Tor, The Onion Router
Tor, The Onion Router, allows people to surf anonymously and safely without being traced. An overview of Tor provides further details.
Tor guards against traffic analysis. By shuffling up your packets, Tor prevents someone from tacking and following you as you surf. Tor works for TCP streams and can be used by any application with SOCKS support. Tor also supports hidden services like web servers or IM servers.
Many of us in democractic societies take internet freedom for granted. In many parts of the world governments prevent their own citizens free access to the web. Tor is one tool to circumnavigate net censorship. There are many reasons to use Tor. As my father used to say, "Better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it." Read how Tor was used by Iranian protestors.
There are Tor bundles available for Windows or you can install Tor on Chrome, alternately this way. If you're using Firefox try Torbutton.
Install Tor on a USB drive with the Tor browser bundle. Then you can surf anonymously without leaving a trace on the machine you're using. Just unplug the thumb drive and walk away. If you don't like the Tor browswer bundle try PortableTor.
Watch the Tor video tutorials.
If you have an extra machine and a little spare bandwidth please consider running a Tor relay. The more Tor relays there are the faster and stronger the Tor network will work. If you have a box you can donate, do it! [Windows Server 2003 or later, OS X 10.4, Linux box, or FreeBSD, NetBSD] For example, here are instructions for Ubuntu. Spare Mac? Please volunteer!
As you'd expect, Wikipedia has a robust section on Tor include lots of links to other online resources. Definitely a place to start. There are a couple of Tor FAQs: Tor FAQ 1 and Tor FAQ 2. There's a Tor blog. EFF has a TOR page.
Believe it or not there's a Tor detector. It can tell if you came in through the Tor network. a.) a great way to impress dates and b.) something that might keep you out of trouble by making sure you're configured correctly.
While not a perfect answer for any and all computer surveillance, Tor is a valuable tool when used properly. It provides a high level of anonymity. Be sure to evaluate your particular risk model and consider making Tor part of your overal game plan. It is slower to use Tor than to surf unprotected. Ye olde cost benefit analysis. Please take a minute to read this article on Tor by Bruce Schneier. Bruce is always right on when it comes to math & protocols in a real world social context.
Yes, I run a Tor relay on an on old G3 iMac. I know you have an old machine sitting around unused. And I know you've got more bandwidth than you need cuz yer that kinda guy. Please consider running a Tor server.
All power to the people!
