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Egyptian 'Net Killed By Intimidation, Not a Switch

Posted by Soulskill on from the break-that-router-or-i'll-break-you dept.

jfruhlinger writes "In the wake of the Egyptian revolution of the past weeks, much tech buzz has focused on the 'kill switch' that Mubarak's government used to try to stop Internet-based networking. The New York Times gives the details. As blogger Kevin Fogarty points out, the process involved less high-tech derring do and more intimidation of tech workers by regime thugs."

6 of 126 comments (clear)

  1. Not Surprising by kevinNCSU · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You don't need a kill switch when you have people with guns. Anyone who's willing to stand up to that is already in the streets protesting, not standing around maintaining the network.

    1. Re:Not Surprising by __aaxtnf2500 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Perhaps there are personnel working at those telco's that understand that information is more powerful than a brick thrown at a police officer.

    2. Re:Not Surprising by commodore6502 · · Score: 1, Insightful

      >>>That information is only powerful if people are willing to stand up for it.

      There are many Egyptian Telco workers who think, 'If the government tells me to shutdown the ISP connection, I will obey, because the government knows best.' - These are the same types you find in the EU or US who say it's okay for the SA officers to stick hands down passengers' pants (i.e. grope penises) and touch women's breasts.* They think it's okay if the government does it.

      *
      *Pour-out baby's milk in the trash.
      *Lock people in glass cages.
      *Have men remove urine/feces bags & dump contents on the floor.
      *Ask women to remove mastectomy bras. And on and on.

      --
      Information wants to be expensive AND wants to be free. So you have Value vs. Cheap distribution fighting each other.
    3. Re:Not Surprising by kevinNCSU · · Score: 4, Insightful

      One million tweets is more powerful than a brick.

      First of all I think that's highly debatable if not flat out false. I think we like to believe that because that's what we see over here, and that's what stirs a lot of passion over here, but at the end of the day, even when the internet WAS shut off, it's the people with piles of bricks holding the square and responding to low-tech alarms of clacking two steel rods together to cause people to rush to the defense in order to continue to hold the square that won the day. If tweets were more powerful then bricks then justin beiber (sp?) fans would be running the world. But the truth is the tweets are only as powerful so far as their ability to incite, organize and deploy said bricks. In that they have a use, but there are other methods to do such things.

      I think the problem with your statement that the revolutionary telco employee should stay to defend the networks comes down to basic force deployment strategy. Not every member of the telco is going to be willing to fight. If he makes his stand there alone he's just going to get locked up or shot because chances are every member of the police force or group of thugs that show up to turn the internet off WILL be willing to fight. Therefore he's far better abandoning his indefensible location and banding together with the handful of employees from every other teclo and business across the city thereby concentrating their forces into a size large enough to hold ground and force change. If the telco is truly THAT important it would be easy to convince the larger force to move in and defend it. It seems however they decided the main square was far more appropriate.

    4. Re:Not Surprising by BCGlorfindel · · Score: 3, Insightful

      There are many Egyptian Telco workers who think, 'If the government tells me to shutdown the ISP connection, I will obey, because the government knows best.' - These are the same types you find in the EU or US who say it's okay for the SA officers to stick hands down passengers' pants (i.e. grope penises) and touch women's breasts.* They think it's okay if the government does it.

      Your experience in a free country doesn't translate quite so well to a dictatorship. The Egyptian Telco workers also think "If the government tells me to shutdown the ISP connection, I will obey, because the government will jail or possibly kill me and my family if I don't".

      Don't marginalize the position and plight of those under repressive dictatorships by pretending it's akin to your own struggles in a free country. By all means fight to keep your country free. By all means point out measures in your free country that can lead to suppression and tyranny. By all means stand up against those measures. Just don't do it on the backs of those like the Egyptians fighting a very different and much harder conflict.

  2. Is anyone surprised ? by mbone · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Is anyone really surprised by this ? However, I don't think it was just as simple as sending over a bunch of goons - or even a "Brooks Brother's Riot."

    The Egypt Internet cutoff was technically done by stopping the BGP (Border Gateway Protocol) announcement of most Egyptian address blocks. BGP itself was not taken down, and the circuits themselves did not alarm. This was most likely not achieved by cutting cords or unplugging routers (which would have downed BGP, at the least). Pulling the plug, any general can do, but most generals don't know anything about BGP.

    My guess is that there was a contingency plan for this (maybe as a military defense measure), that that plan took some thought by a technically savvy person, but, having a plan, it probably wasn't much more than a few phone calls to execute it. This can be compared to Burma (which really did just pull the plug - the link light was lost at the other end).