Chinese Censor-Beating Software Resembles Malware, But Isn't

coondoggie writes "Software designed to beat Chinese censorship may behave in ways that seem suspect, but it is all part of the application's strategy to fool the Great Firewall of China, according to one programmer of the software. 'There are many built-in tricks that do all kinds of things to confuse the firewall,' says David Tian, a scientist for NASA who works spare-time on UltraSurf, the free software designed to promote unrestricted Internet access for citizens of China persecuted for being members of Falun Gang, the religious group the Chinese government is trying to suppress."

Comments

Falun Gang

[argux]

I think it's Falun Gong

Re:Falun Gang

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it's Falun Gong

Great, now Slashdot will be censored in China. I hope you are happy.

Re:Falun Gang

[rchh]

I am currently in China and the Internet censoring is not as bad as I had thought. I can open most websites, including BBC and New York Times. Most online proxies work. I can read any article from wikipedia- including that of Falun Gong ,Tibet and Human Rights.The most notable failures are Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch websites. Maybe I can read most websites because they are in English?

Confuse it? How?

[girlintraining]

You shouldn't be trying to "confuse it", you should be making sure that the traffic patterns aren't unique and discernable. In other words, using steganography. All this "confusion" stuff I read in the article gives the user a distinct pattern of behavior that can identify the user as actively using said software. If you're trying to get under the radar of the government, don't start by sending up a big digital flare that says "Hey! I'm trying to bypass your crap." It usually ends badly for the would-be revolutionary, who's first job (I might add) is to survive.

Even in so-called "free" countries like the US, the government can imprison people indefinately on the off chance that the encrypted data may be subversive. How do you suppose China would handle it? Encryption doesn't enable free speech -- a gun to the head is a pretty effective way of recovering the key.

Save lives: Use stenography.

Re:Confuse it? How?

[tecnico.hitos]

Save lives: Use stenography.

abv cmt shd b fxd

Re:Confuse it? How?

[girlintraining]

It sends out search based noise and obfuscation by making randomized search-queries to popular search engines, e.g., AOL, Yahoo!, Google, and MSN..

*face palm* Googling "how do I blow up government buildings" is going to attract the attention of shub internet no matter how many bogus queries you put before or after it. Most filtering schemes are based on content -- they don't care to do statistical analysis. You're just not that important. All they need to hang you is proof you visited a certain website or looked for certain terms. For example, if I typ[$)%(T^NO CARRIER

What is the obsession with Falun Gong?

[DNS-and-BIND]

Seriously, wtf is this Western obsession with the Falun Gong? On one hand, you have fundamentalist athiests in charge of Western media who take every opportunity to attack and discredit any religion, much less crazy cults like Scientology or Raëlism. On the other hand, you have those same exact people coming to the defense of Falun Gong! Everyone knows they're nuts, right? To call them the Mormons of China would be too mild, they're more like the Branch Davidians. So, to sum up, we have hardcore athiests getting really offended that an officially atheist government (the best kind!) is cracking down on religion. Strange days, eh?

My own personal explanation for this bizarre behavior is that Westerners actually don't know anything about Falun Gong, and don't care to learn. They are comfortable with the "narrative" that FG=good, China=bad. And as recent events have shown, narratives are more important and cherished than the actual facts on the ground. People get *angry* when their comfortable narratives are revealed to be inaccurate.

Atheist media?

[MushMouth]

While I agree that Falun Gong is a total wacky cult (and I have old friends where sadly involved with it), but maybe you should think with a little objectivity calling the media atheist. I mean the one thing that a US presidential candidate must do is prove their love to Jesus. Don't you think if the media were atheist this sort of thing would be questioned a bit more. The one thing that a major political candidate simply can not be is Atheist, polls have pretty much proven that we will get an islamic president before we get an atheist. Personally I find the rites of all christianity, and bible stories just as nutty as the Xenu crap. Think for a second if you first heard these stories when you were in your 20s.