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Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

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Re: Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

#311

Post by toast0 »

jacobush wrote: post #274
toast0 wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not apparent from the article if phone calls are blocked. It's probably not cheap, and it's certainly easy to track, but you can run data over international voice calls. Probably works better on a real landline, but should work a bit over mobile too.

You'd have to know a modem pool to call and have an account there, I wouldn't even know where to start. Especially if I was already cut off from the Internet.

The question was asking about prep work that could have been done. Now is the time to print out some modem pools and get an account ;)

However, if you know someone technical out of the country, you can call them and ask them to set something up and get you the details. (Or you can't call them, and there you go).

If you're talking with people on things like Signal or WhatsApp, where phone numbers are user ids, you automatically know their phone number to call them in case the chat service is unreachable.

Re: Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

#312

Post by yellowapple »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #271
yellowapple wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like it'd be pretty straightforward to block signals coming from the side (e.g. by putting some metal or something else similarly RF-blocking between the antenna and the jammer), no? Kinda like how wearing a hat helps keep the sun out of your eyes. Actively jamming the jammer (i.e. inverting the signal received from the jammer side and rebroadcasting on the the antenna side) would help, too, though this probabl…

> Seems like it'd be pretty straightforward to block signals coming from the side (e.g. by putting some metal or something else similarly RF-blocking between the antenna and the jammer), no? Depends on the wavelength and your surroundings. Imagine yourself wearing a cap that's little too small and half-transparent on the edges, walking on fresh snow, surrounded by snow mounds, trying to spot something on one of the h…

> Imagine yourself wearing a cap that's little too small and half-transparent on the edges, walking on fresh snow, surrounded by snow mounds, trying to spot something on one of the hilltops nearby. So the cap mostly protects you from direct jamming signal, but reflections and bleed are still painful.

The usual answer, then, would be a polarized filter and a more narrow aperture (e.g. goggles). The narrower the FOV, the less risk of glare.

That does mean an antenna will have to actively keep itself pointed at a moving point in the sky, but with GPS, a compass, a clock, and each satellite's orbital parameters, that should be a solvable problem.

The harder problem would be for the satellite to pick out the signal coming back from the ground without having to limit itself to a single ground station.

Re: Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

#313

Post by JohnFen »

input_sh wrote: post #247
JohnFen wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe that the only way the US could legally do that is by exerting control over up/downlink stations that are in US jurisdiction. I'm assuming that things like Starlink will have up and downlink stations in places outside of the US as well as inside. Extralegally, though? All bets are off.

You're making an assumption that Starlink will fight a nudge by the US government instead of quietly complying.

I'm not, really. That's why I added my "all bets are off" comment.

Re: Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

#314

Post by hutzlibu »

lostmsu wrote: post #307
hutzlibu wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The relevant question for the people living there is allways: but is it better tody? And it seems, no.

You never know who gets the power after a tyranny is removed. However, if you want tyranny to go, you have to gamble.

But the chances of a smooth transition are higher if the people of the country mange that by themself, instead of foreign forced change, where many suspect the motives are different.

Re: Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

#315

Post by cheese4242 »

anigbrowl wrote: post #253
cheese4242 wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what will the UN do if we chose not to comply because the original intent of said convention is now being abused as an excuse for mass third-world immigration? No, I'm serious, what will the UN, a cabal of unelected bureaucrats who I have never voted for, do to my country if we don't comply with said convention?

Treaties like are predicated on the will of the signatories to sanction each other for non-compliance, which can take subtle or overt forms. While that by itself is no guarantee of change, it may be that you have underestimated the depth of others' political feelings on the topic.

In other words, the worse that will happen is strongly-worded letter from timid bureaucrats.

Re: Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

#316

Post by dane-pgp »

cheese4242 wrote: post #223
anigbrowl wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Utter BS, a specious argument we've heard a million times before (often from Larry, who has been here a long time). You should go for a more subtle sty;e, right wing trolls are always endorsing pithiness, perhaps because of Andrew Anglin's fondness for that adjective in his Daily Stormer trolling guides. I'm sure you would not wish to be mistaken for keeping such noisome company.

Sounds like you are the expert. Will have to take your word on it. It's interesting phenomena though, isn't it? Those who praise diversity and immigration the loudest are often those most insulated from it. Why is that? Why don't those people move to those diverse, ethnic neighborhoods they claim to love so much? They seem to only care for the abstract idea of it all, not the reality.

> Those who praise diversity and immigration the loudest are often those most insulated from it.

Do you have any data to support that assertion? Someone could claim just as confidently that the people most comfortable with diversity and immigration are those who have had (assumedly positive) exposure to it. That would seem just as valid a hypothesis, except there is actually some evidence that supports it, at least in one political context:

http://theconversation.com/hard-evidence-how-areas-with-low-...

Re: Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

#317

Post by mschuster91 »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #272
mschuster91 wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such antennas however are an easy target for rockets, grenades, IEDs, car bombs... in a riot situation good luck defending the jammers.

What kind of protests are you imagining? With that kind of ordnance in use, it's no longer a protest but an all-out civil war.

Let's face it these things will be used mostly in situations which can at best be described that way. France's Yellow Vests, Hongkong, China and whatever is happening in India at the moment.

Re: Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

#318

Post by yellowapple »

lloeki wrote: post #263
yellowapple wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, sorry, "electromagnetic radiation amplified and collimated in the same manner as a laser does to visible light". Better?

Like beamforming, or something more extreme like a maser? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beamforming https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maser

A maser's what I had in mind, but either would likely work reasonably well.

Re: Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

#319

Post by sangnoir »

cheese4242 wrote: post #220
sangnoir wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the US were providing adequately for its victims, the Middle East taking in their fellow Muslims, and China showing some semblance of humanity in offering a home to some, we wouldn't be seeing the rise of nationalism in Europe that we now are. I don't think you can pin the rise of nationalism solely on migration - non-European countries are also experiencing sharp increase in (right-wing) nationalism - including…

> I don't think you can pin the rise of nationalism solely on migration - non-European countries are also experiencing sharp increase in (right-wing) nationalism - including the US which you noted hasn't bourne the social cost. Hold on. The US has also seen massive demographic change due to migration (just not from migrations from the Middle East). Indeed there have been US politicians and other mainstream figures op…

Immigration into the US from central & south America has been steadily going down for years now. The demographic change is mostly due to differences in birthrates, not even whittling down immigration to 0 will change this.

Re: Iraq blocks Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram, shuts down internet

#320

Post by stefek99 »

Just from the past couple of months:

• Kashmir: https://netblocks.org/reports/pakistan-shuts-down-internet-i...

• Russia: https://netblocks.org/reports/evidence-of-internet-disruptio... • Bangladesh: https://www.economist.com/news/2019/09/04/bangladesh-bans-mo...

• Sudan: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/06/13/end-mass-...

• London: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/london-tube-...

"Shutting down digital infrastructure in response to a peaceful protest is deeply authoritarian," said Griff Ferris, legal and policy officer at Big Brother Watch."

I've heard they did not shut down internet in Hong Kong as lots of mainland China is routed via Hong Kong...

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