How to Maintain Internet Access Even If Your Government Turns It Off

It wouldn't surprise Peacenik at all if the Harper Gov't tried to set up a kill switch for the Internet. He's already allowed the CRTC to make it too expensive for some people to use. So Peacenik is going to file this article away for future reference. And Peacenik is glad Peacenik has some walkies talkies and a citizen's band radio. 10-4

This is a great companion article to the brief article I posted yesterday about the expected increasing growing civil unrest and violence worldwide that will be the fallout from Central Banks' highly inflationary fiat currency devaluation schemes. If mass civil unrest strikes a country, a government may respond by banning internet access and severely restricting information flow. To address this concern, Patrick Miller & David Daw just published an article to let you know how you can maintain your freedom of information even when your government tries to ban this right.

I've reprinted some of the most pertinent excerpts from Get Internet Access When Your Government Shuts it Down, by Patrick Miller & David Daw below. I figured that this information will probably be useful to someone living in a country where the next revolution is brewing.

"Even if you've managed to find an Internet connection for yourself, it won't be that helpful in reaching out to your fellow locals if they can't get online to find you. If you're trying to coordinate a group of people in your area and can't rely on an Internet connection, cell phones, or SMS, your best bet could be a wireless mesh network of sorts--essentially, a distributed network of wireless networking devices that can all find each other and communicate with each other. Even if none of those devices have a working Internet connection, they can still find each other, which, if your network covers the city you're in, might be all you need. At the moment, wireless mesh networking isn't really anywhere close to market-ready, though we have seen an implementation of the 802.11s draft standard, which extends the 802.11 Wi-Fi standard to include wireless mesh networking, in the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) XO laptop."

Read on...

Bracing for New Protests, Iran Issues Media Warning

Does anyone think that world governments aren't watching and taking notes about how the Iranian protests play out. The Internet and cell phones are playing a huge role in keeping the protests going.

Peacenik thinks this bodes very badly for the future of an open Internet. Twitter has become a revolutionary tool. As has texting. Controlling and shutting down Twitter and texting will be part of supressing the protests. How free is the Internet? How easy would it be to shut it down? How secure is it? Peacenik thinks the days of access to things like Twitter and texting may be numbered. And not just in Iran. Peacenik is reading up on smoke signals and carrier pigeons.

Bracing for New Protests, Iran Issues Media Warning

By NAZILA FATHI and ALAN COWELL
Published: June 17, 2009

TEHRAN — In face of a growing official campaign to disrupt channels of dissent with arrests and restrictions, Tehran braced for a third day of defiance by opposition supporters on Wednesday after Iran’s leaders failed to halt huge demonstrations against last week’s disputed election results.

Placed on the defensive by the biggest demonstrations since the Islamic revolution in 1979, the authorities on Tuesday offered a concession to the sustained rage here, saying they would allow a limited recount of the vote — an offer that was resoundingly rejected.

Read on...

