Contrabandwidth 270
tcd004 writes "Kate Palmer writes in Foreign Policy Magazine that an international black market for Internet access has arisen in many authoritarian countries who keep their populations offline. Savvy black marketers in cybercafes, universities, private homes, and elsewhere are exploiting technological loopholes to circumvent government filters and charge fees for access. According to OpenNet Initiative, a nonprofit that tracks banned sites, visiting a single website in Saudi Arabia can cost anywhere from $26 to $67. And as censorship spreads, the prices are only going up." It's just a few paragraphs, but thought provoking.
When /. is blacklisted (Score:5, Funny)
that's expensive (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:that's expensive (Score:5, Interesting)
On a side note, since I'm in the US, and running a proxy here is legal, would there be any potential legal implication to my supporting a black market overseas, assuming I never go to saudi arabia? What if I did go do saudi arabia?
Re:that's expensive (Score:5, Interesting)
However, if you are serious about helping, what I would suggest grabbing a copy of FreeNet [sourceforge.net] and running a node. You don't even have to actively surf on it, IIRC, to allow it to make active copies of nodes, thus allowing "banned" content to get out.
IIRC, they had also included last time I ran it a built in proxy server/anonymizer, so you'd be helping in that way, too.
If you are concerned about Bandwidth, you can use Netlimiter [netlimiter.com] to throttle it. I don't know of any Linux equivilants to Netlimiter, but I'm sure there's something (probably built in).
Never (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Never (Score:5, Insightful)
In any case, my
Re:Never (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Never (Score:2, Insightful)
B
Nota bene: I am NOT condoning child abuse.
Re:Never (Score:5, Insightful)
It is important to keep the distinction between an idea, thought or speech from that of an act or action against others. The freedom to discuss anything, have opinions about anything is an inalienable right that all people have. It is not granted by the government nor can it be rightfully taken away by the government. We are all born with that right.
There is NEVER a legitimate reason to censor free speech, never.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:I will police my own FreeNet node if I run one! (Score:2, Insightful)
Certainly. Freedom of speech means you can say anything you want, about anyone you want, anytime you want. But it does not mean you have to listen to other people when they get on the soapbox. ie, they can say it, but you can refuse to allow them to use your node, blow-horn or soapbox to say it with.
Freedom of speech does not guarantee that other people will listen to what you have to say. Nor does it guarantee that anyone will help you say it. Your node is still your node and you can dictate what do
Re:I will police my own FreeNet node if I run one! (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:I will police my own FreeNet node if I run one! (Score:3, Informative)
I most certainly agree, I too would have a moral obligation to prevent it from spreading, however.. what's right isn't always right.
If you begin censoring content, you will lose Common Carrier Status, and [could] be held liable for anything illegal that moves through your servers from there out. Why do you think usenet (as a whole, there are moderated groups) is so raw and uncensored?
Perhaps this is a problem with the law as a whole, but Common Carrier goes back 70+ [nfbohio.org]
Re:Never (Score:2)
Re:Never (Score:3, Insightful)
I just find it hard to understand your viewpoint - It's throwing the baby (no pun intended) out with the bathwater.
so much "child porn?" (Score:2)
Is there really *that much* of it out there or are "the children" being used against us once again? Scare tactics? Hrm.
I know Pete Townshend found some, but he was obviously looking for it and knew exactly where to go.
Re:Never (Score:5, Insightful)
I really don't see any obvious way in which the childporn on Freenet can result in more child abuse.
Well the first argument would be that exposing people to the child porn might encourage them to become paedophiles. I think that's false in the same way that gay pornograpgy doesn't make straight people gay, but it's an argument.
The main issue with the child pornography is that it so abhorrent that most people natural instinct is to do everything they can to stamp it out. You've taken an extremely rational approach to it that ignores this disgust, though you make a good case.
However, consider that these children are harmed not just in the making of the porn but in its distribution. I really don't know what we're talkig about with this stuff, if it's pictures of children being abused or if it's just nude children, but if it's the latter then the kid might be far more traumatised just by growing up knowing that people were using her picture. And imagine being the parent of that kid and knowing that guys around the world were using that photo.
As I say, you may have a valid point as far as Freenet is concerned that I'd have to consider further, but there definitely are arguments against it.
