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Staying ahead of censors in 2025

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Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025

#111

Post by hdgvhicv »

asacrowflies wrote: post #100
hdgvhicv wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

American views on “free speech” are not global, both in terms of what’s banned and in terms of what’s not banned.

This has been a long held "western" value. Especially in the context of West vs Russia Iran North Korea etc. this rapid increase over the past few years in draconian enforcement of absurd thought control can not be explained away by such a shallow statement. ESPECIALLY the uk. Most of the American bill of rights and early constitutional amendment where based on centurys old English common law values just as much as t…

Hate speech has not been tolerated in the U.K. for many years. Other subversive speech hasn’t been tolerated in many counties, from nazi worship to glorifying terror, from obscenity to copyright.

America bans Harry Potter, in the past The U.K. banned Lady Chatterly, Germany bans nazi worship but America is quite happy with it.

Just because an american view on what is and isn’t acceptable exists doesn’t mean others have that same view.

Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025

#112

Post by kolektiv »

jmnicolas wrote: post #105
widdershins wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> almost anything now can be interpreted as 'offensive' or 'hate speech' I only know about the UK, but this is not really true there. Your speech has to be obviously threatening or abusive, and obviously motivated by prejudice towards one of a few categories (disability, race, religion, gender identity or sexual orientation are the main ones). If you don't make threatening or abusive remarks towards these groups, you…

"Abusive" and "threatening" is "in the eye of the beholder".

Well, no, more accurately, when it comes to it, it's in the eyes of a judge (or a jury in some cases). You can have all kinds of arguments about validity of arrests, of prosecutions, etc., but it's still fundamentally a system where you'll be charged with an offence and then either convicted or not.

I don't know of a single case (and don't believe anyone can point to one) where people have been arrested for simply criticising politicians. Has the number of incidents risen over recent years? Yes, and while this might be partly explained by stricter legal approaches, I suspect it's much more to do with a drastic rise in far-right activity and a consequent feeling among many that they can now say/do whatever they like with impunity (including making threatening and inflammatory remarks about minorities, and so on).

Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025

#113

Post by iTCart »

The "Mimicry" Angle (Best for technical discussion) The shift from "obfuscation" to "mimicry" is the real story here. In 2025, "random-looking" traffic is itself a signature for DPI. Tools like WebTunnel that mimic standard HTTPS/SNI and Conjure that hides in unused ISP space force censors into a "collateral damage" dilemma: they can't block Tor without breaking their own web.

Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025

#114

Post by vbezhenar »

throwfaraway135 wrote: post #17

Considering the staggering number of arrest for online/offensive communications in England & Wales, we should add Britain to the list of Russia and Iran 2017: ~5,500 arrests 2019: ~7,734 arrests 2023: ~12,183 arrests

What are numbers for Russia and Iran?

Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025

#115

Post by curtisblaine »

thrance wrote: post #93
curtisblaine wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> demands for more taxations That would be "eat the rich"? It looks like more demand for homicide and cannibalism, at least at a face value. > free speech is a liberal value That is a really nice definition that allows your side to say whatever they want, but the other side to have their speech restricted. It looks like "free speech" because you say it is, but of course it is not. > but calling for genocide is and sh…

> That would be "eat the rich"? It looks like more demand for homicide and cannibalism, at least at a face value. Very bad faith interpretation. You know full well that's not what is meant when this phrase is employed. > That is a really nice definition that allows your side to say whatever they want, but the other side to have their speech restricted. It looks like "free speech" because you say it is, but of course…

> Very bad faith interpretation. You know full well that's not what is meant when this phrase is employed.

I hope you're willing to extend this charitable way of interpreting intentions to the hyperboles made by the far right in their slogans. What if a anti-immigration group came out with the "eat the aliens" slogan? Should they be allowed to chant that? Make signs?

> Should we extend free speech to groups actively trying to suppress it

Again, it cuts two ways. Should we extend free speech to groups trying to suppress public discourse by deplatformimg, cancelling and banning people they don't like from speaking in campuses?

> You're completely muddying the waters, you know what is a genocide. And throwing in a line about trans people for some reasons

I only mentioned trans people because not believing their self appointed sexual identity was famously equated to erasing and genociding them. As you see, the waters are indeed very muddy. You see them clear just because you already made up your mind about what kind of speech you want to allow and what kind of speech you want to ruthlessly ban.

Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025

#116

Post by simonjgreen »

OtherShrezzing wrote: post #102
throwfaraway135 wrote: post #17

Considering the staggering number of arrest for online/offensive communications in England & Wales, we should add Britain to the list of Russia and Iran 2017: ~5,500 arrests 2019: ~7,734 arrests 2023: ~12,183 arrests

>2023: ~12,183 arrests These numbers are for _all_ arrests under the Malicious Communications Act in that year. So while that category includes arrests for tweets, it also includes all arrests for any offensive communications via an internet-enabled device. So it'd include arrests for domestic abuse where at least one component of the abuse was through WhatsApp. Similarly, it can include just about any arrest where t…

I’m not sure why you are being downvoted, this is a critically important point. Context is king, numbers alone are unhelpful

Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025

#117

Post by vbezhenar »

mmsc wrote: post #2

Does anybody know what the situation is like in China these days? What's the most commonly used tool for proxying now? Does basically all network leaving China still get ratelimited at a few megabytes per second?

I visited China last year. I had a lot of issues accessing some known VPN services. My main tool to avoid censorship was using my foreign roaming and then I used VLESS on my VPS. Both approaches worked for me.

I'm not sure about rate limited by few megabytes per second, as I had rate limits like few bytes per second, when I tried to use ssh as a proxy. Few megabytes per seconds sounds like a perfect connectivity to me.

Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025

#118

Post by hkt »

kolektiv wrote: post #112
jmnicolas wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Abusive" and "threatening" is "in the eye of the beholder".

Well, no, more accurately, when it comes to it, it's in the eyes of a judge (or a jury in some cases). You can have all kinds of arguments about validity of arrests, of prosecutions, etc., but it's still fundamentally a system where you'll be charged with an offence and then either convicted or not. I don't know of a single case (and don't believe anyone can point to one) where people have been arrested for simply cr…

Not exactly a judge or jury. IIRC a common law assault can go on with only the subjective experience of threat. Hard to prove, but the bar is not objective. See:

https://sentencingcouncil.org.uk/resources/common-offences/a...

That is by no means the only crime that is committed subjectively.

Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025

#119

Post by _k2vp »

mmsc wrote: post #2

Does anybody know what the situation is like in China these days? What's the most commonly used tool for proxying now? Does basically all network leaving China still get ratelimited at a few megabytes per second?

Currently in China (as a visitor). Wireguard literally just works (to a VPS). Mullvad works as a commercial provider, just slower. Xray-core (vless, Trojan) if you're paranoid. I have my own proxy over syncthing relays https://github.com/acheong08/syndicate which I use to proxy to my home in the UK (residential IP) without exposing any ports.

I get rate limited to around 10mbps in Chongqing. Was slightly higher in Beijing.

Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025

#120

Post by kolektiv »

JuniperMesos wrote: post #54
earthnail wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That comparison is not only highly inaccurate, it’s also harmful in that it distracts from the real problem at hand. Putin and Khamenei are ruthless, brutal dictators. You don’t need to like Starmer, but he’s none of that. He’s a proper democrat. The implication that they’re all somewhat the same delegitimises democracies and legitimises these dictators. That’s how they win. I personally don’t think UK’s age verifica…

> Putin and Khamenei are ruthless, brutal dictators. You don’t need to like Starmer, but he’s none of that. He’s a proper democrat. The implication that they’re all somewhat the same delegitimises democracies and legitimises these dictators. That’s how they win. Someone who is a citizen of the UK who has no connection to Iran or Russia is legitimately much more concerned with the ways in which Starmer governs the UK,…

> a democratically-elected official can wield the power of the state against you and harm your interests just as much as a dictator can

Really? Can they? Because in a functioning democracy you generally have recourse to courts, tertiary adjudication of various forms, a (relatively) free press that you can try and interest in taking up your story, etc. In a brutal dictatorship you're likely to have none of those, and to go missing in the night if you try and suggest that you should.

It's absolutely right to oppose politicians you disagree with - that's what political engagement is all about! But beyond a certain level, hyperbole (and the general sense of "they're all the same") simply does serve to undermine not just democracy, but any rationale for political engagement vs. simple rioting.

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