7 ms·

How India, the World's Largest Democracy, Shuts Down the Internet

forgotmypw 7y ago
For the no-JS users... 27 Jan 2020 | 14:45 GMT How India, the World's Largest Democracy, Shuts Down the Internet Colonial-era laws give Indian officials broad authority to order Internet shutdowns in the name of public order By Jeremy Hsu Kashmiri journalists, shown here in November, hold laptops and a placard during a protest against the government of India's ongoing Internet shutdown in the region. Photo: Saqib Majeed/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images Kashmiri journalists, shown here in November, hold laptops and a placard during a protest against the government of India's ongoing Internet shutdown in the region. Advertisement Editor's Picks null Google X Balloons Will Circle the Earth to Deliver Internet null System Routes Internet Traffic Around Countries You Don't Trust Items of clothing are used to make an SOS sign on the ground at the campus of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University in the Hung Hom district of Hong Kong on November 20, 2019. Fear of Internet Censorship Hangs Over Hong Kong Protests Update 27 January 2020: News reports state that India's government has restored Internet access to the Kashmir region, though residents there can currently only browse 301 websites approved by the government and still cannot use social media. Mobile Internet is only available at very low speeds, according to a report from The Wire. When government officials in India decided to shut down the Internet, software engineers working for an IT and data analytics firm lost half a day of work and fell behind in delivering a project for clients based in London. A hotel was unable to pay its employees or manage online bookings for tourists. A major hospital delayed staff salary payments and restricted its medical services to the outpatient and emergency departments. At a time when many concerns surround online censorship by authoritarian governments, India represents both the world’s largest democracy and the world leader in deploying Internet shutdowns as a political tool. Since August 2019, Indian officials have maintained the longest Internet blackout ever to occur in a democracy, in the disputed Kashmir region between India and Pakistan. Broad legal and regulatory government authority over Internet service providers has also enabled officials to frequently order short-term Internet shutdowns on a regional and even city district level. “One of the reasons why India has so many shutdowns is that the institutional framework enables them,” says Jan Rydzak, a research analyst at Ranking Digital Rights, a nonprofit research institute based in Washington, D.C. “It is a framework where local officials have very broad discretion to order shutdowns.” That institutional framework helped India implement more than 100 Internet shutdowns in 2019, according to the Internet Shutdown Tracker run by the Software Freedom Law Centre in New Delhi. A conservative estimate by the Top10VPN website found that the 2019 shutdowns alone cost India’s economy at least US $1.3 billion last year—not including the many cases where officials blacked out mobile communications within individual city districts for several hours. Another report [PDF] by the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations previously found that Internet shutdowns cost the national economy approximately $3 billion between 2012 to 2017. And it documented many examples of the economic impact felt by individual workers, students, businesses, and even government officials. “Every single statistic you’re going to see on the total number of shutdowns by country shows that India just dwarfs every other country on the planet and most likely has had more shutdowns in the past five years than every other country on the planet [combined],” Rydzak says. The Indian government’s powers represent “colonial vestiges” of laws first implemented during the British Empire’s rule over India, says Apar Gupta, executive director of the Internet Freedom Foundation, a digital liberties nonprofit based in New Delhi, India. Such power stems in part from the Section 144 Criminal Procedure Code that empowers officials to prohibit large gatherings and block the Internet in specific geographic areas in the name of public order. India’s central government also gets regulatory power over the Internet from the Indian Telegraph Act, 1885, which originally gave British colonial officials authority over telegraph lines in India. This provided the basis for India’s government to implement Temporary Suspension of Telecom Services Rules in 2017 that further formalized the way officials could issue orders for Internet shutdowns. As a result, the government needs no advanced kill-switch for the nation’s Internet—local officials have the legal authority to compel individual telecom companies to manually shut down services. When ordering an Internet shutdown, officials typically write a letter and email it to all Internet service providers with regional offices in a specific geographic