Re:Never (Score:2, Insightful)
Viewing child porn, and especially paying for it means that there is a market for it, which means someone has to produce it. Which means physically getting some poor kid to Pose for it.
So yes, viewing it, creates child abuse.
Re:Never (Score:2)
I have a few female friends who let b
Re:Never (Score:3, Insightful)
Generally most child porn comming out of the former USSR is done purely for the money and not the sexual gratification of the perpitrator.
So by buying the stuff you are feeding the market meani
Re:Never (Score:2)
The incentive isn't direct payment but a secure distribution channel and the cultivation of the market. There is as well the instant gratification of seeing your work "in print," at
Re:that's expensive (Score:2)
If you ever went to Arabia,
Heh, that's funny, I thought that country didn't exist!
Re:that's expensive (Score:2)
A peninsula of southwest Asia between the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf. Politically, it includes Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, and Kuwait. Arabia has an estimated one third of the world's oil reserves.
So now you know. And knowledge is power!
What about export laws? (Score:2, Informative)
IIRC, export laws pertain to data as well. This means that if you export data to countries listed on your own countries "embargo list" (specifically, the U.S. has a trade embargo on any country it doesn't like) you may be held in violation. (Typically I would say this is software capable of high-encryption, such as Windows NT/2000/XP with high encryption pack etc etc).
Just make sure it's encrypted so they can't
Re:that's expensive (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:that's expensive (Score:2)
Right so far.
I'm going to assume you included that "not" by mistake. If upon further review, however, you stand by this erroneous statement, write back and I'll find cites for you.
So - Appreciate that you live in a free country (Score:5, Insightful)
In my land of the free... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:In my land of the free... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:In my land of the free... (Score:2)
Freedom, Internet, Tibet, & Chinese Tyranny (Score:5, Interesting)
There are techniques by which anyone can bypass government control of the Internet. Consider the following. A Tibetan uses a cell phone to call into an internet service provider (ISP) in Australia. Radio Free Asia subsidizes all such accounts so that they are essentially free.
The cell phone then becomes a 56K modem. It is not fast but will do the job. The Tibetan can then freely and daily e-mail reports about Chinese brutality in and around Tibet. Moreoever, the Tibetan can receive factual information about the outside world. After all, both CNN and FoxNews have web sites.
Re:Freedom, Internet, Tibet, & Chinese Tyranny (Score:3, Insightful)
Bypassing blocks (Score:2)
A workmate spent a year in China, and did this routinely so he could access non-filtered searches. He also used our IMAP and SMTP server over an SSH tunnel, since his ISP didn't even _provide_ an SMTP server. Apparently "email" is hotmail.com in China.
While all this worked fine
Yup (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Yup (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Yup (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Yup (Score:2)
Re:Yup (Score:2, Funny)
It took only a couple of hours to resolve it, but the number of embarrassed faces was amusing.
(Proxy used to bring up a big red banned site warning with an alarm wav...)
Yaaahoooooo (Score:5, Funny)
I can just picture geeks driving around in red 70's Dodge Chargers shouting "Yaaahoooo" and "Yeehaaaaa" as we jump over ravines to bring data to the censored masses.
Re:Yaaahoooooo (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Yaaahoooooo (Score:2)
With stars-and-bars paint jobs, and the number "01" printed on the side? Them Duke boys don't just run their car on 'shine these days, now they got engine booster ROM kits too! And they're getting ready to change The General's number to "1334".
/Enos, you n00b!
What causes the price? (Score:2, Insightful)
I wonder if the price is because of the cost of the connection (probobly a satellite phone), or something else.... What do you guys think?
Re:What causes the price? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:What causes the price? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:What causes the price? (Score:2)
can you not read? (was Re:What causes the price?) (Score:2)
They're charging that much because the websites are banned/filtered by the government/ISPs. The 'contrabandwidth' specialists bypass those bans and filters on internet connections and sell usage. That is why the prices are so high; they can charge that much because there's really no other way to gain access to these banned/filtered websites (unless you bypass them yourself).
Only proves IP exists... (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not as if it's unprecedented... (Score:4, Insightful)
Question is, though, is visiting 'banned' websites worth the cash, or is it just for 'thrill' value? I don't think I'd pay $26 just to get to Maddox's site, despite it's inherent awesomeness.
