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Egypt Cuts the Net, Net Fights Back

Posted by timothy on from the let's-use-big-metaphors dept.

GMGruman writes "Egypt's cutoff of the Net enrages the Netizenry, who are finding a bunch of ways — high tech and low tech — to fight back, from dial-up to ham radio, from mesh networks to Twitter. Robert X. Cringely shows how the Net war is being waged, and asks, Could it happen at home, too?" Sure, it could. On the same topic, reader dermiste writes "In reaction to the Egyptian government crackdown on the Internet, the French non-profit ISP French Data Network set up a dial-up Internet access. This way, anyone in Egypt who has access to a analog phone line and can call France is able to connect to the network using the following number: +33 1 72 89 01 50 (login: toto, password: toto)."

22 of 232 comments (clear)

  1. Re:France has a non-profit ISP? by McTickles · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Yeah it is an association where members split the overall cost of the network.

    I'll possibly go with them eventually because other ISPs in france insist on making you pay for services you do not want, like TV...

  2. For how long by cdp0 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This way, anyone in Egypt who has access to a analog phone line and can call France is able to connect to the network [...]

    I'm wondering for how long will the international phone lines work. The gvt. is most likely able to cut those too. Remaining options will then be HAM radio, GSM roaming, if you are close enough to a border and you are lucky to be in the range of a GSM base station from across (but I have no idea about the situation in Egypt), and satellite phone.

  3. Re:What's the Catch? by McTickles · · Score: 3, Informative

    They ARE offfering it for free, it is an association, there is nothing in it for them. They are fierce defenders of net neutrality, they have been around for quite a while now.

  4. Toto...?! by Ghoser777 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Would that be a homage to the group Toto, "famous" for the song "Africa"?

    It's gonna take a lot to take me away from you
    There's nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do
    I bless the rains down in Africa
    Gonna take some time to do the things we never have

    --
    James Tiberius Kirk: "Spock, the women on your planet are logical. No other planet in the galaxy can make that claim."
    1. Re:Toto...?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      No, it's just the French equivalent of "foo". The sequence "foo bar biz baz" is "toto titi tata tutu".

      If you want to bless the reigns, you should worry more about what's happening in Jordan, rather than Egypt.

    2. Re:Toto...?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Yes "toto" is common fill-in for passwords and first names. It's more like "joe" than "foobar".

    3. Re:Toto...?! by doomsday_device · · Score: 3, Funny

      Where do I sign up?

      Here, I guess.

  5. The Cringley article is crap. I want to know MORE by sllim · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Yesterday when I read that Egypt had pulled the plug on the internet the first thing that went through my mind was, 'the people will find a way.'. The second thing was, 'I can't wait to see how they do it. This is going to be fascinating.'. Since then I have been contemplating ad-hoc wireless networks and dialing into 56k modems thousands of miles away.
    I have been chewing at the bit (haha! I made a pun!) for any information as to how this little project is proceeding.

    The best Cringley's article can muster is a French company offering 56k access for free and the words, 'Wireless mesh network'. That is all fine and dandy.
    I am happy and impressed that the French company is offering there resources to the Egyptian people. Big round of appluase for those guys. But the geek in me is not impressed. Dialing out of country to a 56k connection is just so bloody obvious. I want to know the bloody details of the wireless mesh. I want to know about the sap that has hacked his satelite dish to give internet access to his town.

    I want more. It has to be out there.

  6. effect of the 'net overstated? by petes_PoV · · Score: 4, Insightful
    People like to think of the internet as the answer to "the man" and that it has a grass-roots connection to people that allows them to multiply their effectiveness at bringing "people power" to bear. Is there really any truth in that? Although it's a popular meme among advocates, it does sound unlikely.

    For a start, the greater the technological advancement, the more dependent it is on a larger number of underlying functions. That makes it vulnerable not only to someone hitting the kill switch, but to government agents (of whom we can safely assume there are many infiltrated amongst any overthrow plot) sending out false information under the guise of "the people" Whether that's reports saying things are different from what they really are, or sabotaging rallies by sending people tot he wrong place - the problem with believing an anonymous source (on twitter, say) is that they're anonymous: you can never be sure they truly represent who they say they do.

    So, while there is/was obviously some use of the internet by some people in Egypt, I would think that its main effect has been to deliver part of the story to outsiders (whether news organisations or just people) rather than to get things going within the country itself. As such, if the only way we have of getting information is through the internet we naturally (and mistakenly) presume that is also how people inside are getting information, too. There appears to already have been quite enough groundswell without the need for smartphones or websites.

    --
    politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
    1. Re:effect of the 'net overstated? by bogjobber · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I would disagree with you that the main effect of the internet in Egypt has been to deliver news to outsiders. While internet access is blocked now, the use of social media has been instrumental in informing the population and organizing protests for quite a while. See the April 6 Youth Movement. (Sorry, my work blocks most sites so I can't give a more informative reference than that wikipedia article).

      This is a movement that has been years in the making. I imagine a large number of the people involved in the protests (who are largely young, educated people who would have internet access) became interested and involved well before the protests of the last few days.

    2. Re:effect of the 'net overstated? by mad+flyer · · Score: 3, Insightful

      you are in denial or full of shit...

      Just look at what's happening, how it started and how it's being conducted... The net was not shutdown in egypt without reason... Denying it's usefulness as an insurectional tool or saying it lack reliability is just stupidity or attention whoring "HEY look at me ! i'm going against the flow!!!"

      One thing for a start, multiple report from multiple source have more chance to give a good picture than any official newsgroup. It's chaos, propaganda and truth have the same 'timeslot' on the net... it's usually not difficult in these case to see that something is going on, maybe not precisely, but enough to get some part of the big picture...