area, Gupta explains. The Internet service providers then block all incoming and outgoing data moving through cellphone towers and fiber-optic networks in that particular area. More than 90 percent of India’s estimated 451 million active Internet users rely on their phones’ mobile data plans for online access, according to a report [PDF] by the Internet and Mobile Association of India. And India’s network of cellphone towers is dominated by just a handful of major telecom companies, including Reliance Jio, Vodafone Idea, and Bharti Airtel. That makes it fairly straightforward for officials to lean on these big telecom companies when ordering Internet shutdowns. “It’s fairly easy because you don’t have a large multiplicity of backbone providers in India,” Gupta says. In practice, India’s Internet shutdowns resemble a total communications blackout that also blocks phone calls and text messaging services alongside data connectivity. One recent example came from the government ordering the big telecoms to shut down voice and Internet services in the capital of New Delhi and other cities during protests over a new and controversial citizenship law in December. More than 90 percent of India’s estimated 451 million active Internet users rely on their phones’ mobile data plans for online access. The government usually justifies shutdowns as necessary to maintain public order and prevent violence during times of unrest. But Rydzak’s research has found that India’s Internet blackouts have not reduced levels of protest, and may have even worsened violence during such periods. On a similar note, Gupta pointed out that protesters are more likely to use mobile communication and Internet access “to coordinate messages of safety, to organize peacefully, and to challenge the government within constitutional means,” as well as to record and share pictures and videos of any excessive violent responses by law enforcement. Furthermore, government officials have not been very transparent about publishing the written legal orders they’re supposed to provide in the case of Internet shutdowns. The government has typically resisted making such orders public, Gupta says, even in response to lawyers’ requests made under India’s right to information law. That makes it tricky to understand and potentially challenge a given Internet shutdown order. “Without such orders, the public cannot address judicial forums and assert constitutional rights in challenges,” Gupta says. “It prevents people from having their day in court.” That may now be changing. On 10 January, India’s Supreme Court ruled that the ongoing Internet shutdown and other suspensions of civil rights in Kashmir represent a violation of constitutional fundamental rights. Specifically, the Supreme Court of India pointed out that the Temporary Suspension of Telecom Services Rules do not allow for indefinite suspension of Internet services, says N. S. Nappinai, a Supreme Court of India lawyer and a cyber law expert. The Supreme Court ruling requires Indian officials to review the Internet shutdown orders about every five to seven days and publish the orders to demonstrate their legal basis. Such requirements for greater transparency and “adherence to the settled tests of proportionality and due process” would also apply to future Internet shutdown orders, Nappinai explains. Still, the recent court decision did not order an immediate end to Kashmir’s ongoing Internet shutdown, leaving that decision up to the government. “Considering the notoriety that India has acquired towards Internet shutdowns, the perception is that the Supreme Court stopped short of the needed threshold of protecting against future shutdowns,” Nappinai says. “Having said that, one could say that the Supreme Court judgment is still a good first step to a better future.”
iKevinShah 7y ago
Context is super important while reporting such news. "India, the World's Largest Democracy, Shuts Down the Internet " - False. "India, the World's Largest Democracy, Shuts Down the Internet in the disputed Kashmir region between India and Pakistan " (they had it blocked for entire state of Jammu and Kashmir) where terror attacks are (were?) a norm, specially in Kashmir
- jMyles 7y ago
  I find that context unimportant and the thrust of the headline to be true and worth considering. Even if only for a relatively small region, this government blocked access to information and communications.
- yati 7y ago
  Internet access was cut off recently also in the states of UP and Karnataka, where terror attacks are totally not the norm. It was done in response to protests against the CAA. Edit: I mention this to call out the tendency of this government to use internet access cuts to suppress dissent regularly as a powerful tool. https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/internet-shutdown-continues-in-several-parts-including-mangaluru-ghaziabad-following-anti-citizenship-protests/story-hnPSSj9oGh2AtZw8TQoxaM.html https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/internet-shutdown-...
  - tomThom 7y ago
    Is burning buses just dissent for you?
