The Coming Censorship Wars 197
KentuckyFC writes "Many countries censor internet traffic using techniques such as blocking IP addresses, filtering traffic with certain URLs in the data packets and prefix hijacking. Others allow wiretapping of international traffic with few if any legal safeguards. There are growing fears that these practices could trigger a major international incident should international
traffic routed through these countries fall victim, whether deliberately or by accident (witness the prefix hijacking of YouTube in Pakistan last year). So how to avoid these places? A group of computer scientists investigating this problem say it turns out to be surprisingly difficult to determine which countries traffic might pass through. But their initial assessment indicates that the countries with the most pervasive censorship policies — China, Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia — pose a minimal threat because so little international traffic passes their way. The researchers instead point the finger at western countries that have active censorship policies and carry large amounts of international traffic. They highlight the roles of the two biggest carriers: Great Britain, which actively censors internet traffic, and the US, which allows warrantless wiretapping of international traffic (abstract)."
Not just the US, pretty much everybody (Score:3, Informative)
Any country with an active sigint program is snooping international internet traffic coming through their pipes. After all, that is the job of an intelligence agency. Only questions are to what degree and sophistication. Oh, and here's a list of countries with SIGINT programme.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIGINT_by_Alliances,_Nations_and_Industries [wikipedia.org]
Re:skibaldy (Score:5, Informative)
We know for sure one thing that the UK tried to censor: the album cover image on Wikipedia. We only found out about that one by chance. Presumably they censor many more things like that, that we haven't found out about. And since the item in question had been openly on sale for many years, we know that it is certainly not illegal.
Re:skibaldy (Score:5, Informative)
I found the Australian and Danish block lists on Wikileaks, and a random sample weren't blocked by my big-name UK ISP. I checked all the ones that looked like they shouldn't be blocked at all (shock sites, anti-abortion etc). I didn't want to look at all the child porn, but I tried about 5 and the home pages all loaded.
The censoring in the UK is at the level of the home user's ISP anyway, so there's no need to "route around" anything. It's inaccurate to say Great Britain (well, the UK) censors Internet traffic. The government has asked ISPs providing connections to home users to filter DNS requests for some websites. This is nothing like the Chinese Firewall, for instance.
Re:voluntary, domestic censorship only in GB (Score:4, Informative)
How is that voluntary? In most cases you can only slightly "choose" your ISP, and even then you simply have to get the least evil. Voluntary for the ISPs, but that is not voluntary for the end user, not in the least.
In the UK, if you can get ADSL you can choose *any* ADSL provider. All the phone lines are owned by the ex-monopoly (BT), but BT are required to lease the line to any broadband provider the customer chooses.
At the moment, the ISPs that don't censor are the smaller ones, which tend to be slightly more expensive -- but also provide better customer service etc.
Re:to paraphrase a quote (Score:5, Informative)
Australia doesn't _yet_. The govt is trying to set up a system, but hasn't got there yet
Re:voluntary, domestic censorship only in GB (Score:1, Informative)
If it is voluntary for the ISP's it is voluntary for the user as he can choose which ISP he wants to use, and so ISP's which don't censor will thrive.
The problem is when it isn't voluntary, which is what Government does when its voluntary programs are seen to be a joke.
Australia had a voluntary program for ages, it was no problem, nobody used it, it wasn't valuable. So the Australian Government upped the ante by making it non-voluntary, which is when people get up in arms over it.
Re:skibaldy (Score:2, Informative)
No one can know the law or how it will be applied.
There are quite a few excellent lawyers out there, they do know the law and how to apply it.
you have no property rights, since they are suing the cash itself, not you.
I don't think that it's possible to sue a stack of cash, no matter how big it is.
The ability to travel is no longer a right but a privilege contingent on showing your government-issued papers and not being on the "terrorist watch list", which is really just an alleged enemies list.
Travel is a right, within certain guidelines. True it has gotten worse lately, for some people at least, I know many people that travel without a problem at all.
No other countries except Russia and China imprison more people.
