Egypt Cuts the Net, Net Fights Back

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)."

Comments

Re:Toto...?!

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

effect of the 'net overstated?

[petes_PoV]

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.

Re:effect of the 'net overstated?

[dkleinsc]

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.

Re:What's the Catch?

[ryzvonusef]

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

It's all shades of gray

[mangu]

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.

Re:It's all shades of gray

[dachshund]

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.

Re:It's all shades of gray

[MrL0G1C]

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.

Does this mean...

[Okian Warrior]

Does this mean we can get their IPV4 addresses back?

Just 'sayin

Re:What's the Catch?

[commodore6502]

>>>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/

Re:The Cringley article is crap. I want to know MO

[Xyrus]

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