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Egypt Shutting Down Noor, Its Last ISP
- tomjen3 16y agoSo now even the geeks are out in the streets?
- akkartik 16y agoSo no more egyptian stock market?
- Vivtek 16y agoThat turned out to be hot air - the stock market's closed for the duration anyway.
- ck2 16y agoWhat about satellite internet? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_Internet_access#Mechanics_and_limitations_of_satellite_communication http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_Internet_access#Mecha... Relatively expensive but nearly impossible to stop. We have it out here in the more rural parts of the USA. They used to use dial-up for the return feed, but now it can do 2-way via the sat. A bit laggy though.
- pan69 16y agoI think the Egyptian government wants to prevent "the people" from using the Internet as a tool organise themselves. A hand full of people with satellite Internet access is not going to make a massive impact. But I see your point. I think there will be more hackers getting into this satellite technology just in case it happens to us. Because of this happening in Egypt, other countries will be better prepared (hopefully).
- kragen 16y agoThere was a report earlier that a satellite phone was being jammed, but I never saw confirmation. Technically, though, it should be pretty easy to do, at least inside big cities. Your jammer just needs to be louder than the satellite by as much as the antenna gain. Given that the satellite is 42000km away, while the jammer can easily be 10km away, the jammer signal has a 70dB "gain" just from being closer. The antenna gain is rarely more than 30dB, and I suspect that any coding gain can be compensated for pretty easily. Still, more avenues for communication means more hoops for would-be censors to jump through.
- uvdiv 16y ago>Your jammer just needs to be louder than the satellite by as much as the antenna gain. Given that the satellite is 42000km away, while the jammer can easily be 10km away, the jammer signal has a 70dB "gain" just from being closer. You've underestimated the signal strength from the satellite; it would be very wasteful for a GEO satellite to transmit in all directions, which would send 99.5%+ of the signal into space. So add at least 20-30 dB for the directionality of the satellite's antenna.
- kragen 16y agoYou're right; you have to be louder than the satellite's EIRP, not the satellite's actual radiated power. In theory there's no ceiling on how directional the satellite's antenna could be, is there? But I'm guessing your 20–30dB guess is right.
- spoiledtechie 16y agoRural parts? Where from? Any tech nests out there?
- mtrn 16y agoPure act of desperation.
- maeon3 16y agoWhat if there was a device that could prevent the people in egypt from communicating verbally as well as with body language. I shudder to think what kind of devistation Mubarak could have done if the Internet had more control over people. What if Mubarrak had the ability to power-down humans on an individual basis? As it stands, this guy is ranking right up there with Dr Evil. I wonder if he would have gone so far as to detain every protester if he could have pressed a button online to do so.
- gojomo 16y agoWhat if there was a device that could prevent the people in egypt from communicating verbally as well as with body language. That device is called a machine gun.