BitTorrent: Bypass any Firewall or Throttling ISP with SSH
Written by Ernesto on October 14, 2007On some networks it’s impossible to use BitTorrent. For example, if you’re at work, school, or connected to Comcast or a public hotspot. But there’s an easy solution to overcome this problem. By using a secure connection (SSH), you can bypass almost every firewall or traffic shaping application.
Here’s a relatively simple 3-step guide that will show you how to set it up.
I wouldn’t recommend BitTorrent over SSH as a permanent solution since it will cripple the servers of the SSH providers. If you’re looking for a long term solution check out a VPN service such as Relakks.
1. Get an SSH account.
You need an SSH account in order to get this working. You can try one of these free shell providers from this list. I currently use silenceisdefeat which requires a small $1 donation. However, the account is immediately activated and works fine for me.
2. Download, Install and Configure Putty
Download Putty, store it somewhere on your computer and run it. In the session screen enter the host name (I use ssh.silenceisdefeat.org), the port number (22), and tick the connection type box (SSH).
Next, go to SSH –> Tunnels, enter a source port and tick the dynamic box. I’m using port 23456, but you are free to choose any post you like as long as it’s available.
When you’re done, it might be a good idea to save the session so you don’t have to enter the info next time you run Putty. If you’re ready, hit the “open” button in the session screen. A command-line interface will pop-up so enter your username and password that you received from your shell-provider, and you’re done.
3. Configure your BitTorrent client.
The last step is to configure your BitTorrent client. I will show you how it’s done in uTorrent and Azureus but other BitTorrent clients use a similar setup.
uTorrent: go to Options > Preferences > Connection. Enter your port number (I use 23456), socks 4 or 5 as type, and localhost in the proxy field.
Azureus: go to Tools > Options > Connection > Proxy Options. Tick the “Enable proxying of tracker communications” and “I have a SOCKS proxy” box. Next, enter your port number in the port field (I use 23456) and localhost in the host field.
When you’re done, restart your BitTorrent client and you’re ready to go. BitTorrent over SSH tends to be a bit slower than your normal connection, but it’s a great solution when BitTorrent connections are blocked or throttled.
For those on a Mac OSX, please check out this great tutorial (which in part inspired this article) for more details. It includes instructions on how to do this on a Mac, using Azureus.
Previously: Most Popular DVDrips on BitTorrent (wk41)
Next: BitLet Bookmarklet: Directly Download Torrents in your Browser
189 Responses
Pages: « 1 [2] 3 4 5 6 7 8 » Show All
Read the silenceisdefeat TOS they sure wouldn’t like filesharers:
http://silenceisdefeat.org/tos
Hey dumbasses:
“Participating in activities including but not limited to spamming, port flooding, network scanning, distributing copyrighted works or using SD systems for any other type of illegal activity is strictly prohibited.”
“Violators of any of the terms expressed above will have their account immediately
terminated from SD, and in the event that illegal activities have occured, law
enforcement authorities will be contacted and provided with any information felt to be
useful in a thorough and complete investigation.”
So no, do NOT abuse free unix shells to tunnel P2P. What the hell were you thinking?
Write first think later… wasn’t that always the TF motto?
for being a complete jackass!
This DOES NOT WORK! After creaing the dynamic tunnel it says…
channel 3: open failed: administratively prohibited: open failed
in the terminal window, which indicates that the ability to create dynamic port tunnels is disabled.
Can I play WOW using this method?
I want my $1 back!
GREAT IDEA
NOT
Abusing other servers through illegal downloads, not to mention this will be incredibly slow considering most free servers will only have x mbit to their discretion.
Fucking useless blog shit
Bad idea. It violates their TOS and slows down their free network. Soon none will exist because of p2p abusers. I hope they put a bandwidth cap on each shell account if they don’t have one already.
[quote comment="187584"]Hey dumbasses:
“Participating in activities including but not limited to spamming, port flooding, network scanning, distributing copyrighted works or using SD systems for any other type of illegal activity is strictly prohibited.”[/quote]
I didn’t see ANYONE encouraging ANYONE to break ANY laws with this tutorial. Its clearly about getting through throttles and firewalls. If YOU choose to abuse any service, that’s down to you.
If you’re unhappy about silenceisdefeat being used, suggest another service FFS and be HELPFUL to other users.
Anyone can pick faults, c’est facile
Cant I do this myself? I mean by setting up a Linux computer at home with SSH-server, and then tunnel into that?
You should write a guide on that. Ubuntu comes with SSH-server already installed.
I whish I knew how to do it with a home server.
any other services to abuse then?
my school filters ssh packets…any way around this?
Using SSH for P2P is a bad idea. A mere $1 won’t fund the service, but it will provide traceability through the banks.
The interesting thing is it effectively tunnels you to have a different ISP. That opens a whole can of worms, especially if the provider is in another jurisdiction.
Some uses could be:
1. Accessing export denied (by IP) material. (US - encryption, China/US - embargo)
2. Locating your apparent presence outside of the jurisdiction (DCMA, etc).
3. Bypassing content filters, even of your local router.
4. Allow an apparent point of access to move countries by changing proxy. In mere seconds.
A whole heap of stuff government could get nasty about!
@nosmoke
First of all it already abuse if you use this kind free service to tunnel your legal torrents through it. It will still kill the service bandwidth costs money!
And secondly we all know that torrenting is all about legal downloads right? None here uses it for anything else so posting this peace of shit article on a popular torrent site… which in terms of course got to digg a few minutes later will of course not lead to abuse for illegal stuff.
ssh or seedbox on the cheap-
vps4less.de
shinjiru.com
no violation of TOS there. have fun.
This article also assumes that port 22 is open for outbound connections from inside the firewall… Any decent organisation has this blocked (only ports with an operational need to be open are open, for either direction).
If you can find an SSH provider that accepts SSH connections on HTTPS port then you are home and hosed (assuming you are abiding by their TOS of course) as it’s extremely unlikely that any firewall has this port blocked for outbound connections.
That’s how I connect to home at any rate.. I have my home SSH server listening on port 443. The place I am currently contracted to runs an ISA firewall so I also need a local proxy for which I use the GPL’d ntlmaps.
Works great!
one quick …. has any of the people that cant use bittorrent try running it through Tor?
Wouldn’t it work by using Relakks?
@HiP.P
Depends if they want the torrent to complete sometime this century.
old!
[quote comment="187638"]@HiP.P
Depends if they want the torrent to complete sometime this century.[/quote]
Easy. Just asking. I ment non-peer to peer connections.
meant[quote comment="187646"][quote comment="187638"]@HiP.P
Depends if they want the torrent to complete sometime this century.[/quote]
Easy. Just asking. I ment non-peer to peer connections.[/quote]
*meant …. spelling *shakes head*
DAMN YOU, leechers. That is NOT for what free shell providers are for. Get a vsever or whatever you like, but DO NOT ABUSE services others provide for free.
Thanks to you, Tor has become almost unusable.
Now you are effectively DESTROYING another piece of infrustructure that was very useful for a lot of people.
Grow up guys.
If you’re not talking about peer connections why ask?
Tor works with a website so it will of course work with a tracker both use http (usually).
It would even work for peer connections Tor is a socks proxy it works with everything… if the app has no option just socksify it.
You can even set an exit point…
Pages: « 1 [2] 3 4 5 6 7 8 » Show All
Responses are closed
All remaining responses will continue to be archived. Use the TorrentFreak forums if you want to discuss something.