The Cable-Cutter Mystery

February 8, 2008

by Justin Raimondo www.antiwar.com

I was skeptical, at first, of speculation over the cutting of two cables linking the Middle East with the Internet, which had it as part of some Vast Neocon Conspiracy to isolate the region prior to a US military assault. However, when two more cables – this time, in the Persian Gulf – were mysteriously cut, I began to wonder …. In a piece headlined "Cable cutter nutters chase conspiracy theories," The Register goes out of its way to laugh off the prospect that what we are witnessing is a military operation, or the prelude to one, sniffing "there's little more than suspicions to work with" since we've yet to reach the damaged cables. Yet, given the sort of government we are dealing with – a regime that lied us into one war, and is not-so-subtly trying to finagle us into yet another one – why shouldn't we be suspicious? We'd have to be crazy not to be. The Economistfollows suit, sneering at "internet conspiracy theories" and denouncing the whole brouhaha as an "online frenzy" that is "way out of line." Yet one has to wonder: four cable cuts in the past week? I'm with Steven Bellovin, a computer science professor at Columbia University, who avers: "As a security guy, I'm paranoid, but I don't understand the threat model here. On the other hand, four accidental failures in a week is a bit hard to swallow, too. Let's hope there will be close, open examination of the failed parts of the cables." First it was supposed to be a ship's anchor that caused the damage, and yet the Egyptians have said there were no ships in the vicinity, which they regularly monitor: besides which, that entire area near Alexandria is off-limits to all shipping. Another reason to suspect a deliberate act: this politically-sensitive region is an Internet choke-point, as ABC News points out. "The route connecting Europe to Egypt, and from there to the Middle East" is tenuous: "Today, just three major data cables stretch from Italy to Egypt and run down the Suez Canal, and from there to much of the Middle East. (A separate line connects Italy with Israel.) A serious cut here is immediately obvious across the region, and a double cut can be crippling." Yet theories that this incident prefigures a US attack on Iran don't comport with the facts: Iran, far from being isolated by the cuts, may have enjoyed better connectivity as a result of the events. The areas hardest hit were Kuwait, Egypt, and especially Pakistan – this last being a likelier target for isolation than Iran, and certainly more current Another, and far more plausible, theory is that the seemingly coordinated cuts resulted from efforts to tap into the cables – a spying operation. Go here for an exhaustive and very convincing case for viewing this as "special warfare." The Register cites Prof. Bellovin, but fails to note the real gist of his remarks. While he's skeptical of the above-cited link, which posits a scenario whereby the USS Jimmy Carter, present whereabouts unknown, uses its specially designed facilities to tap directly into the cables, Bellovin poses an alternative scenario: "If if wasn't a direct attempt at eavesdropping, perhaps it was indirect. Several years ago, a colleague and I wrote about link-cutting attacks. In these, you cut some cables, to force traffic past a link you're monitoring. Link-cutting for such purposes isn't new; at the start of World War I, the British cut Germany's overseas telegraph cable to force them to use easily-monitored links. One of the messages they intercepted — and cryptanalyzed — was the Zimmerman telegram, which asked Mexico to join Germany in attacking the US, in exchange for financial support and recovery of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. Instead, public outrage in the US contributed to the decision to enter the war against Germany." "The problem with this scenario," he adds, "is that the benefit is short-lived: the cables will be repaired in a few weeks." Yes, but long enough to have accomplished – what? We can't know, of course, but Prof. Bellovin certainly raises some interesting possibilities, none of which can be discounted by clueless journalists who sniff at "conspiracy theories" – as if we have no reason whatsoever to suspect covert action, by the US or whomever, in that area of the world. As Prof. Bellovin and a co-author point out in this paper on the subject: "Attacks on the routing system, with the goal of diverting traffic past an enemy-controlled point for purposes of eavesdropping or connection-hijacking, have long been known." Given the context in which these cable cuts are occurring – heightened tensions in the region, and not only with Iran – I think it is probable that they are deliberate, and that the diversion of internet traffic for purposes of eavesdropping is clearly the intent. After all, ask yourself this question: which is more plausible, an "accidental" cutting of four cables in one week in an area of the world which is the current focus of US military and diplomatic efforts, or the scenario outlined by Prof. Bellovin? None of this is at all surprising. The US government currently claims the right to spy on Americans, in their own country, as well as when they're in communication with overseas individuals. They don't hide this, but proclaim it from the rooftops: does anyone doubt they are capable of commandeering the world's internet cable network in order to utilize it for their own purposes? You don't have to quaff the "conspiracy theorist" Kool-Aid to find this credible: a dose of realism will do. punditman says: Rule #1 when looking for the motives of crime: Who stands to benefit?

The Internet and the Anti-War Movement: The Jury is Out

The very fact that you are reading this blog means that at some level, I have faith in the power of the internet to affect positive change. But lately I am beginning to question this belief. In North America, internet penetration approaches 70 %. But maybe this very fact is partially to blame for the lack of concrete citizen action in areas of global importance, such as the war in Iraq.

