Deprecated/Vidalia
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Using Vidalia with Whonix
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Introduction[edit]
Not recommended.[1]
Advanced users only!
Better use Arm. See Tor Controller.
You have two possibility to get Vidalia.
1) Vidalia on the Whonix-Gateway™.
2) Vidalia on the Host.
Each option's pros and cons are documented below.
1. Vidalia on the Whonix-Gateway[edit]
You need to boot into a graphical user environment, see also RAM Adjusted Desktop Starter. Essentially, you need to assign at least 512 MB RAM to Whonix-Gateway, 768 MB RAM for better performance. The latter is the default setting.
Install Vidalia.
sudo apt update sudo apt install vidalia
You'll be asked to add user clearnet to the debian-tor group, don't do this, as it is unnecessary. To get out of the debconf dialog, just press Tab followed by Enter. Probably no harm done if you mess(ed) that up and added the clearnet user.
You can then start Vidalia from the start menu, Start Menu → Applications Internet → Tor GUI or from Terminal (Konsole) by starting vidalia.
2. Vidalia on the Host[edit]
Untested since Whonix 6 and above!
Ok, this is an ugly hack, but it works. Vidalia can be installed on the host, in this example on a Windows host but you can most likely do it also on a Linux host. We have to "trick" Vidalia because Vidalia insists on starting Tor itself, which is already running on Whonix-Workstation™.
You will be able to stop Tor using Vidalia, but not be able to start it again. Restarting Tor has to be done manually in Whonix-Gateway (or by ssh). "Start proxy application when Tor starts" will probably work (untested) but it will start it on the host and not on the Whonix-Gateway. What also won't work are all settings which modify torrc, because our torrc will be just a dummy one and the real torrc is inside the Whonix-Gateway. All settings in the settings, network tab won't work. Neither the "Sharing/Setup Relaying" tab will work (there will be instructions how to do it manually in torrc for the Whonix-Gateway). Services tab will also not work, this is covered above under Onion Services. The "Start Tor" button will actually not start Tor, but connect to the Control Port inside the Whonix-Gateway. "View the network", "Use a New Identity" and "Message Log" should be functional.
(0) You need to ensure yourself, that port 9051 is firewalled on your host. It must not be accessible from the internet.
(1) Create a folder Vidalia somewhere you like it. Ensure that your current user account has the necessary rights read, create, modify.
(2) Grab some dummy exe, for example cmd.exe from C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe and copy it to your new Vidalia folder.
(3) Login as root sudo su. Go to your Whonix-Gateway and type in console.
tor --hash-password password
This will result in something like
16:E61CFDC2FF3FDCDE605D8EDC3631F268B554612B0721E99F95588282B5 ## copy it into the clipboard.
(4) Open your /usr/local/etc/torrc.d/50_user.conf.
sudoedit /usr/local/etc/torrc.d/50_user.conf
And add.
ControlPort 9051 ControlListenAddress 10.0.2.15:9051 HashedControlPassword 16:E61CFDC2FF3FDCDE605D8EDC3631F268B554612B0721E99F95588282B5
(5) nano /usr/bin/whonix_firewall and look out for the following
## Allow incoming SSH connections on the external interface iptables -A INPUT -i $EXT_IF -p tcp --dport 22 -j ACCEPT
and add additionally the following below
## Allow incomming Tor ControlPort connections on the external interface iptables -A INPUT -i $EXT_IF -p tcp --dport 9051 -j ACCEPT
(6) Then go to your host and create a file named control_auth_cookie inside your Vidalia folder. Insert the password only, this example we used "password". Choose your secure password. control_auth_cookie has no file extension, be sure that Windows will normally show you file extensions (like .exe, .pdf...), otherwise you will be probably unable to create a file without extension.
(7) We need a start file, otherwise Vidalia will use the default documents and settings folder. Call it vidalia.bat and create it inside your Vidalia folder. The content of vidalia.bat must be
start do_not_start.exe --datadir .\\
(8) And of course you will be needing the Vidalia binaries. Download the Tor Browser Bundle for your platform. Go to *\Tor Browser\App* and copy the following files into your Vidalia directory.
libeay32.dll libgcc_s_dw2-1.dll libgnurx-0.dll mingwm10.dll QtCore4.dll QtGui4.dll QtNetwork4.dll QtXml4.dll ssleay32.dll vidalia.exe
tor.exe and tor-resolv.exe will not be needed (we have our own dummy tor.exe).
(9) Rename vidalia.exe to do_not_start.exe.
(10) Create a file called vidalia.conf inside your Vidalia directory. The content must be
[Tor] TorExecutable=.\\tor.exe Torrc=.\\torrc DataDirectory=.\\ UseRandomPassword=false ControlPassword=password Changed=true ControlPort=9052 ControlAddr=127.0.0.1
(11) Create a file torrc inside your Vidalia directory, leave it empty, it is just another dummy file for Vidalia's fate.
(12) In the Whonix-Gateway VM network settings. Set up Port Forwarding: within the "Adapter 1" tab click "Advanced", then Port Forwarding. Insert a new rule as follows: Name: Vidalia; Protocol: TCP; Host IP: 127.0.0.1; Host Port: 9052; Guest IP: leave blank; Guest Port: 9051
(13) That's it. From now you can vidalia.bat. For your convinience create a shortcut of vidalia.bat on your desktop.
Optional, for debugging if you have problems.
- We test if the IP/Port is reachable from the host.
telnet 10.152.152.10 9051, press enter should say "514 Authentication required." - Vidalia FAQ
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