bundled version of Tor becoming obsolete and unable to connect to the Tor network which was the reason for the appearance of forks that basically just replaced the bundled Tor.exe with a current one. In December 2010 finally an official update became available that among some minor bugfixes also includes an up-to-date Tor.exe again.
A fork was released for Mac OS X in the summer of 2010 by a French developer. The binary (a Cocoa application) and source-code (C/C++/Objective-C/Objective-C++) bundled in a XCode 4 project can be downloaded on SourceMac. It should be noted that this fork is still in beta and need more test before claiming to be safe.
In TorChat every user has a unique alphanumeric ID consisting of 16 characters. This ID will be randomly created by Tor when the client is started the first time, it is basically the .onion
.onion
.onion is a pseudo-top-level domain host suffix designating an anonymous hidden service reachable via the Tor network...
address of a hidden service. TorChat clients communicate with each other by using Tor to contact the other's hidden service (derived from his ID) and exchanging status information, chat messages and other data over this connections. Since Tor hidden services can receive incoming connections even if they are behind a router doing Network Address Translation
Network address translation
In computer networking, network address translation is the process of modifying IP address information in IP packet headers while in transit across a traffic routing device....
, TorChat does not need any Port Forwarding
Port forwarding
Port forwarding or port mapping is a name given to the combined technique of# translating the address and/or port number of a packet to a new destination# possibly accepting such packet in a packet filter...
to work.
TorChat is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License
GNU General Public License
The GNU General Public License is the most widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU Project....
(GPL). The first public version of TorChat was released in November 2007 by Bernd Kreuß and has since then been constantly developed further. It is written in Python
Python (programming language)
Python is a general-purpose, high-level programming language whose design philosophy emphasizes code readability. Python claims to "[combine] remarkable power with very clear syntax", and its standard library is large and comprehensive...
and uses the cross-platform
Cross-platform
In computing, cross-platform, or multi-platform, is an attribute conferred to computer software or computing methods and concepts that are implemented and inter-operate on multiple computer platforms...
GUI toolkit wxPython
WxPython
-External links:* * at showmedo...
which makes it possible to support a wide range of platforms and operating system
Operating system
An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...
s. At the moment there are versions available for Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
and Linux
Linux
Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...
.
The older windows versions of TorChat were built with py2exe
Py2exe
py2exe is a Python extension which converts Python scripts into Windows executables . These executables can run on a system without Python installed. It is the most common tool for doing so....
(since 0.9.9.292 replaced with pyinstaller) and comes bundled with a copy of the Tor onion router readily configured so that it can be run as a portable application
Portable application
A portable application , sometimes also called standalone, is a computer software program designed to run independently from an operating system...
right off an USB flash drive
USB flash drive
A flash drive is a data storage device that consists of flash memory with an integrated Universal Serial Bus interface. flash drives are typically removable and rewritable, and physically much smaller than a floppy disk. Most weigh less than 30 g...
without any installation, configuration or account creation.
Between 2008 and 2010 there have not been any updated packages, resulting in the bundled version of Tor becoming obsolete and unable to connect to the Tor network which was the reason for the appearance of forks that basically just replaced the bundled Tor.exe with a current one. In December 2010 finally an official update became available that among some minor bugfixes also includes an up-to-date Tor.exe again.
A fork was released for Mac OS X in the summer of 2010 by a French developer. The binary (a Cocoa application) and source-code (C/C++/Objective-C/Objective-C++) bundled in a XCode 4 project can be downloaded on SourceMac. It should be noted that this fork is still in beta and need more test before claiming to be safe.