this post was submitted on 07 Oct 2026
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I assume it would be possible, the difference would only be to set up an onion service rather than doing traditional port forwarding. On the client side the users would have to be able to configure tor as proxy, which would likely be a hazzle. I also found this guide, though it reads sloppy. There is also a discussion about this here: https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse/issues/5152
But how does TOR prevent leakage of outbound requests to the clearnet?
By default, not at all. The server application needs to be sandboxed, firewalled, and proxied through Tor to prevent that
That seems like quite the hassle. I wouldn't trust myself trying to host an anonymous service if all of that has to happen.
The link you shared doesn't mention any of that either. It might actually be putting people at risk who want to host hidden services.
The page I shared does also have a section about security advice which has a link to Onion services best practices by Riseup Collective. I figured that those who would be at risk in the event of an information leak would take this section to heart, because many use cases for onion services don't actually require location hiding, like when the site is also available through the clearnet, or when the service is only used by you and people you trust. In those cases you may as well set
HiddenServiceSingleHopMode 1to reduce latency.It's also worth noting that in the past some high-value onion services have been deanonymized, so depending on how much of a target the service is it's worth considering taking extra precautions to prevent getting swatted if the server gets compromised