Re: [soac-mapo] Background info?

[Evan Leibovitch <evan@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Andrei.

On 30 August 2010 02:35, Andrei Kolesnikov <andrei@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

 Dear Evan, there is no such things as global blocking of some
> URLs/IPs/Content in Russia.
>

Indeed. The Economist article indicated that the efforts listed were
regional, and not completely successful.

I use them as examples of the desires of politicians, bureaucrats and
theocrats to block undesirable pieces of the web. It also demonstrates that
MAPO (and specifically the PO part in this case) can be broadly interpreted
by some political leaders as means to suppress opposition.



> There is no central system nor technical possibility. There is no central
> proxy/filter lists.
>


Don't take it personally. The examples were only that, examples. The
practice is well-used if not (yet) widespread. And, as you have pointed out,
some of the blocking is done by regions whose presence as ICANN stakeholders
is negligible if existent at all.



> Sometimes attempts to block occurs as local court decision  in far away
> regions out of judge’s knowledge on how internet works. All these cases
> listed in Economist, but none have been implemented . Blocking *only* by
> domain name - technically useless.
>

It's all relative. The blockers do not have to be incredibly sophisticated
-- they only need to be more sophisticated than those to whom they are
trying to block access. Determined and knowledgeable people can get around
most such circumventions, but I would suggest that such people constitute a
rather small and elite segment of the population. While such elites play
cat-and-mouse with the government technicians, most of the populace remains
blocked.

Do your parents know what an IP address is? Must they?

- Evan


On 30 August 2010 02:35, Andrei Kolesnikov <andrei@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

 Dear Evan, there is no such things as global blocking of some
> URLs/IPs/Content in Russia.
>

Indeed. The Economist article indicated that the efforts listed were
regional, and not completely successful.

I use them as examples of the desires of politici



> There is no central system nor technical possibility. There is no central
> proxy/filter lists. Sometimes attempts to block occurs as local court
> decision  in far away regions out of judge’s knowledge on how internet
> works. All these cases listed in Economist, but none have been implemented .
> Blocking *only* by domain name - technically useless.  The only way to
> completely control / filter the net -  turn off the light.
>
> MAPO issue is a design of the process to make politicians happy. It has
> nothing to do with technology.
>
>
>
> --andrei
>
>
>
> *From:* owner-soac-mapo@xxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-soac-mapo@xxxxxxxxx] *On
> Behalf Of *Evan Leibovitch
> *Sent:* Thursday, August 26, 2010 9:23 PM
> *To:* soac-mapo@xxxxxxxxx
> *Subject:* [soac-mapo] Background info?
>
>
>
> Hello all,
>
> I'm not totally sure that the posting of background information or relevant
> news stories here is welcomed or frowned upon, but to me it may help with
> the discussion to know what is already happening.
>
> By this I mean the existing practices of governments using Internet
> infrastructure to block access to sites with objectionable content based on
> names or IP addresses. For example there is this article from The
> Economist<http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2010/08/internet_censorship_russia>on
>  such blocking efforts in Russia and this
> report from the OpenNet Initiative <http://opennet.net/studies/uae> on a
> variety of blocking tactics in place in the United Arab Emirates -- some of
> which block based on TLD.
>
> Is it of value to this group to attempt to collect such information? To me,
> we can't ignore what's already being done in the real world, and any efforts
> we make will need to complement -- or at least recognize -- existing
> practice. Trying to dismiss, ignore or regulate existing government action
> seems pointless and indeed counter-productive. It's clear that measures by
> national governments to filter/ban domains with objectionable content
> already exist, and it's important to our efforts (IMO) to determine how our
> proposals here will actually affect such efforts without doing damage to
> other policy priorities.
>
> Of course, if there is a consensus that such news items and background info
> will not help, I'll stop sending them. I have no intention to be
> disruptive.
>
> - Evan
>