  - sbmthakur 7y ago
    > Internet access was cut off recently also in the states of UP and Karnataka, where terror attacks are totally not the norm. It was done in response to protests against the CAA. Some more context: The Internet was cut off in regions where protestors resorted to violence. And usually, the violence here doesn't just mean fighting among people. It involves burning buses and destroying public property. https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/delhi-anti-caa-protesters-set-fire-on-bbuses-jamia-millia-islamia-students-blamed/videoshow/72683068.cms https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-natio... https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/anti-caa-stir-death-toll-in-up-violence-rises-to-11/videoshow/72912531.cms https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-natio... https://morungexpress.com/index.php/mayhem-bengal-anti-caa-protests-turn-violent https://morungexpress.com/index.php/mayhem-bengal-anti-caa-p... There was no internet shutdown in cities like Mumbai and Pune where protestors remained peaceful.
desipenguin 7y ago
The article starts with: "Update 27 January 2020: News reports state that India's government has restored Internet access to the Kashmir region" RESTORED (albeit partially)
- yipbub 7y ago
  "though residents there can currently only browse 301 websites approved by the government and still cannot use social media" It's also worth noting that this started in August 2019.
nnq 7y ago
Uhm, maybe it's time we work harder to put communication infrastructure in the hands of corporations and other non-state non-nation transnational entities that are powerful enough so governments don't have much power over them? Maybe monopolies and tech giants could be a good thing you know... Under a few big "Unbrella Co."-s you could have a nice pseudo-anarchic libertarian global system. Whatever happened with the idea of a future where corporations would be truly transnational and would have private armies and police forces and such and really dwarf governments in power? ...it sounded like a dystopia back then, but nowadays I'd really wish we'd be in that variant of the future instead of the current one!
- ErrantX 7y ago
  I mean. In case the downvotes arent clear, you are aware of the history of e.g. the British East India Company?
  - twherw4234 7y ago
    Ah yes, 'we need to go there, steal all their money, and then teach those pagan devils that we're doing this to civilize them!'.
  - nnq 7y ago
    ...wasn't that familiar with the gritty details this part of history, but from a simple skimming, I see that things sort of worked-out fine until BEIC shifted its focus from trade and profit to territory grabbing, waring around, and administration. And it started behaving as a nation, probably because it was... all its owners where British nobility, right? That seems to be also when things turned bad for them - they practically went bankrupt but were still artificially kept a float by the then British Empire? Probably a good lesson to be learned from BEIC for future transnational megacorps: (1) keep your focus on making profit and growing (growing in the do-lots-of-R&D to increase your technological supremacy sense - you probably can't grow marketshare after you're already a monopoly), (2) let governments do the "drawing borders" and maintaining local civil order part, and (3) diversity, diversity, diversity - if all your owners are from one nation and one social-class / race / whatever, you'll be phagocytized or subverted by that nation and/or sub-group.
minewastaken 7y ago
Realistically, what are the options to access Internet in a region where government blocks it on an ISP level? Or is it back to carrier pigeons?
- brokenmachine 7y ago
  People smuggle usb sticks into North Korea... I've also read about still using the usb sticks or something similar for the transport but using ipfs or dat so you can propagate updates to files, eg an archive of news or resistance communications. You could actually do this with carrier pigeons.
  - minewastaken 7y ago
    What is 'dat'? I couldn't find anything that would make sense in this context.
    - self 7y ago
      These should help: https://datprotocol.github.io/how-dat-works/ https://datprotocol.github.io/how-dat-works/ https://www.datprotocol.com/ https://www.datprotocol.com/
- bestouff 7y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over_Avian_Carriers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over_Avian_Carriers
cat199 7y ago
can anyone with any insight into indian governance comment on why this wouldn't somehow be a massive legal liability? I realize states typically have full autonomy w/r/t 'fighting terror', but the economic implications for just about everything seem like this could result in all kinds of lawsuits and also wouldn't be tenable from the perspective of 'political capital'
- rusticpenn 7y ago
  Its a complicated problem to solve. There is extensive use of internet to spread false alarms in India using Whatsapp, facebook forwards. Mostly without any malicious intent. Combine that with an extremely right wing government which is holding on to power with "saving hinduism" as one of its main "goals".
- sbmthakur 7y ago
  India is massively under policed, which makes maintaining law and order a daunting task in volatile situations[1]. For Kashmir, the situation is far more complicated due to the presence of external terror. 1. https://www.livemint.com/news/india/india-s-police-force-among-the-world-s-weakest-1560925355383.html https://www.livemint.com/news/india/india-s-police-force-amo...
ismail 7y ago
We need to realise that the internet/social media shutdowns will now become normal to “control” populations and ensure people cannot mobilise or protest. Governments are putting in place the methods to avoid protest. The problem with this if you have a maniac in charge it’s going to be a helluva thing to get theM out. The only way around this is to develop tools and solutions. Otherwise democracy as we know it is dead.
