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Lawmakers want to ban VPNs

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Re: Lawmakers want to ban VPNs

#211

Post by cedws »

defanor wrote: post #140

> It Won’t Even Work I heard similar sentiments about censorship efforts in Russia, but it does seem to work, unfortunately. So far they have outlawed and blocked major VPN providers (and keep blocking more, including non-commercial ones, like Tor bridges, and foreign hosting companies' websites), blocked major detectable protocols used for those (IPsec, WireGuard), made usage of proxying ("VPN") an aggravating circu…

I think us software people tend to think in absolutes. Yes, completely banning VPNs is very difficult. But for a totalitarian government, reducing VPN usage by say 60% is a win. You only have to make it difficult enough for the layman.

Re: Lawmakers want to ban VPNs

#212

Post by imiric »

defanor wrote: post #140

> It Won’t Even Work I heard similar sentiments about censorship efforts in Russia, but it does seem to work, unfortunately. So far they have outlawed and blocked major VPN providers (and keep blocking more, including non-commercial ones, like Tor bridges, and foreign hosting companies' websites), blocked major detectable protocols used for those (IPsec, WireGuard), made usage of proxying ("VPN") an aggravating circu…

Unless the government decides to ban all cryptography, or forcefully install their own certificates on every device, it should be possible to avoid any restriction attempts. If they're doing deep packet inspection to detect specific protocols, then those can be tunneled via encrypted protocols they do allow, such as TLS or SSH. This is certainly more inconvenient to use, but not impossible.

If they're blocking all traffic beyond their borders, then that's a separate matter, but usually such restrictions are more annoying than absolute.

Re: Lawmakers want to ban VPNs

#213

Post by lucianbr »

martin-t wrote: post #204
hdgvhicv wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Voting doesn’t help. You need to win hearts and minds, and the synergy of resources available between the trillion dollar industries like AI and Marketing and you makes that a losing battle too. People want this stuff. People want ring doorbells, they want age verification, they want government control. Think of the children/criminals/immigrants. Voting won’t help.

Voting doesn't work because people are not smart enough to think multiple steps ahead of people who are professionals at this. Voting doesn't work because everybody votes on everything, not just people who understand the subject matter. Voting doesn't work because it's impossible to express nuanced choice - you vote for a candidate or party as a whole, not on specific policies. The number of parties is much smaller t…

Those are arguments why voting does not produce a perfect outcome. That's different than "voting doesn't work". Using arguments like yours nothing can ever work.

Society is complex and there will always be someone somewhere that can influence an outcome where he/she doesn't understand the subject matter. Hence, nothing works and can ever work.

"Let's just give up" is the only conclusion I can see. Hardly useful.

Can you give an example of something that works by your standards?

Re: Lawmakers want to ban VPNs

#214

Post by lucianbr »

LadyCailin wrote: post #187
slfnflctd wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some would argue that the US is already unrecognizable in many ways, and that there are clear indications this trend will continue.

For sure. And the US looked very different under McCarthyism too, so there’s even precedent. But my point is that there are other prerequisites that have to happen first.

Why is that important? Sounds like saying "well before winter comes, autumn must come first". Yeah duh, so what? Winter is still coming, if anyone cares about it.

Re: Lawmakers want to ban VPNs

#215

Post by _njyk »

imiric wrote: post #212
defanor wrote: post #140

> It Won’t Even Work I heard similar sentiments about censorship efforts in Russia, but it does seem to work, unfortunately. So far they have outlawed and blocked major VPN providers (and keep blocking more, including non-commercial ones, like Tor bridges, and foreign hosting companies' websites), blocked major detectable protocols used for those (IPsec, WireGuard), made usage of proxying ("VPN") an aggravating circu…

Unless the government decides to ban all cryptography, or forcefully install their own certificates on every device, it should be possible to avoid any restriction attempts. If they're doing deep packet inspection to detect specific protocols, then those can be tunneled via encrypted protocols they do allow, such as TLS or SSH. This is certainly more inconvenient to use, but not impossible. If they're blocking all tr…

Technically it's easy to come around restrictions (for example, where I live, RT.com is fully censored "to protect me").

But from a lawmaker perspective, the topic is not technical.

The question, at the end, is about the enforcement of the punishments that go with circumvention; and in some places there is punishment even when you are "just" trying to circumvent these restrictions.

It's easy to break-in into someone's place. What prevents you from doing it, is the punishment (and potentially ethics), not the physical barrier.

Re: Lawmakers want to ban VPNs

#216

Post by Gud »

colechristensen wrote: post #174
forgotoldacc wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every country that has slid into North Korea style total control begins with a "it won't happen here. And it'd stop before it gets that bad."

>Every country that has slid into North Korea style total control begins with a "it won't happen here. And it'd stop before it gets that bad." This is a pretty bold claim and I'm not sure it matches up with reality. Karl Marx said that in the first stage of communism there would be a required period of dictatorial control in order to transition from and dismantle capitalist institutions. This is exactly what happened…

Not really, because pre-Soviet Union wasn’t a capitalist society.

Russia and China were barely industrial nations.

Re: Lawmakers want to ban VPNs

#217

Post by ndriscoll »

hellotheretoday wrote: post #127
duxup wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think putting parents in control is the right path, but will reveal a sad fact. Many parents aren't taking time to be in control, and no amount of legislation will fix that.

This is 100% the response. I work with kids in mental health and the “kick the can to the parents” response is so shortsighted Apple and android controls aren’t that difficult to understand. Roblox parental controls aren’t that difficult to understand. Could it be simpler by unifying these things under one framework? Sure - I’ve worked with tons of parents who fall under the trap that Roblox is safe because they set…

Android doesn't have parental controls, does it? The closest thing I'm aware of is Family Link, which is a Google service that requires parent and child to have a Google account.

Re: Lawmakers want to ban VPNs

#220

Post by motohagiography »

ive been invovled in privacy for decades and not once has anyone named the parties behind the bills or authors of it, or who lobbies and uses leverage over lawmakers to push these bills through.

they are persistent and have continuity through generations, organize across borders, influence manufacturers and even pressure individual developers.

tech doesnt secure privacy. finding these people and calling them out directly might.

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