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The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

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Re: The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

#71

Post by keyme »

missedthecue wrote: post #70
keyme wrote: post #63

Air dropping starlink terminals onto protesters is the solution. In fact, if you live anywhere outside of the US, owning one "just in case" is good for future proofing your freedom, IMHO. Kind of like being armed. Edit: in fact, starlink v2 global LTE-from-space coverage will be a true game changer for world freedom. We can only hope this comes to be sooner rather than later.

Until having a starlink terminal on your roof becomes punishable by death. You can try to hide them visually, but Iran could always detect them electronically if they want to put in the effort.

Half the households in Iran have an illegal satellite dish on the roof to receive disallowed TV from abroad.

This is punishable and does get punished (rarely, I hear). Doesn't deter anyone.

Edit: it will also be quite difficult to detect electronically, judging by the fact that even Russia fails to jam these signals on the battlefield.

Re: The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

#72

Post by nonrandomstring »

DeathArrow wrote: post #50
killjoywashere wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is the neo-liberals of Silicon Valley, who essentially adopt a policy of splendid isolation, have failed to protect democracy.

Since when was their job to protect democracy?

Since the basis of their entire project [1] was given to them as the output of an obscure DARPA project ostensibly aimed at securing democracy in the world. It's not written into a contract, just a sorta "moral obligation" to, you know... not shit on the values of the people who put you where you are.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet

Re: The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

#73

Post by killjoywashere »

DeathArrow wrote: post #50
killjoywashere wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is the neo-liberals of Silicon Valley, who essentially adopt a policy of splendid isolation, have failed to protect democracy.

Since when was their job to protect democracy?

Since they claim US citizenship. Citizenship is a bit more than your token to ride the bus.

Re: The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

#74

Post by modeless »

keyme wrote: post #71
missedthecue wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Until having a starlink terminal on your roof becomes punishable by death. You can try to hide them visually, but Iran could always detect them electronically if they want to put in the effort.

Half the households in Iran have an illegal satellite dish on the roof to receive disallowed TV from abroad. This is punishable and does get punished (rarely, I hear). Doesn't deter anyone. Edit: it will also be quite difficult to detect electronically, judging by the fact that even Russia fails to jam these signals on the battlefield.

Satellite TV dishes don't transmit. Jamming and detection are very different.

Re: The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

#75

Post by keyme »

modeless wrote: post #74
keyme wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Half the households in Iran have an illegal satellite dish on the roof to receive disallowed TV from abroad. This is punishable and does get punished (rarely, I hear). Doesn't deter anyone. Edit: it will also be quite difficult to detect electronically, judging by the fact that even Russia fails to jam these signals on the battlefield.

Satellite TV dishes don't transmit. Jamming and detection are very different.

TV dishes transmit very clearly in the visible light spectrum :)

As for TX detection, you'd be surprised. Directional signals like starlink uplink are fairly hard to detect.

Re: The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

#76

Post by vbezhenar »

novok wrote: post #61
vbezhenar wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it means that state firewalls will just block all CDNs.

The idea is you force them to choose the entire effective internet or nothing, which is not an economic self own even most dictatorships are willing to make. These firewalls are an exercise in having your cake and eating it too.

CDNs are not entire effective internet.

Also I'm not well-educated in that area, but I would expect that CDNs would allocate dedicated IP ranged for big customers like Microsoft or Apple. So state can ban more selectively, white-listing those ranges.

Re: The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

#77

Post by saurik »

novok wrote: post #61
vbezhenar wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it means that state firewalls will just block all CDNs.

The idea is you force them to choose the entire effective internet or nothing, which is not an economic self own even most dictatorships are willing to make. These firewalls are an exercise in having your cake and eating it too.

But it doesn't end there... they block the CDN that implements this feature, and then the CDN's customers--who probably didn't care much about the benefits this gives to some of their users but are now losing access to some large customer base--start complaining and migrating off the CDN, which results in the CDN pulling back on the feature.

And we know this is what will happen as this is effectively what happened with domain fronting--where you simply use the wrong SNI instead of hiding it entirely--with all the large CDNs actively "fixing" this feature to prevent their customer's websites from being blocked by firewalls because of users who were using this to get around hostname restrictions.

Re: The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

#78

Post by vbezhenar »

whatsthatabout wrote: post #4

Pretty crazy that a country can just completely block all internet outside of what they want to be accessible... One app that came to my mind reading this is Briar [1] - no real internet required, can connect to other briar participants via bluetooth and WiFi. Sadly only for Android... [1] https://briarproject.org

Why would I want to connect to other briar participants? I want to connect to hacker news. It might be useful for terrorists or protesters, but for ordinary people - not sure.

Re: The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

#79

Post by keyme »

Another idea: create an easy way to set up pirate LTE base stations.

Hacked femtocells? SDR? Something more clever?

Distribute eSIMs to everyday people.

The pirate operator takes all the risk and technical difficulties.

Re: The Iran Firewall: A preliminary report

#80

Post by hot_gril »

xhevahir wrote: post #34
hot_gril wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard neocon many times, always in a different context. As far as I'm concerned, the word has no meaning.

I don't see how it's any less meaningful than "liberal," or "conservative." Each of these terms labels a set of family resemblances and is dependent on context.

"Liberal" is at least a really imprecise synonym for Democrat party in the US, ditto for "conservative" and Republican.
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