Tor Telnet control gives Authentication Required error on any command

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?

palswim

Posted 2010-09-22T19:32:45.670

Reputation: 2 793

Answers

It appears that, in PuTTY at least, I have to specify a Raw connection instead of a Telnet connection. But, using telnet localhost 9051 in the Windows prompt now gives me a 250 OK on authenticate "[pass]", though it doesn't print the authenticate command as I type it.

palswim

Posted 2010-09-22T19:32:45.670

Reputation: 2 793

telnet doesn't print what you type by default, you have to tell it to. – Rob – 2012-02-22T18:34:11.700

As i said in my answer you did not see anything when you type it. Then if the pass is correct you'll see a OK statement....From my answer : Type: authenticate "" (also if you did not see anything) and you'll see 250 OK. – Tony – 2012-03-02T00:14:59.177

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.

Tony

Posted 2010-09-22T19:32:45.670

Reputation: 121