Internet shut down as Egypt unrest continues

dg-1618

The internet has been closed down in Egypt ahead of the biggest protests yet planned against president Hosni Mubarak's 30-year-rule...

More info: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/01/28/3124300.htm

rolf

Walla walla the Arabs are pushing the frontiers of stupidity again.

hussam

rolf wroteWalla walla the Arabs are pushing the frontiers of stupidity again.

I'm an Egyptian although I've only been there three times in my entire life. But revolting against dictatorship is hardly stupid.
If you're referring to shutting down the internet, then that's nothing compared to what the government here in Lebanon does including turning off the electricity three hours a day to force us to pay for "black market electricity" (generators). I seriously hope the people there are able to do something.

euryale

I think he meant it was the government's stupidity to turn off the internet and cellphones because this would only make more people gather on the streets to communicate and it would only make them even more angry... I wish people here would do something similar and remove the scumbags which govern this country... even if nothing happens here karma will eventually get them, just like it got mubarak ';...;'

Devaz

Well technically they cut off communication withing Egypt and between egypt and the world , so they don't Organize protests , or be Encouraged to Rebel even more ( even though i don't that's even remotely possible ) So basically he's Trying to Corner them , I AM NOT SAYING THIS IS ACCEPTABLE ON ANY LEVEL ! ( just to clarify )

And yes in this perticular case it won't work , That would've been effective before the Protests and uprisings and such , And if i'm not mistaken i think i heard something on the news about syria and jordan doing the same ? So their population doesn't get influenced "Cough" inspired "cough" by what's happening .

rolf

euryale wroteI think he meant it was the government's stupidity to turn off the internet and cellphones

Exactly.
I don't think the "digital blackout" is gonna help lots. If I had no internet, no phone... it means no job to me. And less to do means more people free and willing to demonstrate.
And that is without mentioning the effects on the economy.
Regarding the electricity blackout in Lebanon, I was not aware that it was done on purpose, I thought it was the product of incompetence - but I might be wrong... who knows.

hussam

rolf, sorry I overreacted.

In any case, the problem in Egypt is that there is no middle class. Some people are poor and some are rich. Recent inflation isn't helping either. It is a high tech country. Last time I was there, I had a 3.5 or 3.6 Mbit broadband connection for 20 USD per month. But the government doesn't care about the people. There is major corruption. I went to this place there to renew my passport and I had to pay a bribe. Others weren't paying a bribe but they saw an Egyptian guy who was talking in a non Egyptian accent and they decided to exploit that.
Remember 10 years ago when Lebanon got the digital ID cards? Those were introduced last year in Egypt. So while I was there on vacation, I decided to get this done since I'm there anyway. Again I had to pay a bribe to get mine done. It's sad but true and if I may say very embarrassing.

Kassem

hussam wroteIn any case, the problem in Egypt is that there is no middle class. Some people are poor and some are rich.

Lebanon is suffering the same problem at the time being. This is always due to unjust governmental policies.

monkey-d-luffy

There is a way to go to internet in Egypt....
By using a dial up 56k connections... A french ISP is proposing this to it's clients.

J4D

They only shutdown the Domain Name System or (DNS). If you know the IP of your destination, you can access it normally.

samer

J4D wroteThey only shutdown the Domain Name System or (DNS). If you know the IP of your destination, you can access it normally.

So all you have to do to in order to fix this is to get your router to use Google's DNS instead?
It seems that this strategy will merely fool the general population and only for a few days (till the tech-oriented people propagate the fix).

dp0001

ars mentions border routers :

"It could also be that the big "border" routers that the Egyptian ISPs use to connect to ISPs in Italy and elsewhere were disconnected or turned off. This works well in a relatively small country with only a few ISPs.

When the border routers are turned off or lose their connection to the outside world, an ISP's network becomes isolated from the rest of the world. However, that doesn't necessarily mean local connectivity is disrupted. Egypt has an Internet exchange, and many ISPs have direct interconnections. The connections between different ISPs are also governed by BGP, which requires extensive manual configuration. Disrupt the border routers, or the fibers that BGP knows about, and two ISPs can't exchange traffic anymore. "

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/01/how-egypt-or-how-your-government-could-shut-down-the-internet.ars

J4D

Samer, they are already distributing the IPs for Facebook, twitter, youtube and any other site that they might use in their great efforts. Using Google's DNS is probably the best solution.