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takyon writes:

Wired and others report that ProPublica has become the first "major" news outlet to launch a version of the site using Tor:

On Wednesday, ProPublica became the first known major media outlet to launch a version of its site that runs as a "hidden service" on the Tor network, the anonymity system that powers the thousands of untraceable websites that are sometimes known as the darknet or dark web. The move, ProPublica says, is designed to offer the best possible privacy protections for its visitors seeking to read the site's news with their anonymity fully intact. Unlike mere SSL encryption, which hides the content of the site a web visitor is accessing, the Tor hidden service would ensure that even the fact that the reader visited ProPublica's website would be hidden from an eavesdropper or Internet service provider.

"Everyone should have the ability to decide what types of metadata they leave behind," says Mike Tigas, ProPublica's developer who worked on the Tor hidden service. "We don't want anyone to know that you came to us or what you read."

ProPublica accepts news tips using a SecureDrop hidden service. The recent move to include a Tor hidden site was motivated by concerns that Chinese readers could be put at risk by reading reports about the country's Web censorship.

The site can be reached at: propub3r6espa33w.onion

ProPublica often collaborates with The New York Times, NPR, PBS, The Intercept and others to publish stories. Here are a few ProPublica stories that have made it to our front page:

Somebody's Already Using Verizon's ID to Track Users
Fines Remain Rare as Health Data Breaches Multiply
NSA Monitors Americans' International Internet Traffic to Hunt Hackers for FBI
Fairview: AT&T's Collaborative Relationship with NSA Revealed
Psychology Practice Revealed Patients' Mental Disorders in Debt Lawsuits

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