Network architecture

No exit node. Structurally, not by configuration.

Most "Tor-integrated" apps route traffic out of the Tor network through an exit node — the one hop where your traffic becomes plaintext again before it reaches the regular internet, and a known interception/monitoring point. Obscura's peer-to-peer network never does this: every node talks to every other node as a Tor hidden service, onion address to onion address, entirely inside the Tor network. There is no exit node in that path to compromise, because the path never needs one.

Run a node → Read the P2P code →

Two different things people call "using Tor"

THE DIFFERENCE THAT MATTERS

Your app → Tor → Exit node → example.com
Typical "Tor-enabled" app: reaching the regular internet through Tor. The exit node decrypts Tor's onion layers to forward your traffic onward — it's a real, known weak point (a malicious or monitored exit relay sees whatever isn't separately encrypted).
Obscura node A
.onion ↔ Tor hidden-service circuit ↔ Obscura node B
.onion
Obscura's P2P network: both ends are Tor hidden services. The connection never leaves the Tor network in either direction, so there is no exit node anywhere in this path — not a safer exit node, no exit node at all.

Why this is a structural property, not a promise

WHAT "ONION-ONLY" ACTUALLY MEANS

Default behavior

Tor is on by default, not opt-in

On startup, the node launches its own Tor hidden service and runs in onion-only mode automatically. Peers only ever see your .onion address, never your home IP — this is the default a fresh install gets, not a flag you have to know to set.

Fails closed

No Tor binary → no P2P, not a silent fallback

If the node can't find a working tor binary on PATH, it fails closed rather than quietly leaking your real IP over clearnet. Privacy-by-default only means something if failure mode is "stop," not "degrade silently."

No exposed listener

Onion-only mode never opens a clearnet-reachable port

In onion-only mode the node deliberately never advertises or exposes a real, publicly dialable address — only the hidden-service address, forwarded to a local port Tor itself controls. There's no accidental "also reachable directly" surface to misconfigure.

Where we're precise about the boundary

WHAT THIS PAGE IS NOT CLAIMING

Does everything the node does avoid Tor exit nodes?

No — and we'd rather say that plainly than let the P2P claim above get overread. The built-in atomic-swap engine talks to an external Nano RPC endpoint (e.g. a public Nano node) over an ordinary network connection, separate from the peer-to-peer Tor dialer. That leg is not Tor-onion-routed today. The claim on this page is specifically about Obscura's peer-to-peer network layer — block and transaction gossip between Obscura nodes — which is onion-to-onion with no exit node, full stop.

Can I still run a public, non-Tor node?

Yes — pass --clearnet to opt out of Tor entirely and run as a public clearnet node (this is what seed/public nodes and CI use). Onion-only is the default, not the only mode; the point of this page is what the default gives you without asking for anything.

Where's the actual code?

The P2P transport and onion-only enforcement live in pkg/p2p/ in the public repo — read it yourself rather than take a marketing page's word for it: github.com/obscura-node/obscura.

Run a node. Check the claim yourself.

One command installs a full node with Tor on by default — or read the P2P source first and decide for yourself.

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