Moby: A Blackout-Resistant Anonymity Network for Mobile Devices

Internet blackouts are challenging environments for anonymity and censorship resistance. Existing popular networks (e.g., Freenet, I2P, Tor) rely on connectivity to function, making them impracticable during such blackouts. In a setting, mobile ad-hoc can provide connectivity, but prior communication protocols not designed attack resilience. We address this need by designing, implementing, evaluating Moby, blackout-resistant network devices. Moby provides end-to-end encryption, forward secrecy sender-receiver anonymity. It features bi-modal design of operation, using when available During periods functions as regular messaging application bootstraps information that is later used in the absence achieve secure anonymous communications. incorporates model trust based users’ contact lists, establishment protocol mitigates flooding attacks. perform an empirically informed simulation-based study cellphone traces 268,596 users over span week large cellular provider determine Moby’s feasibility present our findings. Last, we implement evaluate client Android app.