Next, we’ll need to configure the SOCKS proxy.

Once installed, simply run tor at a command line and you’ll start routing traffic sent at your computer if configured appropriately: To do so, we’ll first install Tor, using homebrew: My favorite way to do this is to have a simple script that configures a SOCKS proxy for Tor. But for IRC and other traffic you usually need a little more. This is great for protecting web traffic. Here, you can simply download the browser, install it on your computer by dragging it to /Applications, and then all traffic for that browser routes through Tor. So if each step is partially encrypted, a compromise of any device in the route will still defeat network surveillance, and because all traffic at the entry point to Tor is encrypted it’s safe to browse anonymously when using, let’s say, a conference wi-fi. Since each step is encrypted, these layers of encryption can be considered like a network with layers like an onion. Each of those computers or routers is only aware of the node in front of or behind it in the communication route and encrypting the next node sent.

Tor routes your data through a bunch of nodes. You install software, available at or a browser extension. Tor is simple to use and yet incredibly complicated under the hood. Tor, short for The Onion Router, is a tool to anonymize your web traffic.

Tor project mac