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Ask Slashdot: How To Combat IP-Based Censorship?
An anonymous reader writes "For a while now there has been a lot of buzz on a new proposed censorship scheme in Turkey. The government wants to crack down on freedom of speech and other rights by preventing us from accessing any websites it deems unsuitable. The reasons for that could be criticism of the government, pornography and basically anything a politician might dislike (YouTube is blocked for example — I'm not sure about Google, etc., because I'm bypassing the filter). Right now the state is using DNS-based filtering which can be circumvented with OpenDNS or proxy services which everybody knows about in Turkey. On August 22, however, a new scheme will go into effect that uses IP-based filtering. Bypassing this by any means is illegal, but I wanted to get some opinions on how this could be done without having to set up a VPN server outside of Turkey and using it as a private proxy."
You know, there's not a lot of ways other than VPN and the other ways usually aren't as secure. The last link provided covers most of the bases -- albeit in subpar English. So I guess what I would suggest is you contacting a not-for profit like Garden Networks and ask them to grant Turks the same status as Chinese users in that you don't have to subscribe to use their premium servers. Their gTunnel application seems straight forward and intuitive and appears secure. It appears that users in China, Kuwait and Iran enjoy it so I imagine you shouldn't have any problems either.
... that would be pretty extensive however.
Furthering that idea, you might pass out "awareness" pamphlets while asking for donations to "keep the internet uncensored" and then pay for your pamphlets and donate the rest of that money to Garden Networks. I don't fully know what level of risk that might entail in Turkey, I certainly would not suggest that to a Chinese citizen.
I will say that it is conceivably possible for your government to go insane and block ranges of IP addresses so that you cannot access Garden Network's premium servers or Tor nodes
My work here is dung.
What about using Tor bridges?
https://www.torproject.org/docs/bridges
This is assuming, of course, that simply using encryption will not put you under suspicion.
Palm trees and 8
Bypassing this by any means is illegal
Well, obviously then just about anything you do WILL be illegal. Depending on how well this law is enforced, that could be an acceptable risk or not.
I wanted to get some opinions on how this could be done without having to set up a VPN server outside of Turkey
In your situation, just about any solution is going to involve outside help from SOMEONE. And an outside VPN is as good a solution as any.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
That's why it will be the EU joining Turkey instead.
You seem to be confused about the difference between using Tor and running a Tor exit node. A simple way to think of Tor is as a system that automatically sets up a chain of proxy servers for you, and then builds a new chain periodically (your connections to each proxy are encrypted, so there are many layers of encryption surrounding your connection -- hence "onion routing"). As a user, you connect to an "entry node," and use that node to connect to a "relay node" and ultimately to an "exit node," and from the exit node you connect to whatever it was that you wanted to anonymously connect to. Running an exit node entails the risks that you described, although I hear that the EFF will defend any American citizen who is caught up in such a situation.
Palm trees and 8
Don't be so hard on them. They're just trying to pass the candidate requirements!
Proud member of the Ferengi Socialist Party.
It sound like the Turkish government is beginning to emulate the repressive and regressive moral "leadership" established by the totalitarian Internet regimes in Australia, the US and the UK.
Hey! You get all the free speech you can pay for!
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
"Sounds like citizens of Turkey need to take a more active role in government."
They are doing just that, which is the problem. Democracy is fine, but don't delude yourself that it can't also be used by an Islamist people to produce Islamist government. Consider democratic Iran.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
OpenVPN uses SSL as its encryption layer. No worse performance than visiting an HTTPS site.