tor browser cannot connect running on trisquel 12
Trisquel 12 installed on notebook. An usb wifi card ar9271 provides internet access.
Double clicking the tor browser icon starts tor browser. But when you click the connect button in tor browser then it returns: Tor browser could not connect to tor
If tor is blocked in your location trying a bridge may help. Connection assist can choose one for you using your location or you can configure your connection manually instead.
Using a bridge does not work either. But no bridge should be required because on another non trisquel computer tor browser starts and connects to the internet. And no bridge is required.
Tor browser also displays this message: Some of tor browsers security features may offer less protection on your current operating system.
What is that about?
Do you know how to get tor browser to connect to the internet on trisquel 12? Thank you.
I am a translator!
on another non trisquel computer tor browser starts and connects to the internet
Is that computer connected to the same wifi network on which tor browser cannot connect on your notebook using Trisquel 12?
When I am connected to a network that has IPv4, tor browser works fine, but when I am connected via a cellular router that only has IPv6 (even with CLAT configured to access IPv4), it does not work. I don't have a reference here, but I found a page saying this is a known behaviour of tor browser (due to tor browser itself) and apparently there is currently no plan to change this (although to me it is a serious problem).
If tor browser works on one computer and does not work on another computer and both are on the same network, then it is worth some investigations. One thing is to check the network configuration on both computers and compare them. Perhaps there are other issues. By the way, how did you install tor browser on Trisquel 12? I installed it using guix.
> computer connected to the same wifi network
Yes, both computers use the same router.
I also tested using the same usb wifi card ar9271 on the non trisquel computer. The wifi card provides an internet connection and tor browser starts, gets an internet connection and works on the non trisquel computer. So it appears that it is not the wifi card which courses the tor browser's no connection error on the trisquel computer.
It rather seems that something about trisquel 12 courses the no connection error. I have run tor browser on several different x86 gnu linux systems and I do not remember having encountered a tor browser no connection error on any of them.
> it is a serious problem
If you say that a tor instance running on a computer connected to a hot spot relying on ipv6 will not work, then that is a big problem. On
youtube watch?v=2k8Hr5Aw73o you can get privacy guy's take on ipv6.
> check the network configuration on both computers
Can you specifically say what I should look for?
> how did you install tor browser on Trisquel 12?
I do not quite understand that sentence. For a given gnu linux computer I get tor browser here:
https://www.torproject.org/download/
You double click the tor browser folder. Then you double click the icon to the right. Which starts tor browser. You do not install anything. Tor browser listens on port 9150. If a given program supports socks5 and you want the program to get internet access over tor, you configure the program's socks5 settings to 127.0.0.1 port 9150.
What does the local networking information display on your computer?
$ ifconfig
And what does running the script display on the terminal?
$ ./start-tor-browser.desktop
I was able to run the browser on my Trisquel 12 computer. https://check.torproject.org says it is configured to use tor.
I scratched what after reading the second sentence from the original post and am more curious what the tor log says in the settings of about:preferences#connection
Here is mine:
2026-08-20 00:54:36.583
[NOTICE] DisableNetwork is set. Tor will not make or accept non-control network connections. Shutting down all existing connections.
2026-08-20 00:54:36.587
[NOTICE] DisableNetwork is set. Tor will not make or accept non-control network connections. Shutting down all existing connections.
2026-08-20 00:54:36.590
[NOTICE] DisableNetwork is set. Tor will not make or accept non-control network connections. Shutting down all existing connections.
2026-08-20 00:55:24.261
[NOTICE] Opening Socks listener on 127.0.0.1:9150
2026-08-20 00:55:24.261
[NOTICE] Opened Socks listener connection (ready) on 127.0.0.1:9150
2026-08-20 00:55:24.715
[NOTICE] Bootstrapped 5% (conn): Connecting to a relay
2026-08-20 00:55:24.739
[NOTICE] Bootstrapped 10% (conn_done): Connected to a relay
2026-08-20 00:55:24.850
[NOTICE] Bootstrapped 14% (handshake): Handshaking with a relay
2026-08-20 00:55:25.236
[NOTICE] Bootstrapped 15% (handshake_done): Handshake with a relay done
2026-08-20 00:55:25.236
[NOTICE] Bootstrapped 75% (enough_dirinfo): Loaded enough directory info to build circuits
2026-08-20 00:55:25.237
[NOTICE] Bootstrapped 90% (ap_handshake_done): Handshake finished with a relay to build circuits
2026-08-20 00:55:25.238
[NOTICE] Bootstrapped 95% (circuit_create): Establishing a Tor circuit
2026-08-20 00:55:25.716
[NOTICE] Bootstrapped 100% (done): Done
I described how tor browser will start but not connect to the internet on a trisquel computer that I will call computer A. I took the hdd and the usb ar9271 wifi card from computer A and moved it to another computer, called computer B. On computer B I started trisquel. I then started tor browser on computer B. On computer B tor browser starts and connects to the internet and works. So it is something about computer A.
I looked into the tor browser log on computer A. The log looks similar to the log you displayed. But at a point warnings get displayed. Warn our clock is days hours minutes behind the time published in the consensus network status document. Tor needs an accurate clock to work correctly. Please check your time and date settings. Another warn says received microdesc flavor consensus with skewed time. I noticed on computer A the clock gets the hour time wrong. But trisquel is set to run in another time zone. But on computer A the clock also gets the minute count wrong. Could that be the error causing tor browser not to work? Could it be the time is wrong on computer A because the clock battery in computer A is defect?
> Could it be the time is wrong on computer A because the clock battery in computer A is defect?
I did see an warning/error on the Tor Browser too when I set the incorrect BIOS time. But when I set an incorrect system time with the correct BIOS time, it doesn't seem to care. CMOS batteries tend to die when the computer is not used often I read somewhere.
Torbrowser seems to make an error when the operating system date/time is off more than a day. Try following the documentation to set the correct time: