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I am an irregular user of Tor but like to have it at hand and use it from time to time. Up until recently, I would update frequently and it all worked smoothly. However, today is the first time I try launching it after upgrading to macOS Sierra and I am bumping into an error for the first time.

Instead of connecting like it used to, the "Tor Status" window stays in place for a while and eventually delivers an error message saying "Tor Launcher. Could not connect to Tor control port".

I upgraded to the most recent version of Tor Browser (6.0.2), created an exception in my Firewall and even deactivated my firewall for a bit, but all to no avail. Is this something someone else has bumped into? All the messages I found seemed linked to other parameters that do not apply to me. Could it be Sierra? Could it be some other functionality that blows ports? Any ideas?

Thanks a lot in advance!

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  • This kind of inconveniences are expected when using a very early beta OS. Report the situation to the Tor team.
    – Rui F Ribeiro
    Commented Jul 31, 2016 at 9:54
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    Thanks for the comment, Rui. I was fearing it could be as simple as that... However, I see no link on the Tor website to report such issues. Am I missing something? EDIT: I guess the tor-talk mailing list is the closest thing ([email protected])
    – user13820
    Commented Aug 1, 2016 at 15:41

2 Answers 2

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If you're having trouble saving the changes to the prefs.js file, might be a permissions issue. Did you try updating the pref.js file using terminal:

sudo nano ~/Library/Application Support/TorBrowser-Data/Browser/*.default/prefs.js

Add

user_pref("extensions.torlauncher.control_port_use_socket", false);

and Crtl-O to save, Ctrl-X to exit

(new user so not enough reputation to add as comment to Gbla Kbla's answer so have repeated details here)

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After official release i've met the same problem too. As described here, temporary fix is: add line 

user_pref("extensions.torlauncher.control_port_use_socket", false);

in ~/Library/Application Support/TorBrowser-Data/Browser/*.default/prefs.js

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  • Thanks for the reply, Gbla Kbla. Unfortuntely, this didn't quite work for me. I did add the line but to no avail. When I launch TorBrowser, a window says "Waiting for TorBrowser to start" and invariably an error message says "Could not connect to Tor control port". When I check the prefs.js file, the extra line has disappeared. PS: I am now running macOS Sierra 10.12.1 public beta 3 and TorBrowser 6.5a3 (though I also tried with the 6.0.5 stable release).
    – user13820
    Commented Oct 10, 2016 at 9:31
  • Anyone? Any help appreciated.
    – user13820
    Commented Oct 22, 2016 at 12:03

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