Re:It's not as if it's unprecedented... (Score:3, Informative)
before you react (Score:5, Insightful)
How backward ? Yes, indeed try to travel to Cuba then...
Re:before you react (Score:3, Informative)
Re:before you react (Score:2)
Re:before you react (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:before you react (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:before you react (Score:3, Funny)
Thank you. You can now consider your passport stamped.
Re:before you react (Score:4, Insightful)
However, a reasonable person is able to distingush the difference between a corrupt and restrictive western democracy and its misguided foriegn policy, and a brutal totalitarian dictatorship that doesn't let anyone leave unless they are diplomats, and doesn't let anyone who isn't a government official access the internet, and executes anyone who breaks those rules.
It is a shame that so many of the people who are rightly critical of the US government, are in love with genocidal totalitarian regimes and their brutal dictators.
Re:before you react (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:before you react (Score:2)
Re:before you react (Score:2)
Correction, ALL governments restrict the real world travel of their citizens.
Where did you get that idea? Just because the US does it, then, of course, all governments do it?
Well, I'm sorry to say that you're wrong. In fact, as far as western countries go, I'd say that the US is one of the few that does stop people.
I just had a look at an Australian government site, www.smarttraveller.gov.au (I won't make it a hyprerlink, you can cut and paste if you really want to look). It has a list of cou
Re:before you react (Score:2)
Greece and Turkey do it. And just about every other country restricts incoming visitors. They restrict you through visas and tourist/student visiting periods. You obviously haven't traveled enough to know what you're talking about.
Re:before you react (Score:4, Informative)
Re:before you react (Score:2)
Yeah, like in the middle of the night on a cobbled-together raft trying to get to freedom in America. People in so many (mainly European) countries are so far removed from opression, they've forgotten what tyrany is really like, and turn their venom toward countries that offer a form of freedom they don't understand.
Re:before you react (Score:2, Interesting)
My undocumented research... (Score:5, Interesting)
Conclusion: communes work well when they are small enough. Rule of thumb based on extended visits: communes where every member has personal contact with the current leader, and where the leader is replaceable, work well. The further removed the least prominent members are from the leaders - the more dicatorial and cult-like the commune becomes. Cuba is way past my "works well" limit. Counter-example: small cults with very charismatic leaders (e.g. Jim Jones, Heaven's gate) (although they also fail the "replaceable" test).
One Christian group in Vermont that I spent 2 weeks with had a leader who declared himself (while I was there!) an "Apostle" whose authority cannot be questioned of removed. Fortunately, the group was under oversight by an international board with members from every subscribing commune. The "Apostle" was removed.
Interestingly, while every group I visited was a "commune" in the sense that all property was legally owned by the corporate entity, a huge part of what made them tick was "ownership" of a different sort. The head chemist at the Vermont group (in charge of making soap and perfumes) was so excited about his products and workmanship that he "owned" his unique position in the commune. One of the things the "Apostle" talked about doing was switching around jobs so that everyone would learn "humility". Kind of reminded me of the part in the Communist Manefesto were everone is supposed to be able to do anyone elses job.
This is where I began to see that there is a big difference between "commune" and "Communism". Classic Communism as a political philosophy is bunk. However you handle production and distribution of goods, every person is unique, and brings unique gifts and talents to an organisation. A political philosophy that tries to make everyone interchangeable is just another means of oppression. Capitalism becomes oppressive in the same way when it tries to make every employee an interchangeable cog in the machine.
Re:My undocumented research... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:My undocumented research... (Score:2)
Re:before you react (Score:2)
Slashdot (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Slashdot (Score:2)
Re:Slashdot (Score:2)
An arm and a leg.
Hmmm (Score:3, Funny)
And suddenly, a Slashdot addiction seems to be a much more costly habit than a smoking addiction...
Re:Hmmm (Score:2)
Censoring == import tax, illegal access == smuggle (Score:5, Informative)
Censorship is an attempt by the State to prevent the import of information. In an exact parallel, this encourages the smuggling of information, since there is censorship by no means eliminates demand; it merely restricts supply and so drives up prices.
