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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.
I live in the UK so ive never understood this. If you wanted to go to cuba, couldn't you just fly from mexico or canada, or even fly to europe and fly to cuba from there?
In a market, import duties encourage smuggling, since the artificial State imposes cost makes it possible to provide a given good at a significantly cheaper rate simply by avoiding customs.
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
Also, the point of that travel ban wasn't to keep Americans out but to help prevent US money from propping up the dictatorship. I'm not sure if Cuba allows people to leave, except in very special circumstances. I don't think North Korea allows its people to leave.
From A website that promotes democracy in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Diplomat Defects to France Saturday, 19 March 2005 Washington DC - A Saudi diplomat defected to France Thursday, according to the diplomat who issued a statement on the first anniversary of the reformers arrest last year. Ahmed Bin Jaza Al-Shaikh, the second secretary at the Saudi Mission to the United Nations in Geneva told the Saudi Institute from Paris he defected to protest the Saudi government oppressive polices against reformers and democratic activists. Al-Shaikh called for a fully elected parliament with real powers in order to curb massive official corruption and to ensure the human rights f the population, and their rights for free expression.
...would there be any potential legal implication to my supporting a black market overseas...
;)
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 read it.
IANAL, but I would be worried about this aspect if I lived in the US. Read your EULA for further details, it's in there.
I am in Canada, and I don't think we have too many countries on our embargo list, so I'm not too worried...but still.
Inject.
FreeNet nodes can - and often do - contain generally unacceptable content such as images of child pornography. It's not an acceptable solution for most people.
I have been a user for about 10 years. This ends Feb 2014. The site's been ruined. I'm off. Dice, FU
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. 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:
- 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:
-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.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. All of the above can also be configured by the Putty GUI and saved as a 'session' if you prefer.
You wouldn't pay $26 to visit a website because you aren't banned from seeing most of them. If paying $26 was the only way you could see non-government approved sites, then maybe you would. The only reason drugs cost so much is because they are illegal and the people distributing them want to make sure they are being compensated well for taking that risk. You remove the wrongness of something, and you remove the high prices.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
It cannot be argued any other way.
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+ years. I don't see this changing soon..