XPost: alt.privacy.anon-server, alt.2600   
   From: anonymous@example.invalid   
      
   Statement from Ricochet-Refresh Regarding The Recent Stories in German   
   Media About Alleged Timing Attacks Affecting Our Users   
      
   Wednesday 18 September 2024   
      
   Several German media news outlets have run a story about   
   law enforcement agencies allegedly breaking the anonymity provided by   
   Tor and, with it, Ricochet-Refresh.   
      
   We would like to answer some questions on the matter to clarify the   
   facts from the hype.   
      
   1. Are you aware of cases where Ricochet users were de-anonymised? If   
   so, how? We are not aware of any cases where users of the current   
   version of Ricochet-Refresh have been de-anonymised. (Including this   
   alleged case, since no evidence of such was provided to us).   
      
   The reported attacks occurred 2019-2021, and we have substantially   
   updated the software to improve security since that time.   
      
   Some technical details from our end:   
      
   In particular, the vanguards-lite feature was introduced to   
   Ricochet-Refresh in version 3.0.12 in June of 2022, after upgrading to   
   the tor 0.4.7 series. Without being provided with the details of the   
   reported attack, we can not say definitively this feature would have   
   stopped it. However, we do know vanguards were introduced in part to   
   make this general class of attacks more difficult to pull off. Since   
   then, we have continued releasing regular updates which include   
   security updates from our upstream dependencies (including Tor).   
      
   2. What are these 'timing' attacks? Could they be applied to anonymous   
   communications? Do they breach the confidentiality of an online   
   conversation? Again, we have no proven details of the attack and it's   
   hard to respond to an incident when you can't see the documentation.   
      
   'Timing' attacks have been around for a while, nothing new there. They   
   can in theory unmask the identity of an anonymous end-user, but they do   
   not break open the content of a secret conversation. Generally the   
   attacker in this situation would need vast resources and enormous legal   
   powers to be successful - only the kind that a state could access.   
      
   The field of cybersecurity rarely offers absolute guarantees. If you   
   want to be perfectly private, you need to disconnect entirely from the   
   digital world. That's not a very practical solution for most people.   
      
   So you winnow down risk as far as possible. It's illogical to say   
   'because there is some very small risk, we should stop using technology   
   to protect ourselves'. Instead, the best choice is to opt for free,   
   open-source software like Ricochet-Refresh, which by design, gives you   
   enormously more privacy and anonymity than the vast majority of other   
   tools.   
      
   3. Is it at all possible for Ricochet-Refresh users to protect   
   themselves against such 'timing analyses'? If so, how? Ricochet-Refresh   
   is one of the safest ways to communicate online. The vast majority of   
   people using Ricochet-Refresh do not need to do anything to protect   
   themselves against timing analysis attacks.   
      
   In the overwhelming majority of cases, an attacker will not be able to   
   find someone's identity because they do not have these kinds of very   
   large resources.   
      
   As a purely precautionary measure, we suggest end-users who face   
   powerful attackers should limit the number of people to whom they   
   distribute their Ricochet-Refresh ID. In the context of   
   Ricochet-Refresh, most theoretical and practical attacks are only   
   possible if the adversary knows the ID of the target they are   
   attempting to de-anonymise   
      
   Note that the content of the message stays secret in the attack   
   scenarios described to us by the journalist who wrote the story.   
      
   4. Do you continue to improve Ricochet-Refresh' security?   
   We do. We provide monthly(ish) Ricochet-Refresh releases when upstream   
   dependencies (e.g. Tor, openssl, qt, etc) publish security updates.   
   Beyond that, we have also been researching and developing an improved   
   back-end which should make 'timing analysis' attacks much more   
   difficult by providing the user the ability to control their online   
   visibility to unauthorised peers.   
      
   5. Is it safe to continue using Ricochet? Why?   
   Note: Ricochet is not the same as Ricochet-Refresh. Ricochet has been   
   retired because it relies on legacy technology that no longer exists in   
   the Tor Network.   
      
   Yes. People should continue using Ricochet-Refresh with a high degree   
   of confidence. It is still one of the most private and secure ways to   
   communicate online.   
      
   The protocol is completely peer-to-peer and the client is open-source;   
   there is no account registration, no servers hosting your data, and no   
   centralised organisations or infrastructure to attack. A person's   
   account data is stored locally on their own computer and their   
   communications are only sent to the intended recipients. These   
   communications are private and secure by default because they are   
   end-to-end encrypted.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)