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[tor-relays] Re: webtunnel bridges for the telegram distributor



Is there a place to see how many bridges are currently assigned to each distribution method?

Jonah

On 7/17/25 8:20 AM, meskio via tor-relays wrote:
Hello,

Russia is extending their Tor block[0]. Currently, they block Fully Encrypted
Protocols like obfs4 on some mobile networks[1]. For a while, WebTunnel has been
a good alternative, but since June, Roskomnadzor has enumerated some WebTunnel
bridges and blocked them by domain name[2]. Bridge operators can bypass this
block by creating a new subdomain or using a new domain for their WebTunnel
bridge.

We are working on multiple solutions for this problem. And one of them is to
start distributing WebTunnel bridges over Telegram[3]. In the past, our Telegram
distribution bot has proved to be fairly resistant to the attempts to enumerate
bridges made by the Russian censor.

But to be able to do that, we first need to have enough bridges assigned to that
distributor. We are looking for a minimum of 30 bridges assigned to this
distributor. If you are in the capacity to host a WebTunnel bridge, please do
so!

You can follow the documentation on the Community portal[4] and configure your
WebTunnel bridge with this option in your torrc:

   BridgeDistribution telegram

Or if you're using our Docker container, you will need to add the lines below to
your .env file:
   OBFS4_ENABLE_ADDITIONAL_VARIABLES=1
   OBFS4V_BridgeDistribution=telegram

It is ok if your WebTunnel bridge is on the same IP address of another existing
WebTunnel bridge as long as is in a different subdomain name, for example
www1.example.com. As the censor is blocking the bridges by domain name and not
by IP.

Please avoid hosting your bridge with Hetzner, Digital Ocean, OVH and do not use
Cloudflare DNS, as there are reports of these are being targeted and blocked by
DPI[5].

Thank you.


[0]https://gitlab.torproject.org/tpo/anti-censorship/censorship-analysis/-/issues/40057
[1]https://gitlab.torproject.org/tpo/anti-censorship/censorship-analysis/-/issues/40050
[2]https://gitlab.torproject.org/tpo/anti-censorship/censorship-analysis/-/issues/40064
[3]https://gitlab.torproject.org/tpo/anti-censorship/team/-/issues/158
[4]https://community.torproject.org/relay/setup/webtunnel/
[5]https://github.com/net4people/bbs/issues/490


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