      I'm getting really tired of smartasses like you, you have nothing of any value to add, just bucket loads of improbable "what if" that you try to pass as reasonable analysis...

    3. Re:effect of the 'net overstated? by dkleinsc · · Score: 4, Informative

      There are 2 reasons Mubarak tried to block Internet access:
      1. It was being used by protesters to coordinate - reporting on where police were concentrated, where people were gathering, etc.
      2. It had this video of a civilian getting shot by police while he was backing away. Mubarak probably thought that by blocking access to the video the Egyptian people wouldn't figure out that the cops had crossed that line.

      It hasn't worked. As a longtime /. sig once put it: The Internet treats censorship as damage and routes around it.

      --
      I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
    4. Re:effect of the 'net overstated? by RCL · · Score: 3, Funny

      (Sorry, my work blocks most sites so I can't give a more informative reference than that wikipedia article).

      Are calls to France cheap at yours?

      --
      Coding etudes
  7. Re:The Cringley article is crap. I want to know MO by bogjobber · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I can't imagine that somebody who set up a wireless mesh network or hacked his satellite TV is going to be very focused on reporting the technical details of what he's doing to the foreign press. There's a revolution happening and the Egyptian government is cracking down hard on protesters.

  8. Re:What's the Catch? by ryzvonusef · · Score: 4, Informative

    Also, the number is probably already blocked.

    If you read their comments there are links to other alternatives, including this interesting link that some how uses cellphones[1], and more people are pitching in.

    Also, they have offered some statistics:

    Some figures:

    The first calls arriving from Egypt (code +20) are seen around 19:30. One every 2 or 3 minutes.

    Rarely more than one simultaneous connection. Most are short-term (probably related to the costs of communications).

    Also saw some other sources (Iraq, Algeria, UAE, among others)

    [1]: http://manalaa.net/dialup

    --
    I am an ACCA student. Got a query on Accountancy/Finance? Maybe I can help!
  9. It's all shades of gray by mangu · · Score: 5, Interesting

    doesn't anyone want to talk about about the fact that the good old US of A is supporting a brutal regime that murders and tortures its own people?

    If the USA didn't support any regime that murders and tortures its own people it would have very few relations to other countries. It's all a matter of proportion. Egypt is less brutal than other countries in that region, they have a relatively moderate stance regarding international relations, they try not to let Muslim radicals do too much harm.

    Don't get me wrong, I think Mubarak should step down, but Obama is right in taking a cautious approach to that crisis.

    1. Re:It's all shades of gray by dachshund · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Egypt is less brutal than other countries in that region, they have a relatively moderate stance regarding international relations, they try not to let Muslim radicals do too much harm.

      This is one way of looking at things. The other is that the local population's views aren't (or at one point, weren't) deemed compatible with the U.S.'s strategic and economic interests in the reason. As a result, it became convenient to ally with a totalitarian regime that overrode those interests.

      In this view, which I believe is pretty well supported by history, Muslim extremists are more of a symptom than a cause of U.S. policy (i.e., if a regime crushes all of its non-violent, secular opponents, sooner or later you'll be left with fanatics who are willing to die for their cause). For a great view on this, look up the history of the U.S. in Iran, and in particular how our Operation Ajax eventually replaced a secular prime minister with a radical Islamic government.

      The one thing I'll offer in "our" defense is that these things are highly path dependent. In other words, our mistakes beget a dictator, which leads to radicalism, which leads to our offering more support to the dictator in order to hold down the radicals --- basically the situation you described in your post. It can be very difficult to untangle yourself from bad decisions made by your predecessors.

      Doesn't mean we shouldn't try --- even as a practical matter (rather than a moral one) these dictatorships in the middle east aren't going to last forever, and the longer we support them the worse it'll be for us when the shit hits.

    2. Re:It's all shades of gray by MrL0G1C · · Score: 4, Interesting

      If the USA didn't support any regime that murders and tortures its own people.......

      It doesn't just support them politically it actually trains their police how to do this: Leaked U.S. Military Manual:

      How to Train Death Squads and Quash Revolutions from San Salvador to Iraq.

      --
      Waterfox - a Firefox fork with legacy extension support, security updates and better privacy by default.
  10. Does this mean... by Okian+Warrior · · Score: 5, Funny

    Does this mean we can get their IPV4 addresses back?

    Just 'sayin

  11. Re:What's the Catch? by commodore6502 · · Score: 5, Informative

    >>>are they charging an arm and a leg? I mean, I know they're Not for Profit, but that doesn't always meant they offer all services free. If they ARE offering it for free... I can't help but wonder what their angle is.
    >>>

    I don't know why you're surprised. DIALUP internet only costs me $7/month. Netzero and Juno offer it for free (see links below). It's not that much of a burden for the Non-profit ISP to offer free access to egyptians.

    And the datarate is only ~30 kbit/s via analog lines, so you could carry over 300 users in the space of one DSL or cable customer.

    http://www.juno.com/start/landing.do?page=www/free/index
    http://isp.netscape.com/

    --
    Information wants to be expensive AND wants to be free. So you have Value vs. Cheap distribution fighting each other.
  12. Re:The Cringley article is crap. I want to know MO by Xyrus · · Score: 5, Funny

    I propose a new protocol: Internet Delivers Information Over Twitter, or I.D.I.O.T for short.

    --
    ~X~
  13. Not the "real" Robert X. Cringely by Simon80 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Mark Stephens and InfoWorld parted ways acrimoniously, and one of the results of that is that they both still use the Robert X. Cringely name. The InfoWorld Cringely is NOT the same author as this one.