The article implies that Internet access is expensive in authoritarian countries because of the rates being charged by black access groups.
In fact, it is a testimoney to the power of supply and demand that it is *possible* to obtain access *despite* all attempts by the State to prevent this.
--
Toby
Re:Censoring == import tax, illegal access == smug (Score:2)
import duties encourage smuggling
What? Without import duties, smuggling wouldn't exist, because you can bring with you whatever. You could say that it is the "import duties" that encourage smuggling, because it wouldn't be smuggling without the duties, but I believe it would benefit the discussion if we didn't consider the amount of goods smuggled, but the amount of goods transported across a border - including smuggling.
Then we can agree that less transportation occurs with import taxes than without,
Re:Censoring == import tax, illegal access == smug (Score:2)
> with import taxes than without, even if you
> include the smuggling.
Noooo...this isn't auxiomatic because it's an indirect connection and it is concieveable that circumstances could be such that the relationship you describe doesn't occur.
What import duties do is raise the price of a good and this in turn reduces consumption - but this is only true if there is competition in the market for the given good.
When there is competition in the market
The Market Rules All (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a service that's offered, for a price.
yeah but (Score:2)
To Get More Bandwidth: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:To those who don't know. (Score:2)
The inclusion of "select" by the parent means that he is starting a two person game (iirc).
In case they get Slashdot... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:In case they get Slashdot... (Score:3, Funny)
This can't be right. GW isn't vocal against Saudi Arabia. Therefore, they must best a shining light of Freedom(tm) and democracy.
Illegal = black market (Score:5, Funny)
Examples:
-Prostitution - most of the world (well, exept for Amsterdam, and p0rn)
-Drugs - most of the world (well, exept for Amsterdam)
-[Insert illegal things here (exept Amsterdam)]
So... in conclusion. Go to Amsterdam.
Re:Illegal = black market (Score:3, Funny)
Clearly, there must be a black market for "Illegal Things" in Amsterdam, since they are otherwise unavailable!
Re:Illegal = black market (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm sure the poster meant that as a tongue-in-cheek. But there really is a plan to make a single Free state. Moreover, it's a plan with actual results, in which thousands have signed up, and over a hundred free-market, free-speech, "free-Everything" activists have already moved there [freerepublic.com] and are making a difference right now.
It's called the Free State Project [freestateproject.org], and I myself am a member.
Check this newscast [freestateproject.org] from a local TV station.
No freedom needed for citizens of US "allies" (Score:5, Insightful)
I fail to see how anyone can believe that this administration's goals are anything but getting Bush's friends richer.
Re:No freedom needed for citizens of US "allies" (Score:2)
Re:No freedom needed for citizens of US "allies" (Score:2)
Because decades of media hype has prevented us from building nuclear power plants and drilling for more oil in Alaska. Thus our economy has become somewhat reliant on Saudi Arabian oil.
Fortunately, both of these problems are starting to be remedied as we speak.
*psst* Hey buddy... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:*psst* Hey buddy... (Score:2)
How much for a 0 bit? I'll give you 2 bits.
Re:*psst* Hey buddy... (Score:2, Funny)
From an ex-users point of view (Score:5, Interesting)
The other route was only available to non Muslims was via satellite and was totally uncensored. It was very illegal but we made sure that it was kept quiet and for the 18 months I was there the service was splendid.
From my experience you have to actually live in the place to understand the paranoia of the Censor. In the branch of Safeway that I regulrarly visited there were plenty of womens magazines that carried no censorship whereas any picture of a women in a magazine or paper that was aimed at men was heavily censored with the black felt tip pen.
just my 0.02riyals worth
This isn't all that new. (Score:5, Interesting)
Since the only ISPs were the government-run telcos (Batelco, Etisalat, Qatar Telecom) censorship was rather easy to push. Websites that promoted blasphemy, Israel, anarchy, porn, warez, etc. were banned; sometimes hastily. The ignorant admins at these ISPs used a list of keywords to censor URLs due to the exponential increase in pornography. In fact, because of its very name, Hotmail.com was banned in 3 of those countrie for almost 2 months until they realized its innocence. Similarly, sites such as Whitehouse.com were made available for diplomatic content (for some time) but access was denied to Hotbot.com because it was too lewd.
