I'm sure this has happened to others, but here goes on my problem.
Many academic networks have a variety of online journals they subscribe
to (like thousands of them) .. most allow campus-wide use restricted
only by IP address, usually the whole /16 or greater.
This of course presents a problem when you have a TOR router in that
/16. Sometimes the admin at the journals will understand that TOR is
just one of those 65k+ IP addresses and block that, and sometimes they
get into a snit and say they'll block the whole /16.
Since we can't put thousands of lines in the exit policy without causing
a cascading problem, what about null-routing them .. either by putting
entries in /etc/hosts that will be denied by the exit policy (thus
causing the client to pick another exit -- but not preventing access
directly by IP address), or the more secure, but more problematic,
blocking by changing the kernel routing tables to send those networks
into a blackhole on the TOR router.
The first approach causes a minimal problem performance-wise since the
client will choose a new path. The second will cause timeouts and
significantly impact performance.
Problem is, if these sort of issues persist, most of our institutional
support will evaporate -- so I'm going to have to do something.
I really don't want to hear about censorship, et.al. because I already
know that's what it is, and don't have a problem admitting it. What I
want is viable solutions to the problem.
Any suggestions?
Regards,
Michael Holstein CISSP GCIA
Cleveland State University