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Censorship Government The Internet

How Millions of Iranians Are Evading Internet Censors (msn.com) 48

schwit1 quotes the Wall Street Journal: Authorities in Tehran have ratcheted up their policing of the internet in the past week and a half, part of an attempt to stamp out the most far-reaching protests in Iran since 2009. But the crackdown is driving millions of Iranians to tech tools that can help them evade censors, according to activists and developers of the tools. Some of the tools were attracting three or four times more unique users a day than they were before the internet crackdown, potentially weakening government efforts to control access to information online. "By the time they wake up, the government will have lost control of the internet," said Mehdi Yahyanejad, executive director of NetFreedom Pioneers, a California-based technology nonprofit that largely focuses on Iran and develops educational and freedom of information tools.
Wired calls it "the biggest protest movement in Iran since the 2009 Green Movement uprising," criticing tech companies which "continue to deny services to Iranians that could be crucial to free and open communications."
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How Millions of Iranians Are Evading Internet Censors

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  • by dohzer ( 867770 ) on Sunday January 14, 2018 @05:55PM (#55928647)

    How can they protect the Iranian children if they keep challenging attempts to do so?

  • So, millions of Iranians are evading internet blocks and such. In a place where you can go to jail (or be executed) for doing so....

    And we're telling the Iranian government how it's being done???

  • STFU (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    > . "By the time they wake up, the government will have lost control of the internet," said Mehdi Yahyanejad, executive director of NetFreedom Pioneers, a California-based technology nonprofit that largely focuses on Iran and develops educational and freedom of information tools.

    Not if you keep blabbing about it, dumb ass.

    • Tor Bridge nodes are built to handle precisely this situation.

      It's free to use and free of ads and malware - I assume that "Psiphon" isn't, since they mention how much government crackdowns help their marketing.

    • What harm? Fuckers don't have the internet. Read TFA.

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Take over all telecommunication providers in the country and simply stop outside network access of any kind. Get caught trying to work around it, death penalty.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Take over all telecommunication providers in the country and simply stop outside network access of any kind. Get caught trying to work around it, death penalty.

      If the Iranian government cracks down hard enough, millions of people who are relatively peaceful right now just might decide they've had enough of being butchered.

      Does the name Custer right a bell, by chance?

      • If the Iranian government cracks down hard enough, millions of people who are relatively peaceful right now just might decide they've had enough of being butchered.

        Does the name Custer right a bell, by chance?

        Custer? Why even move out of Iran, that is basically a one-line summary of what happened there in 1979 [wikipedia.org].

  • " criticing tech companies which 'continue to deny services to Iranians'" Do your research. The Islamic Republic of Iran is one of the countries US companies are forbidden from having business dealings with. If you're unhappy with tech companies not being able to service Iranians, you might want to talk to your representative. Here's a handy list: http://smallbusiness.chron.com... [chron.com]
    • by AHuxley ( 892839 )
      Everyone who took a cell phone near a protest would have been found.
      Then its 2, 3, 4 hops from that account.
      Voice prints, advanced facial recognition will get many protesters.
      The western embassies, NGO's and other pro democracy groups pushing for protests need the "internet" to get the protesters protesting for the optics of the 24h news cycle.
      No internet and no coordination. But all the protesters are been tracked on the internet ...
      An interesting problem. How to build national protests but not hav
      • Right, because there's absolutely no way could any actual Iranians might want to protest their government's actions.

        • by AHuxley ( 892839 )
          Look at the fall of Communism in the mid to late 1980's. Lots of peace groups, faith groups in the early 1980's gathered. That had to have help building to a mass focused moment by the mid to late 1980's that could fill city streets every day.
          Small groups of motivated protesters are too easy to contain. So outside funding, planning and support has to help guide national moments.
          Colour revolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] have been well studied by most nations police and security services over
    • This "handy list" is bullshit and not precise at least in one particular entry: Lebanon.
      Because Lebanon are not under "blanket sanctions" list, but specific entities (as in many others) is sanctioned.
      The only exception is that US companies not allowed to ship any weapons to Lebanon, unless it is Lebanese Army.
      Just FYI.
  • Tunisia is currently experiencing a popular uprising (again) and violent repression of protesters (again) based on similar economic motivations to Iran but you don't hear the hawks in Washington calling for regime change there. Why is that?

    • For starters, Tunisia isn't an authoritarian theocracy hell-bent on exporting its system to its neighbours and on building nukes to facilitate that goal.

    • How much oil does Tunisia export?

  • by mapkinase ( 958129 ) on Monday January 15, 2018 @05:34AM (#55930561) Homepage Journal

    ... technological backwardness of government, not excellence of tools or technological awareness of "progressive" masses.

    Russia and China have successfully censored their Internet portions. That's a fact. There is near-to-zero opposition in information sphere within Russia and all the activists I have been reading are confined to their Western audiences from their Western blogs.

"The vast majority of successful major crimes against property are perpetrated by individuals abusing positions of trust." -- Lawrence Dalzell

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