The fines for visiting offensive material and / or finding ways around the filters ranged from about US$10 to ~$200. Of course, in '96 the ISPs charged about US$1.50 for each hour spent online. With that kind of sticker price and the reasonable likelihood of surfing onto banned websites accidentally, some kids started making international calls to ISPs in India and Egypt to get around the limitations. The ones who couldn't dish out the bucks stuck with private BBSs. It would have been possible to make quite a bit of money by meeting the demands of the people, but the risks (especially under Sharia law) are not to be taken lightly.
Re:This isn't all that new. (Score:4, Interesting)
In January, I started getting a lot of hits from Saudi Arabia, and most of my search terms were in Arabic. I discovered that most of these hits were going to Arabic pornography blogs.
All the Internet traffic from Saudi Arabia was coming from cachexx-x.ruh.isu.net.sa, where xx-x is some numbers.
I went to http://www.isu.net.sa/ [isu.net.sa] to find out about their net policies.
The Internet Services Unit (ISU) is a department of King Abdulaziz City for Science & Technology (KACST) responsible for providing Internet services in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, in cooperation with Saudi Telecommunication Company (STC), the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) and a number of Internet Service Providers (ISPs) from the private sector.
The next month, traffic from Saudi Arabia dropped considerably, this month there is no traffic at all. I guess my site is just another site in their blacklist now.
How to get around a restrictive filter (Score:4, Informative)
To bypass censorship and get around a restrictive firewall blocking you from browsing certain web sites all you need is a shell account that is accessable via ssh on a machine that has a free and open connection. This could be another machine that you own, a friend's machine or even an account rented from an ISP. An example ISP offering shell accounts would be Panix [panix.com]. I'll use them for the rest of this example as I have a shell account with them and hence can easily test the example setup.
All you need to do is make use of dynamic port forwarding to simulate a SOCKS proxy. Here is how you would do it.
- Make a ssh connection to the remote machine using dynamic port forwarding. (If the standard ssh port [22] is blocked then some accounts, such as Panix, will allow a ssh connection on another port, such as 80 or 443). For example, on a Windows machine I could connect to Panix by entering the following on the command line:
- -ssh
- Use the ssh protocol
- -D 4096
- Use dynamic port forwarding with 4096 as that port. (You could use any port number you like that is not already in use on your machine).
- -P 80
- Connect to the server on port 80 (this part may not be needed or your remote machine may not support it)
- shell.panix.com
- The server you are connecting to. In this example the panix shell server.
- In a browser that supports SOCKS proxies, go into the proxy configuration page and specify localhost and the port you dynamically port forwarded (in this example 4096). All traffic is now routed through Panix.
Once you have this setup you can also configure any other internet application that supports SOCKS proxies to route their traffic through your secure link (e.g. instant messaging with GAIM).putty -ssh -D 4096 -P 80 shell.panix.com
In case you are not familiar with Putty* and its command line options I will break that down for you:
Note 1: You can also use the Putty graphical user interface. You do not need to use the command line! Once you have started Putty you can get to the port forwarding section via Connection -> SSH -> Tunnels. Then type 4096 (or any other suitable port number) in the Source Port box, click the Dynamic radio box and click the Add button.
Note 2: If you are using Linux or MacOS/X you could use OpenSSH as follows: ssh -D 4096 -p 80 shell.panix.com
For example, in Firefox you can access the proxy settings here: Tools -> Options -> General -> Connections Settings. Then select the radio button for Manual proxy configuration. In SOCKS Host enter: localhost and in Port enter: 4096
*Putty is a free/open source telnet/ssh client for Windows. Here is the home page [greenend.org.uk]. All of the above can also be configured by the Putty GUI and saved as a 'session' if you prefer.
Coincidence? (Score:2, Interesting)
Trade Off (Score:5, Interesting)
I suspect a large number, if not a majority of US citizens would be willing to make a similarly lucrative trade off in exchange for allowing an absolute monoarchy, in a way the house of saud is the ultimate example of free market goverment, they have bought their power.
I for one don't waste any effort hating this goverment, nor do I feel espically sorry for its citizens. I suspect that most could leave if it really bothered them.
Re:Trade Off (Score:2)
Re:Thought provoking (Score:2)