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Briar keeps Iran connected via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when the internet goes dark

briarproject.org

181–190 of 390 posts

Re: Briar keeps Iran connected via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when the internet goes dark

#181

This should be a lesson for all of us. We should start building and maintaining lightweight mesh networks, just in case. We shouldn't take the world of cooperating ISPs and Meta and Cloudflare and Google and AWS for granted.

But also because it seems fun in the meantime. In fact a state that doesn't plan to turn off the internet should probably want a cohort of amateur radio operators ready to turn into a signals corps.

Maybe in the battlefields of the future we'll be fighting with lorawan cyberdecks rescued from desk drawers, and meshtastic hackers will be the equivalent of fighter pilot aces.

On that topic, I'm in this thread hoping to hear about how anyone got into resilient mesh networks and what they're doing with them now (outside of overthrowing the Ayatollah).

Re: Briar keeps Iran connected via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when the internet goes dark

#182

This should be a lesson for all of us. We should start building and maintaining lightweight mesh networks, just in case. We shouldn't take the world of cooperating ISPs and Meta and Cloudflare and Google and AWS for granted.

I built a basic LoRa network so I could send data from my washing machine in the apartment cellar to my Home Assistant box in my apartment several floors up. It very much did occur to me that the technologies/skills I was learning would also be useful to create a decentralized mesh network for general communication.

Re: Briar keeps Iran connected via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when the internet goes dark

#183
post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> looks like the current administration may be seeking violent unrest in the hopes of delaying elections Civil war requires two militaries. Tiananmen Square wasn’t a civil war.

Not wrong, but don't forget there are many militias with itchy trigger fingers all over the political spectrum here, though admittedly some parties have more affiliated with them than others. It's not a stretch to assume should fighting in the streets escalate beyond ICE shenanigans that larger armies would not quickly congeal from the pocket groups and individuals.

> there are many militias with itchy trigger fingers all over the political spectrum here

That’s still not a civil war in the conventional sense. If it gets entrenched and coördinated it could be come something we’ll debate, e.g. the Troubles. But insurgency != civil war.

Re: Briar keeps Iran connected via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when the internet goes dark

#184

This should be a lesson for all of us. We should start building and maintaining lightweight mesh networks, just in case. We shouldn't take the world of cooperating ISPs and Meta and Cloudflare and Google and AWS for granted.

How is Ukraine doing this? I suppose Starlink isn't available to everyone.

Re: Briar keeps Iran connected via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when the internet goes dark

#185

Too bad Briar and similar anonymous E2E messengers would be banned soon across the EU and UK.

"We can't have the tax-cattle talking behind our backs about our failures and corruption that fucked up their living standards .. err I mean think of what the far right, pedos and russian spies could do with anonymous messaging, so we'll be banning it to protect our democratic values."

- EU & UK leadership

Re: Briar keeps Iran connected via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when the internet goes dark

#186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude. Back in 2014 when briar or something similar came up, we found the app.needed to signed in "online" first then it could be used offline. There were apps used in 2019 but it wasnt enough. The government "banned" 14 appps including element "because use by terrorists" meant anyone using element after the ban got a loud knock on the door by the stazi with 100-300 personnel, fully ready to engage in battle. Have see…

That was Bridgefy that required initial online access to setup. Briar doesn't and never has. Traceability of Briar users, if not the actual content, is certainly potentially worse than something like what Bitchat claims (don't use Bitchat it's provably not secure or private at all) with it's traffic obfuscation and multihop. However, the lack of multihop also makes it less promiscuous, so someone would have to be mon…

that's why its difficult to trust these apps? i've been out of the game for years and i would rather be on the fence about the whole thing.

the problem i saw back in 2019 was adoption. it just happened suddenly and the scaremongering done by the government was top notch. literally any anti-government tweet or post was "deemed social media misuse", how dare you question the might of the great nation.

https://thewire.in/rights/kashmir-fir-vpn-social-media this is fresh "misuse".

what i am saying is, in that heated environment, no one wanted to be the one holding the short straw so this tech did not play out, simply out of personal safety.

few years ago we had clubhouse and https://kashmirlife.net/sleuths-silently-listen-to-clubhouse...

which someone like me knew "out of habit" so i didn't even try the app but people did and paid the price.

Re: Briar keeps Iran connected via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when the internet goes dark

#187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> the left cant even fight New York and California have enough GDP, weapons factories and in-state fissile materials to make a civil war at least interesting. (They’re also both primed to land foreign armies on their shores and air strips). In repression, guns and muscles count. In a civil war, they’re as effective as Maduro’s guard was.

[flagged]

Re: Briar keeps Iran connected via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi when the internet goes dark

#188

Take heed, Americaneez -- and prepare, because this may be in your future sooner than prediction markets would have you believe [1]. LoRa mesh networking seems like the runner-up, but vague reports indicate (Meshtastic) doesn't handle crowds well. I think Bitchat can use Meshtastic, so a LoRa radio paired with a phone could be a base for not just texting individuals, but community messaging. 1: https://polymarket.com…

Not to side track too much from this discussion, but I looked at that PolyMarket event: "US civil war before 2027?" Currently, it is priced at 91.3 USD cents for No. If you bet 100 USD, the payout for No will be 109.43. That is very good return -- ~9.5% for 12 months of lending (as PolyMarket required full payment at the time of trade). That is twice the (retail) risk free rate at the moment. I am actually tempted to…

It's similar to selling options out of the money. You get compensated because nobody likes to pick up pennies in front of a steamroller.
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