The Tor Project has recently updated the Tor Browser with WebTunnel bridge support to make it more censorship resistant. WebTunnel is similar to the obfs4 option that users can pick but instead of just trying to be distinct and unrecognizable like obfs4, WebTunnel actually tries to mimic known and typical web traffic.
Explaining how it works, the Tor Project says that WebTunnel wraps a payload connection into a WebSocket-like HTTPS connection. For anyone watching your connection, it’ll just look like a regular connection to a webpage server while you’re actually heading somewhere else on the web.
Unlike the obs4 bridges that you can connect with via an in-built option in the Tor Browser, getting connected with a WebTunnel bridge will require you to get a unique bridge address from Tor’s BridgeDB website then you will need to select Add a Bridge Manually fro the Connection preferences window in the Tor Browser and copy in the bridge you were given before pressing on Connect.
Obviously, if you are in a censored country you will probably not be able to get on the Tor Project’s bridges website as it’ll likely be blocked. In the future, the project aims to add bridge distribution methods like Telegram and moat.
If you are able to get on the Tor Project BridgeDB, then grabbing some WebTunnel bridges and saving them for later might be wise if you think you may need them. You can copy them and paste them anywhere for later usage.
According to the Tor Project, there are currently 60 WebTunnel bridges hosted globally and they have over 700 daily active users. It confirmed that WebTunnel works in China and Russia but doesn’t work in some regions in Iran.
For more information about setting up WebTunnel bridges in your Tor Browser, just check out the step-by-step instructions in the announcement linked below.
Source: Tor Project
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