Check your figures again, I'm pretty sure that the U.S.A. imprisons more people per capita than any other country.
Your posts continually reveal further depths of moral bankruptcy and abject toadying to the lowest forms of parasitic usurping political scum. You have no place in this country, this world, this life. Your ugly idiocy befouls all that is good in mankind. I loathe your very essence and wish your evil spirit complete and eternal annihilation.
Finally, stop talking to yourself :)
Nit: (Score:5, Informative)
... most terrorists are average people having little to no specialized skills, they aren't a professional architect, ...
You shouldn't make that assumption or use it in anti-censorship arguments. In fact a non-trivial number of the planners in terrorist organizations ARE such experts.
Osama, for instance, is/was a civil engineer and owner/operator of a major civil engineering firm. Not only is he such an expert but he had many more working for him aboveground and thus plenty of potential recruits for underground work.
It's pretty clear that the attack on the Twin Towers was well designed to take the building down, probably by experts working with the building plans: The building had a failure mode that could be exploited by heat (weakening the floor structures, which braced the supporting walls against buckling, so the floors would drop away and leave the walls unbraced) and the planes were fully fueled and banked just before impact so their fuel would be deposited on several consecutive floors.
Planners in terrorist organizations don't necessarily ever end up on the operations. Thus they aren't expended and a few of them can plan many attacks.
Re:skibaldy (Score:4, Informative)
And for your comment on flaw finding, you assume that the average person can simply find a flaw by looking at detailed blueprints that an entire team of architects could not find. That is unlikely, most terrorists are average people having little to no specialized skills, they aren't a professional architect, they aren't going to be able to find these said flaws.
1. Many of the leaders in terrorist movements are (western) college educated engineers, scientists, doctors, or they received a practical education on the ground. /. discussions about it
Here's two
http://it.slashdot.org/it/08/01/29/1614206.shtml [slashdot.org]
http://it.slashdot.org/it/08/04/03/1943247.shtml [slashdot.org]
2. The growing fear is that educated westerners (i.e. white people) are going to be radicalized and disrupt the :cough:non-existent:cough: racial profiling that exists.
So while "most terrorists are average people having little to no specialized skills", the reality is that the people planning attacks are educated people with specialized skills.
USA vs. $30,000.00 in US Currency (Score:5, Informative)
> I don't think that it's possible to sue a stack of cash, no matter how big it is.
Actually it is. I picked the first example I could find from a little Googling, but here's the docket for the United States of America v. Thirty Thousand Dollars ($30,000.00) In United States Currency [justia.com] for your reading pleasure.
I also found this news article [thenewspaper.com] about how this works in another case, which is more than a little disturbing. You're simply not allowed to have too much cash these days. They think it proves you're doing something illegal. Even if they're right most of the time, I think it's terrible what they can do to the innocent.
Re:prove it (Score:4, Informative)
Police say the Newark Licking Valley student was arrested Friday and held over the weekend. On Monday, she entered denials to juvenile charges of illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material and possession of criminal tools.
A spokeswoman for the Ohio attorney general's office says an adult convicted of the child pornography charge would have to register as a sexual offender, but a judge would have flexibility on the matter with a convicted juvenile.
A prosecutor says Licking County authorities also considering charges for students who received the photos." (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,434645,00.html)
True, I don't know if she was convicted, but she was charged with a felony.
Re:to paraphrase a quote (Score:5, Informative)
You are labeled a Troll, but I do distinctly remember reading an article that explains that a lot of ISPs do actually route around the USA because of its surveillance policies. Actually, it was quite easy to Google for information: The Internet interprets the USA as damage and routes around it [itwire.com]. Your Troll moniker is certainly unjust.
Re:to paraphrase a quote (Score:3, Informative)
Australia does not have the "right to free speech".
Nowhere in our constitution do residents have "free speech". we've assumed it comes from the UN's Human Rights, but it hasn't been enacted in law, so courts are not required to acknowledge it's existence.
For a sobering read : http://www.aph.gov.au/LIBRARY/Pubs/RN/2001-02/02rn42.htm [aph.gov.au]