Tor Telnet control gives Authentication Required error on any command

privacytelnettor

I am trying to connect to a running instance of Tor with the Tor Control (TC) Protocol using Telnet on the ControlPort (specified in the torrc file) on Windows.

Whenever I connect using Windows's own implementation of Telnet or with PuTTY, I just receive an empty prompt. Knowing that TC only allows the AUTHENTICATE "[pass]", PROTOCOLINFO, or QUIT commands, I enter one of those. No matter which command I enter, I receive the error 514 Authentication Required.

So, Tor is not letting me authenticate and thus I cannot control Tor with Telnet commands. What could I be doing wrong?

Best Answer

  • First you must set the ControlPort in your torrc file like this:

    ControlPort 9051

  • Then restart Tor or Vidalia and set the authentification to None in Preferences → Advanced

  • Then from the command line in Windows type:

    telnet localhost 9051

    (it seems nothing happens and the screen remains black)

  • Type: authenticate "" (also if you did not see anything) and you'll see 250 OK.

Now you can send tor commands like signal newnym.

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