tor/doc/v3-authority-howto.txt

                    How to add a v3 directory authority.

What we'll be doing:

   We'll be configuring your Tor server as a v3 directory authority,
   generating a v3 identity key plus certificates, and adding your v3
   identity fingerprint to the list of default directory authorities.

The steps:

0) Make sure you're running ntp, and that your time is correct.

   Make sure you have Tor version at least r11953. In the short term,
   running a working authority may mean running the latest version of
   Tor from SVN trunk. Later on, we hope that it will become easier
   and you can just run a recent development release (and later still,
   a recent stable release).

1) First, you'll need a certificate.  Run ./src/tools/tor-gencert to
   generate one.

   Run tor-gencert in a separate, very secure directory.  Maybe even on
   a more secure computer.  The first time you run it, you will need to
   run it with the --create-identity-key option to make a v3 authority
   identity key.  Subsequent times, you can just run it as-is.

   tor-gencert will make 3 files:

      authority_identity_key -- THIS IS VERY SECRET AND VERY SENSITIVE.
        DO NOT LEAK IT.  DO NOT LOSE IT.

      authority_signing_key -- A key for signing votes and v3 conensuses.

      authority_certificate -- A document authenticating your signing key
         with your identity-key.

   You will need to rotate your signing key periodically.  The current
   default lifetime is 1 year.  We'll probably take this down to a month or
   two some time soon.  To rotate your key, run tor-gencert as before,
   but without the --create-identity-key option.

2) Copy authority_signing_key and authority_certificate to your Tor keys
   directory.

   For example if your data directory is /var/lib/tor/, you should run
     cp authority_signing_key authority_certificate /var/lib/tor/keys/

   You will need to repeat this every time you rotate your certificate.

3) Tell your Tor to be a v3 authority by adding these lines to your torrc:

   AuthoritativeDirectory 1
   V3AuthoritativeDirectory 1

4) Now your authority is generating a networkstatus opinion (called a
   "vote") every period, but none of the other authorities care yet. The
   next step is to get a Tor developer (likely Roger or Nick) to add
   your v3 identity fingerprint to the default list of dirservers.

   First, you need to learn your authority's v3 identity fingerprint.
   It should be in your authority_certificate file in a line like:

     fingerprint 3041632465FA8847A98B2C5742108C72325532D9

   One of the Tor developers then needs to add this fingerprint to
   the add_default_trusted_dirservers() function in config.c, using
   the syntax "v3ident=<fingerprint>". For example, if moria1's new v3
   identity fingerprint is FOO, the moria1 dirserver line should now be:

     DirServer moria1 v1 orport=9001 v3ident=FOO 128.31.0.34:9031 FFCB 46DB 1339 DA84 674C 70D7 CB58 6434 C437 0441

   The v3ident item must appear after the nickname and before the IP.

5) Once your fingerprint has been added to config.c, we will try to
   get a majority of v3 authorities to upgrade, so they know about you
   too. At that point your vote will automatically be included in the
   networkstatus consensus, and you'll be a fully-functioning contributing
   v3 authority.

   Note also that a majority of the configured v3 authorities need to
   agree in order to generate a consensus: so this is also the point
   where extended downtime on your server means missing votes.