The Tor Project, the organization behind the privacy oriented Tor network, has launched the first mobile version of its Tor browser for Android. It replaces the unofficial Orfox browser, which is being discontinued.
The Tor-browser for Android is available for free in the Google Play Store and is currently located in alpha. Tor Project calls on its users to test the browser for any bugs.
In order to use the browser’s alphabet version, users must also install Orbot. This is a mobile proxy app that allows the browser to connect to the Tor network. From a future release, this will no longer be a requirement.
The mobile Tor-browser already supports a tracker blocker, protection against fingerprinting, circumvention of ISP blockages and multilayer encryption.
Orfox in retirement
The official Tor-browser for Android replaces the Orfox-browser. It has been developed by the Guardian Project so far, but will be retired after the announcement of Tor Project.
For the time being there is no news of an official Tor-browser for iOS. Tor Project advises iOS users to use the Onion Browser.
Tor Browser v8
The announcement of the mobile Tor-browser for Android follows shortly after the launch of a major update for the desktop version of the browser.
Tor Browser v8 was updated to take advantage of the new Firefox Quantum code base, which was launched last November.
This news article was automatically translated from Dutch to give Techzine.eu a head start. All news articles after September 1, 2019 are written in native English and NOT translated. All our background stories are written in native English as well. For more information read our launch article.