Zero-install Tor from the browser
THE ONION SHELL — A STATIC WEB TOR CLIENT
HOPE 26 · SATURDAY 1100 · GRAND BALLROOM
What is Tor?
Free, open-source software for private, uncensored access to the internet
browse privately, explore freely.
It works by routing your traffic through three volunteer relays, each wrapped in encryption — so no one in between can tie you to what you read.
What actually reaches each Tor tool
Escape the Walled Garden
The Onion Shell is a static web application: no install, no extension, and no application backend. Arti runs locally as WebAssembly, builds a real three-hop Tor circuit, and gives you an in-page SSH client over Tor.
It exists for the people Tor was built for but who can't install it: managed laptops, school Chromebooks, locked-down phones, censored networks. The population that most needs Tor is the one least able to install it — so this removes the install.
if you can open a tab, you can reach the onion network.
Not affiliated with The Tor Project. The Onion Shell is not an official client of The Tor Project, Inc. We publish to gitlab.torproject.org as an independent open-source contribution — this does not imply endorsement by The Tor Project, Inc.
Snowflake — Tor over WebRTC
The Onion Shell uses WebRTC to reach a temporary Snowflake volunteer proxy.
The proxy forwards Tor traffic to one of two fixed production bridges. The client selects snowflake-01 or snowflake-02 by pinned identity; the broker only matches it with a proxy.
Two roots of trust, one browser
TLS authenticates the root. Its SRI hashes pin the loader and Arti-WASM.
Arti authenticates Tor.
An OS that runs in the page
A Plan 9-inspired, Wasm-native Unix — everything is a file, per-process namespaces, sandboxed in the browser. The Onion Shell plugs into it as Wanix capabilities: Tor, an SSH client, and a key manager — all mounted under #cap and used from the RC shell.
Wanix by progrium (Jeff Lindsay)
Harelock, a wasm crypto vault
Harelock guards SSH keys and Snowflake settings.
Unlock takes a passphrase plus an optional WebAuthN hardware key.
Honest limit: software, not a security chip — a compromised page could still read its memory.
Post-quantum (ML-DSA) signing is built in, unused by The Onion Shell.
A browser inside your browser
Ladybird — an independent browser engine — compiled to WebAssembly and painted to a canvas. A second browser, in a tab, nothing installed.
Its socket layer is being rewired through the Tor bridge, so every fetch would ride the same onion circuits as the shell.
Status: the engine runs; torified networking is still landing.
The Onion Shell, by the numbers
daily 2xx responses served by The Onion Shell webapp
- ~26 GB served since 2026-03 — every byte a static file, verifiable by hash.
- 2xx only: errors excluded (requests − 4xx − 5xx), so this is successful delivery.
source: CloudWatch AWS/AmplifyHosting, app5106 (hourly, fetched 2026-08-08)
The network it rides
estimated daily Snowflake users, worldwide
- 44k–55k users/day, ~83% of all Tor bridge users.
- Volunteer browsers are the bridges — the same mechanism this client uses.
source: Tor Metrics users (The Tor Project, fetched 2026-08-09)
When censorship moves, Snowflake moves
Tor usage + Tor's curated event timeline
- Russia, Dec 2021: Tor blocking begins; estimated Snowflake use rises from 437 to 3,174 in two weeks.
- Iran, Sep 2022: protests and shutdowns; the estimate jumps from 487 to 9,214 the next day.
- Red verticals are censorship events from Tor's curated timeline — each spike has a cause.
sources: Tor Metrics users · country × transport bounds · Metrics Timeline
Emergent threat: XSS to Tor
A Tor client that fits in an XSS payload. No binary, no process, no inspectable destination.
staging payload may be embedded with the XSS payload or fetched.
verified: Open WebUI 0.7.2 (CVE-2026-44549) → .onion hidden service, real Tor
