From Slaying Dragons To Dictators

tcd004 writes "In a weekend, programmer Austin Heap transformed from an apathetic MMO player to a world class regime-slayer. When word for Iran's rigged election broke over Twitter, Heap decided to dedicate himself to building a better proxy system for people behind Iran's firewall. Heap's creation, Haystack, conceals someone's real online destinations inside a stream of innocuous traffic. You may be browsing an opposition Web site, but to the censors it will appear you are visiting, say, weather.com. Heap tends to hide users in content that is popular in Tehran, sometimes the regime's own government mouthpieces."

Comments

For all that Iran is...

[Wyatt Earp]

It is not a dictatorship.

Misguided, dangerous, theocratic, abusive, yes. But not a dictatorship.

Re:For all that Iran is...

[Wyatt Earp]

That would be a theocracy. Not a dictatorship.

"Theocracy is a form of government in which a god or deity is recognized as the state's supreme civil ruler, or in a higher sense, a form of government in which a state is governed by immediate divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided."

"Iran's government is described as a "theocratic republic".Iran's head of state, or Supreme Leader, is an Islamic cleric appointed for life by an elected body called Assembly of Experts. The Council of Guardians, considered part of the executive branch of government, is responsible for determining if legislation is in line with Islamic law and customs (the Sharia), and can bar candidates from elections, and greenlight or ban investigations into the election process."

A dictatorship is ruled by an individual. So like Iraq before Operation Iraqi Freedom kicked him out of power.

Get a clue

[Zero__Kelvin]

"I always love when someone talks about security through obscurity like they know what they are talking about.

The instant someone like yourself makes such a retarded comment you picked up from someone else or Wikipedia, those of us who DO know about it start chuckling inside."

Hey pal, I've got bad news for you but you are the one who doesn't know what the term means. You should be laughing at yourself for not understanding a term and then looking down upon others who do understand it. I hope you especially laugh at how incompetent Bruce Schneier is to use the term, because you are no doubt more competent than him (ROTFLMAO).

The term has never implied that you can know the keys and still not get in. It specifically refers to a principle in security engineering, which attempts to use secrecy (of design, implementation, etc.) to provide security - [emphasis added]. In other words if you cannot publish the algorithm without rendering the system vulnerable, then that is security through obscurity.

Re:Get a clue

[StikyPad]

From TFFaq:

8. In keeping the source code a secret, aren't you just relying on "security through obscurity"? Won't authorities eventually discover how your software works anyway?

This charge is difficult to rebut, because under normal conditions, "security through obscurity" is indeed false security. However, Haystack has several properties that make it a special case.

First of all, we do not rely on "obscurity" for protecting our users' privacy. Everything that one of ours users sends and receives is enciphered. It would take centuries for all the world's computers to decipher one of our users' browsing sessions even with full access to the Haystack source code.

"Obscurity," however, does make it much harder to find ways to block our software. Of course the authorities will pour resources into finding a way to do this, and they may temporarily succeed. In that event, we will refine our software and issue a new version that circumvents the restrictions. We will not, however, give the authorities any assistance in this process. By retarding their efforts, we ensure that the Haystack network operates more robustly for longer periods.

Re:LOL! "Iran's rigged election broke over Twitter

[alvinrod]

Well, we do have an extensive history of meddling. Okay, it's actually freaking huge. Whether or not we actually did anything or not, I wouldn't blame Iran for believing that the US played some role in the recent turmoil.

A Retrospective on Iran

[Grond]

As this article in Foreign Policy explains, the Internet, especially Twitter, didn't contribute nearly as much to the protests in Iran as has been reported: Misreading Tehran: The Twitter Devolution. "Word of mouth was by far the most influential medium used to shape the postelection opposition activity." Other major media included text messages and email, which this software wouldn't help much with.

Efforts to counter censorship and intrusive government monitoring should be applauded, but it's a bit premature to call this "world class regime-slaying."