The Darknet found a virtual reception of foreign intelligence services of Russia

The foreign intelligence service (SVR) of Russia opened a virtual reception in the darknet (the shadow segment of the Internet), through which everyone is invited to send important information to the department. The English -language message with the instructions for using this feedback channel appeared on the SVR website at the end of December 2020, but this was not officially reported, and the media drew attention to the existence of such a reception room only now.

The description says that the Tor virtual reception of the SVR on the Tor network is intended for those who are "located outside Russia and have important information about the security threats of the Russian Federation." According to the Channel "Present"* , which was the first to report the reception, this is the first reception in the darknet for European intelligence agencies.

Users are offered to send information in a "safe and anonymous way." The instruction says that first you need to download free software for access to access from authoritative independent sources, for example, Tor or Tails. Then the visitor is offered to go to the reception site in the domain zone .onion, enter a verification code and copy five random words in English. In the future, the phrase will be needed to access the service of the sent message. For additional protection, the SVR proposes to encrypt a letter using the PGP system, which turns the usual text into a chaotic set of characters, writes TJ .

Through this CVR channel, you can send files total up to 15 MB and the text of unlimited length. So, the form allowed to send the full text of Leo Tolstoy’s novel “War and Peace”.

Note that the use of the Tor network, although it increases the privacy of users, does not guarantee complete anonymity. So, in 2019, hackers hacked and handed over to reporters an archive from the server of the Moscow IT company "SiteEc". From the documents it followed that the company performed work at at least 20 non-public IT projects ordered by Russian special services and departments. Among them was a project to deanonymization of Tor browser users.