Peer-to-peer direct and anonymous distribution overlay (P2PRIV) was a conceptual anonymous peer-to-peer overlay network introduced at Warsaw University of Technology in 2007.[1] P2PRIV hides an initiator of communications by a parallelization of network nodes receiving or sending user data independently. This concept is contrary to other anonymity networks topologies. The anonymity networks employ a serial communication as a common basis and hide the initiator in a cascade of network nodes forwarding user data consecutively. The main advantage of P2PRIV is viewed as a possibility of providing high-speed anonymous data transfer while anonymous data can be sent directly and independently in the distributed network.
The last update on the web site was in 2009.[2] The official web site is down since 2013.
P2PRIV separates anonymization from user data transport. Before sending data, signalization tokens are forwarded over classical anonymous cascades towards formation of so-called cloning cascades (CC). The well-known anonymous techniques (i.e. Mix network and Crowds' Random walk algorithm) are utilized in hiding the initiator of the CC. Then, after a random interval of time, each CC member (i.e. group of clones and the true initiator) communicates directly and independently with destination nodes. A process of finding the true initiator among network nodes is hard to perform even for an adversary able to collude a significant part of overlay network.
P2PRIV requires a fully distributed network with distributed information content to assure high-anonymous access to its resources. A utility of P2PRIV in client-server like services, e.g., World Wide Web system, or in hybrid P2P topologies, is problematic in its current form.