The
Haystack application aims to use
steganography to hide
samizdat-type data within a larger stream of innocuous network traffic. Thus, civilians in Iran, for example, could more easily evade Iranian censors and provide the world with an
unfiltered report on events within the country. Haystack earned its creator
Austin Heap a great deal of positive coverage from the media during the 2009 Iranian election protests. The BBC described Heap as
"on the front lines" of the protesters' "Twitter revolution", while The Guardian called him an
Innovator of the Year. Despite the laudatory coverage, however, the media were never given a copy of the software to examine. Indeed, not much is known about the software or its inner workings. Specialists in network encryption security were not allowed to perform an independent evaluation of Haystack, despite its distribution to and use by a small number of Iranians, possibly at some risk. As interest in the project
widens and criticisms of the media coverage and software continue to
mount, Heap has currently asked users to
cease using Haystack until a security review can be performed.
posted by Blazecock Pileon
on Sep 13, 2010 -
31 comments
With the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown on Thursday, China's ever-vigilant censors have stepped up the reach of the "Great Firewall," blocking Western sites like Twitter, Flickr, and (just one day after its launch) Microsoft's Bing.
via [more inside]
posted by infini
on Jun 3, 2009 -
54 comments
FT Report Oh dear, I had high hopes that Skype would hold out. Still, I guess they are telling us. Can anyone find the list of banned words in the TOM client?
posted by priorpark17
on Apr 19, 2006 -
22 comments
Google Images Censored in China A picture says 1000 words, and Google.cn is censoring them all. Check out the side-by-side screens of a search for "tiananmen+square" in Google.com and Google.cn images. Looks like a nice place, with little historical significance. You can try the search
yourself. The text on the bottom left is the censorship disclaimer. Very different than our
results. A far cry from Google's
claim that they do not censor results. Nice to know that they stand up to the government here but not abroad.
A good
spoof of the whole thing.
posted by FeldBum
on Jan 30, 2006 -
57 comments
Reporters Without Borders releases a free
handbook for would-be bloggers and cyber-dissidents in censor-happy lands. It features tips on blogging anonymously, ways to get around censorship and to ensure your e-mail privacy, and hosts an Internet-censor World Championship list (which lists China, Vietnam, and Tunisia, among others) as well. Download the guide
here. (PDF)
posted by riffraff
on Sep 22, 2005 -
8 comments
More environmental data goes down the memory hole... Another EPA report gets "edited" by the White House to minimize warnings about climate change and the contributing factors of industrial and automotive emissions. Data from a 2001 report on climate by the National Research Council commissioned
by by White House is omitted in favor of research data funded by the American Petroleum Institute. Behold the best government money can buy...
posted by crookdimwit
on Jun 19, 2003 -
20 comments
"Movie Mask Player is software that gives you the choice to watch any movie at your comfort level. If you don't want to hear profanity, view graphic violence, or see nudity or sexual content in the movies you watch, then mask (remove) those scenes with Movie Mask. You are now in control over the movies you choose to watch." I can't wait to see what it does to the first 20 minutes of "Saving Private Ryan."
posted by KLAX
on Nov 27, 2001 -
33 comments
I was watching "The Craft" last night, and noticed that they censored the image of
Robin Tunney's parents' plane going down (actually a
Glamour, but you know that), and later Nieve Campbell's character says "you know the [silence]", they actually cut out the words "plane crash". Has anybody else noticed this kind of censorship? Would anybody have been really shocked to hear Nieve say "plane crash"? Do you think the WB would've been swamped with calls? It's bad enough what they did to
homer or what the geniuses at
clear channel are doing. Good movie, though.
posted by signal
on Sep 28, 2001 -
16 comments
Censoring Cartoons and in effect, censoring my childhood. Without a doubt, some of these cartoons are racist, but I'd prefer that they not be shown rather than cut up. Other cuts just don't make sense to me.
posted by plinth
on Jun 4, 2001 -
28 comments
