How do I install the Tor Browser Bundle in Ubuntu?

Question

In Ubuntu 13.04 I used to use the ppa:upubuntu-com/tor64 PPA to install the 64-bit Tor Browser Bundle. However, in Ubuntu 13.10 it doesn't work anymore.

How do I install the Tor Browser Bundle in Ubuntu?

Beware of using unofficial PPAs. There is no official PPA which would allow you to automatically update the Tor Browser Bundle in Ubuntu. Such solutions are made by third parties. In fact, the currently accepted answer contains a PPA with an outdated Tor Browser Bundle! It's several updates behind. — king_julien, Jan 15, 2014 at 10:43
To add to that, I would be easy for n$A to infect that unofficial PPA. In other words, it makes no sense using Tor if you use an unofficial PPA. BTW, n$A has already successfully infected Tor in the past. — don.joey, Feb 13, 2014 at 8:52

jtd · Accepted Answer · 2017-07-31 14:33:26Z

Do not use the packages in Ubuntu's universe.

According to The Tor Project, "In the past they have not reliably been updated. That means you could be missing stability and security fixes."

Download Tor Browser Bundle from The Tor Project website

From here, select your Language and download the 32-bit or 64-bit flavor as well as the accompanying sig file to ~/path/to/TBB_directory.

enter image description here

Verify GPG Signature

Download the Tor Browser Developers GPG Public Key (which is used for signing Tor Browser Bundle packages; also see keyserver):
```
gpg --keyserver keys.gnupg.net --recv-keys 0xEF6E286DDA85EA2A4BA7DE684E2C6E8793298290
```
Verify that the signature file was produced when their GPG Key signed your Tor Browser Bundle download (adjust the commands if version is not "5.0.1" or language is not "en"):
```
cd ~/path/to/TBB_directory 
gpg --verify tor-browser-linux64-5.0.1_en-US.tar.xz.asc tor-browser-linux64-5.0.1_en-US.tar.xz
```

You should see "Good signature.." in your terminal if successful (if not, download the file again and try once more):

gpg: Signature made Mon 17 Aug 2015 06:48:06 PM UTC
gpg:                using RSA key D40814E0
gpg: Good signature from "Tor Browser Developers (signing key) <[email protected]>"
gpg: WARNING: This key is not certified with a trusted signature!
gpg:          There is no indication that the signature belongs to the owner.
Primary key fingerprint: EF6E 286D DA85 EA2A 4BA7  DE68 4E2C 6E87 9329 8290
     Subkey fingerprint: BA1E E421 BBB4 5263 180E  1FC7 2E1A C68E D408 14E0

Extract Tor Browser Bundle Package

Right-click .tar.xz file and select "Extract Here" or:
```
tar -xvf tor-browser-linux64-5.0.1_en-US.tar.xz
```

Browse The Internet using globally distributed, encrypted, and anonymous Tor network

Open newly extracted directory, find the file start-tor-browser, and make sure it is executable.
- Right-click > Properties > Permissions > Execute: Allow executing file as program
Double-click start-tor-browser or:
```
./start-tor-browser
```
Select Run if Nautilus asks you how you want to execute the `start-tor-browser' script.

Congratulations!

This is the correct answer. Thank you for taking the time to post this. You're even using FF <3 — earthmeLon, Oct 16, 2014 at 14:16

karel · Accepted Answer · 2022-05-05 06:26:46Z

Install Tor Browser

These are the instructions from the official Tor Browser User Manual in case the Ubuntu torbrowser-launcher package hasn't updated the gpg key that is required to install Tor Browser. When I updated the Tor Browser Developers signing key I noticed that the key that I updated will expire in less than one year.

Navigate to the Tor Browser download page.
Download the GNU/Linux .tar.xz file
(Recommended) Verify the file's signature. The steps for verifying the file's signature are shown below.
When the download is complete, extract the archive with the command tar -xf [TB archive] or with the Archive Manager.
Navigate to the newly extracted Tor Browser directory. Right-click on start-tor-browser, open Properties and change the permission to Allow executing file as program by clicking the checkbox.
Start Tor Browser from the command line by running:
```
 ./start-tor-browser
```

Set a keyboard shortcut to start Tor Browser

Remember the location where you downloaded the tor-browser-linux64-xx.x.xx_xx-xx.tar.xz archive. In this example I will call this location /home/your-username/Downloads/ which is the default location of the Downloads directory in Ubuntu if you replace your-username by your own user name.

Remember the directory where you extracted the Tor Browser files. In this example I will call this directory /home/your-username/Downloads/tor-browser_en-US/ where en is the abbreviation for the language and US is the abbreviation for the nation which could be different depending on your language and nation.

Go to Settings -> Keyboard -> View and Customize Shortcuts -> Set Custom Shortcut.

In the field after Name type Tor Browser.
In the field after Command type: sh -c '"/home/your-username/Downloads/tor-browser_en-US/Browser/start-tor-browser" --detach || ([ ! -x "/home/your-username/Downloads/tor-browser_en-US/Browser/start-tor-browser" ] && "$(dirname "$*")"/Browser/start-tor-browser --detach)' dummy %k
In order to fill in an entry in the field after Shortcut press any easy to remember keyboard shortcut combination (e.g. Ctrl + Alt +B).

Now you can start Tor Browser by pressing Ctrl + Alt +B.

