I Tried an Android App That Helps People Around the World Bypass Censorship Laws.
If you’ve read our previous articles about the Tor network and the Tor browser , you know they’re the best options for maximum privacy and anonymity online. Now, the Tor Project has teamed up with Android studio Bloco to release another privacy-focused app: Snowflake Volunteer .
It’s not just about keeping your own web browsing safe—by installing this app on your Android smartphone, you’re helping others bypass censorship restrictions in their region by sharing part of your internet connection with the web.
The Tor browser is so effective at hiding users’ identities and online activity that some governments prefer that their citizens not use it . This deprives residents of these countries and anyone visiting them of one of the best browsers for privacy. Tor browser censorship is typically accomplished by denying access to the relay nodes through which it routes traffic—nodes en route to and from the internet that conceal location and other identifying information. However, the relay directory is publicly accessible, meaning it can be blocked.
That’s where Snowflake comes in . The standalone Android app is new, but the idea itself is original. Snowflake is an alternative way to connect the Tor Browser to the network: Snowflake disguises the connection as a standard WebRTC video call, which typically has no restrictions, and from there, you can establish a connection to the Tor network.
By using Snowflake on your phone, you’re essentially smuggling someone digitally across borders from a country where Tor access is restricted. Even if these intermediate bridges are detected and blocked, they’re short-lived, and new ones are constantly emerging, making it virtually impossible for the government to block this access method without significantly disrupting the country’s internet service.
The Tor browser operates as usual for the connecting user, albeit with the usual tradeoffs in speed and latency. Due to redirects and technical borrowing, Tor isn’t the best option if you want to maximize download and upload speeds on a broadband internet connection.
What’s it like to be a Snowflake volunteer?
As a strong believer in internet users being able to access the internet with a high level of anonymity and privacy, I installed the new Snowflake Volunteer app from the Google Play Store (it’s also available on F-Droid ) and launched it. The first step is to exclude it from battery management settings so that it remains accessible even when not in use—the app walks you through the process step by step.
After that, all you have to do is turn on the switch on the home screen, and your phone is ready to connect. There’s no need to configure anything or create an account; everything works automatically in the background—the system is truly incredibly easy to use.
Click the gear icon in the upper right corner, and you’ll find several available settings: you can allow connections only on networks with unlimited data (such as Wi-Fi) or while your phone is charging. You can also set how many simultaneous users your phone can support. All of this is done to minimize the load on your device.
Over four hours, I recorded six connections, resulting in a total of 3.2 megabytes of data sent and 17 megabytes received—hardly excessive usage. My phone wasn’t suddenly inundated with messages from other users trying to access the internet. Snowflake Volunteer is designed as an emergency censorship circumvention measure, and the usage I observed confirms this.
I haven’t noticed any bugs or issues with the app, nor has it impacted battery life (which is perhaps expected given such low activity). I think I’ll leave it running, especially at night when I’m not using the device. It’s nice to see statistics about how many people you’ve helped during this time; it motivates you to keep the device handy.
Are there any risks in using the Snowflake Volunteer service?
As a Snowflake volunteer, you don’t risk being identified by any nation-state censorship of the Tor project: to them , you appear as a normal audio or video connection, and there’s no static list of IP addresses to block. Furthermore, the same multi-layered encryption mechanisms that protect the entire Tor network are still in effect, so you can’t see what connecting users are doing, and they’ll still pass through several additional nodes before they start browsing—your device is just an entry point . No one connecting to your device will be able to learn anything about you: the application is simply incapable of any surveillance . You provide part of the connection anonymously and securely. (More details on how this all works can be found in Snowflake’s Tor documentation .)
The new Android app isn’t the only way to become a Snowflake volunteer. You can also install the desktop browser extension or enable “Kindness Mode” in the Orbot iOS app (a VPN that connects to the Tor network).