How on earth, in this incredibly informed and interconnected world can we still put up with the Bush administration calling the shots? The internet is awash with sites outlining the high crimes and misdemeanours of this administration. There is even a book on the topic written by former Nixon White House counsel John Dean of Watergate infamy. Dean spent four months in prison for his role in the Watergate cover-up, so he ought to know a thing or two about corruption and high crime. The fact that there have been no impeachment proceedings launched in the United States, a country built upon the rule of law, speaks volumes about the current political culture. But more to the point it says something about *virtual* power -- or lack thereof.

The web is a great information gathering system, but it sucks at getting people to actually do something with all this knowledge. Fear, of course, is a great motivator to do the following: Keep your mouth shut and mind your keystrokes. According to the OpenNet Initiative, "With respect to online surveillance, the United States may be among the most aggressive states in the world in terms of listening to online conversations." Rebels take note: it is a fact that they are not just listening to Jihadists.

Just because bloggers and internet junkies find the time to write and do research on the internet, not everybody does. Nor do they care to. For most people, computers are a way to forward silly emails to their friends, play games, plan a trip, download music...oh, and let's not forget the all pervasive perusing of porn. Have I missed anything? Check your Inbox. Believe it.

But even if the internet is the new “majority media” there are plenty of sites out there that make the mainstream media look downright sane. There are legions of people who loyally read neo-con and racist blogs. The only saving grace is that they are no more noticeable in the real world than anyone else. Their impact is felt mostly in their acquiescence to power.

Meanwhile, folks everywhere are still glued to CNN (or whatever TV networks in whichever country). The reasons for this are complex, but that’s the damn straight truth, and the advertising dollars tell the story.

What's more, there is an elitist tone, detectable among some lefties and libertarians as they preach to their converted flocks online. The assumption is that anyone who is anyone no longer watches the mainstream media. But the mainstream media, (which they call MSM and expect everyone to know what that stands for), is not all the same and it is not all bad (I say that as a bona fide media critic). Where I live there are some great programs on TV and radio, you just have to sift through the garbage, which is everywhere (but then that’s the way of the internet nowadays as well, perhaps even more so).

Nevertheless, possessing information on government corruption, lies and hidden agendas is apparently not enough to make people act decisively and collectively. The recent resignation of anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan tells the story. Writing about her son Casey, whose death in Iraq galvanized her into a life of real anti-war activism, she states:

Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the next American Idol than how many people will be killed in the next few months while Democrats and Republicans play politics with human lives.

Is all this permeative multi-media--TV, radio, video games, phones with ring tones, downloadable music (which I love), and yes, the blogosphere -- actually a vast, luxurious distraction for us First-Worlders? Even those times when we are getting a good dose of important, inspiring media, our failure to act upon such information means we are really just amusing ourselves--or more likely, others--to death, in some cases quite literally. There's no shortage of hunting and gathering going on. But to what end?

Part of the problem is that it is impossible to be doing two things at the same time.

Occupying real, physical space and taking real action to challenge systems of propaganda, coercion and illegitimacy is more difficult than *virtually* doing it from the confines of one's bedroom.

The old Russian socialist query: "What is to be done?" rings as true today as ever. Strikes, boycotts, sit-ins, massive street demonstrations--yes these are old-fashioned, but they may stand a better chance of actually having an impact than what is happening in the wired, atomized world. They are also more risky and more public for those involved. In countries where the stakes are much higher, citizens appear to have no problem pouring into the streets, and at much greater personal risk. In North America, despite all the internet networking, it still takes months of organizing. Perhaps then, what is needed most, is courage. Courage to use the old methods as well as the new technology more effectively.

In the meantime, punditman says (with more than a touch of irony): *They* have got us right where they want us: seized up in cyberspace, gazing at our navels.