That’s up from an average of 525,000 people during a typical 30 day period in June of 2015.
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Tor preserves users’ privacy by disguising their identity and location by bouncing web traffic randomly through a far-flung network of servers.
Tor, also known as The Onion Router, is a tool that directs Internet traffic through a large network of volunteer relays.
“This growth is a reflection of the choices that people make to use Facebook over Tor, and the value that it provides them”. Traffic has grown in a “roughly linear” pattern sine then, according to Facebook, meaning about 50,000 new users are have been accessing the social network via Tor each month. “We hope they will continue to provide feedback and help us keep improving”, TechCrunch quoted Facebook as saying.
Alec Muffett, a software engineer for Security Infrastructure at Facebook, said the service reached this milestone after making several improvements in the past two years since opening up to make Tor connections more streamlined on the social network.
Though the dark web has negative connotations for hosting black market sites, drug forums, and other illegal marketplaces, many use the Tor network to access ordinary websites but with a layer of protection to prevent prying outside eyes.
Indeed, Facebook has added more ways to access the site on the dark web over time.
Additionally, the company has also built upon its earlier Tor integration and rolled out support for the Android Orbot proxy, allowing Android device users to access Facebook via Tor. But as a spokesperson for Tor told the publication, the Tor network is in charge of a user’s data when it visits Facebook, not Facebook.
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While Tor is often often associated with illegitimate activity due to its focus on anonymity, many people use it to simply have a bit more privacy from potential hackers and snooping governments.
