1

Torrent clients offer encryption of traffic using RC4, and people consider this, like, very safe to hide traffic information from ISP.

Now since I have a website with SSL encryption, I know that RC4 has a vulnerability. But does this apply to torrents encryption?

How safe is it to encrypt torrent traffic with RC4?

The Quantum Physicist
  • 712
  • 3
  • 17
  • 34
  • *How safe is it to encrypt torrent traffic with RC4?"* - this might be better asked on [Information Security Stack Exchange](http://security.stackexchange.com/). There are probably nuances to the problem that you would want to get opinions on. – jww May 24 '15 at 23:29
  • @jww There's a question about the same topic here that's why I'm asking here. – The Quantum Physicist May 25 '15 at 00:32
  • Perfect, good luck. – jww May 25 '15 at 00:40
  • 1
    RC4 is no longer consider secure because of the vulnerabilities that exist. RC4 is RC4 in this context torrents are using for the same reason it was to secure http traffic and it's not longer used because of the weakness that exists – Ramhound May 25 '15 at 03:09

1 Answers1

0

I'm not sure you understand what you're talking about and why.

The encryption isn't there for 'safety', as I'm assuming by 'safe' you're talking about 'safe from notices'. Problem is, it's not your ISP sending you those notices, private companies, hired by rightsholders are, and they either send to the ISP, who then forward on to you, or they go to court to get your identity. Either way though, your ISP is NOT looking at what you do.

Now that we've established what it's NOT for, let me explain what the encryption IS for. Many many years ago, ISP's started to traffic shape bittorrent traffic. First they used ports (6881-6889 to start with) to identify, then the traffic headers. So, as a result, protocol encryption came along, to futz that method up. It's explained in detail in BEP 008

So to answer your question "How safe is it to encrypt torrent traffic with RC4?" we have to say 'very safe'. The problem is you're mistaking what it is for something else entirely, something which doesn't exist (and wouldn't work anyway)

Sorry.

KTetch Dureek
  • 172
  • 1
  • 3