How to verify Tor Browser's signature

Fetching the Tor Developers key

The Tor Browser team signs Tor Browser releases. Import the Tor Browser Developers signing key (0xEF6E286DDA85EA2A4BA7DE684E2C6E8793298290):

gpg --auto-key-locate nodefault,wkd --locate-keys [email protected]

This should show you something like:

gpg: key 4E2C6E8793298290: public key "Tor Browser Developers (signing key) <[email protected]>" imported
gpg: Total number processed: 1
gpg:               imported: 1
pub   rsa4096 2014-12-15 [C] [expires: 2020-08-24]
      EF6E286DDA85EA2A4BA7DE684E2C6E8793298290
uid           [ unknown] Tor Browser Developers (signing key) <[email protected]>
sub   rsa4096 2018-05-26 [S] [expires: 2020-09-12]

After importing the key, you can save it to a file (identifying it by fingerprint here):

gpg --output ./tor.keyring --export 0xEF6E286DDA85EA2A4BA7DE684E2C6E8793298290

Verifying the signature

To verify the signature of the package you downloaded, you will need to download the corresponding ".asc" signature file as well as the installer file itself, and verify it with a command that asks GnuPG to verify the file that you downloaded.

The example below assumes that you downloaded these two files to your Downloads folder.

gpgv --keyring ./tor.keyring ~/Downloads/tor-browser-linux64-9.0_en-US.tar.xz{.asc,}

The result of the command should produce something like this:

gpgv: Signature made 07/08/19 04:03:49 Pacific Daylight Time
gpgv:                using RSA key EB774491D9FF06E2
gpgv: Good signature from "Tor Browser Developers (signing key) <[email protected]>"

Note that running gpg --homedir "$HOME/.local/share/torbrowser/gnupg_homedir/" --refresh-keys --keyserver pgp.mit.edu is currently required for signature verification to work properly. — Chai T. Rex, Mar 23, 2017 at 11:05
The linked bug report is a problem I and the question asker (see the answer below) experienced, as well as the bug reporter and so forth. — Chai T. Rex, Mar 23, 2017 at 11:10
Does anyone else find worrying that the people in charge of Tor couldn't get the keys right? And for that matter, that they haven't been able to regularly distribute Tor through PPAs in the past? — oneloop, Aug 27, 2017 at 18:14

Community · Accepted Answer · 2020-06-12 14:37:07Z

10

NB: This PPA hasn't been updated in YEARS already (since 2017) and it is several updates behind the official Tor Browser Bundle release.

You can install TorBrowser Bundle in Ubuntu by using the TorBrowser WebUpd8 PPA. Open a terminal and copy/paste the following commands:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webupd8team/tor-browser
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install tor-browser

Then simply launch TorBrowser from the Dash / menu.

More info: Tor Browser Bundle Ubuntu PPA

edited Jun 12, 2020 at 14:37

CommunityBot

1

answered Dec 19, 2013 at 13:42

Alin Andrei

7,3484 gold badges42 silver badges55 bronze badges

1

Anybody interested in tor should not be using third party repos, such as webupd8team.
– earthmeLon
Oct 16, 2014 at 14:12
Is this PPA abandoned?...
– user1284631
Feb 27, 2015 at 9:17
@axeoth If you are behing a proxy and you have exported the proxy credentials.... just run the command as sudo -E apt-add-repository ppa:webupd8team/tor-browser
– user3234634
May 21, 2015 at 22:41
It's abandoned now
– 0x777C
Feb 11, 2018 at 20:16

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Abu Abdallah · Accepted Answer · 2020-10-23 09:40:50Z

Ubuntu 20.04

Open terminal run

sudo apt install torbrowser-launcher

Look for start-tor-browser.desktop file
Probably in root/.local/share/torbrowser/tbb/x86_64/tor-browser_en-US

Right click on start-tor-browser.desktop, Click Properties > Permission > click the checkbox Allow executing file as program.

Also Look for start-tor-browser file
Probably in root/.local/share/torbrowser/tbb/x86_64/tor-browser_en-US/Browser

Right click on start-tor-browser, Click Properties > Permission > click the checkbox Allow executing file as program.

Now open Tor Browser. It should work just fine.

Pablo Bianchi · Accepted Answer · 2019-02-04 02:41:23Z

0

Note: This PPA hasn't been updated in YEARS already (since 2015) is several updates behind the official Tor Browser Bundle release.

Run the below commands to install tor browser in Ubuntu 13.10 64-bit version:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:upubuntu-com/tor64
sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list.d/upubuntu-com-tor64-saucy.list

Change saucy to raring and save that file:
Update the repositories:
```
sudo apt-get update
```
Now you can install the Tor Browser Bundle:
```
sudo apt-get install tor-browser 
```

edited Feb 4, 2019 at 2:41

Pablo Bianchi

15.8k4 gold badges80 silver badges120 bronze badges

answered Nov 26, 2013 at 11:29

Avinash Raj

78.6k56 gold badges218 silver badges255 bronze badges

I install it shows unexpected error . tor is not running
– mahdiar
Nov 26, 2013 at 15:38
5

Anybody interested in tor should not be using third party repos, such as webupd8team.
– earthmeLon
Oct 16, 2014 at 14:15
2

I know it's not the most convenient way to get your updates, but use the official torproject binaries and verify them. Don't rely on third-party sources for something that is related to your privacy.
– Patrick Glandien
Sep 25, 2015 at 21:18

Add a comment |

Charles · Accepted Answer · 2019-12-07 16:28:56Z

0

I installed the Tor v.9 browser on Ubuntu 18.04, using jtd's install steps, in a nutshell:

Select your OS on the https://www.torproject.org/download/ web page. Download the tor-browser-linux...tar.xz file.
Unzip the file.
Open the top folder (tor-browser_en-US, in my case) and double-click the start-tor-browser.desktop file.
The startup asks a couple simple questions, then the Tor browser loads up ready to go.

edited Dec 7, 2019 at 16:28

answered Dec 6, 2019 at 16:47

Charles

2021 silver badge10 bronze badges

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How do I install the Tor Browser Bundle in Ubuntu?