- torified 7y ago
  >The only way around this is to develop tools and solutions. It's an interesting thought experiment what those tools would be like. Maybe something like freenet mixed with ipfs over a wifi mesh network? Not sure how that would work with that much latency. You could have throwaway wifi dropboxes to propagate between people. One project I read about was a raspberry pi wifi "grenade". It boots off a usb with the encryption key then it runs off a ramdisk. Then you "pull the pin" and leave it. If it's discovered then nobody can analyze it to find out what it was doing or who it was communicating with.
croon 7y ago
I understand why this is flagged, but I wish it wasn't. Regardless of the proposed merits of the shutdowns (I don't consider them valid), the concept of this is horrifying.
known 7y ago
India is developing due to $160 billion/year FDI + NRI remittance; And Modi regime destroyed the economy/credibility of India https://mobile.twitter.com/TimDraper/status/1207674025616519173 https://mobile.twitter.com/TimDraper/status/1207674025616519...

For the no-JS users... 27 Jan 2020 | 14:45 GMT How India, the World's Largest Democracy, Shuts Down the Internet Colonial-era laws give Indian officials broad authority to order Internet shutdowns in the name of public order By Jeremy Hsu Kashmiri journalists, shown here in November, hold laptops and a placard during a protest against the government of India's ongoing Internet shutdown in the region. Photo: Saqib Majeed/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images Kashmiri journalists, shown here in November, hold laptops and a placard during a protest against the government of India's ongoing Internet shutdown in the region. Advertisement Editor's Picks null Google X Balloons Will Circle the Earth to Deliver Internet null System Routes Internet Traffic Around Countries You Don't Trust Items of clothing are used to make an SOS sign on the ground at the campus of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University in the Hung Hom district of Hong Kong on November 20, 2019. Fear of Internet Censorship Hangs Over Hong Kong Protests Update 27 January 2020: News reports state that India's government has restored Internet access to the Kashmir region, though residents there can currently only browse 301 websites approved by the government and still cannot use social media. Mobile Internet is only available at very low speeds, according to a report from The Wire. When government officials in India decided to shut down the Internet, software engineers working for an IT and data analytics firm lost half a day of work and fell behind in delivering a project for clients based in London. A hotel was unable to pay its employees or manage online bookings for tourists. A major hospital delayed staff salary payments and restricted its medical services to the outpatient and emergency departments. At a time when many concerns surround online censorship by authoritarian governments, India represents both the world’s largest democracy and the world leader in deploying Internet shutdowns as a political tool. Since August 2019, Indian officials have maintained the longest Internet blackout ever to occur in a democracy, in the disputed Kashmir region between India and Pakistan. Broad legal and regulatory government authority over Internet service providers has also enabled officials to frequently order short-term Internet shutdowns on a regional and even city district level. “One of the reasons why India has so many shutdowns is that the institutional framework enables them,” says Jan Rydzak, a research analyst at Ranking Digital Rights, a nonprofit research institute based in Washington, D.C. “It is a framework where local officials have very broad discretion to order shutdowns.” That institutional framework helped India implement more than 100 Internet shutdowns in 2019, according to the Internet Shutdown Tracker run by the Software Freedom Law Centre in New Delhi. A conservative estimate by the Top10VPN website found that the 2019 shutdowns alone cost India’s economy at least US $1.3 billion last year—not including the many cases where officials blacked out mobile communications within individual city districts for several hours. Another report [PDF] by the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations previously found that Internet shutdowns cost the national economy approximately $3 billion between 2012 to 2017. And it documented many examples of the economic impact felt by individual workers, students, businesses, and even government officials. “Every single statistic you’re going to see on the total number of shutdowns by country shows that India just dwarfs every other country on the planet and most likely has had more shutdowns in the past five years than every other country on the planet [combined],” Rydzak says. The Indian government’s powers represent “colonial vestiges” of laws first implemented during the British Empire’s rule over India, says Apar Gupta, executive director of the Internet Freedom Foundation, a digital liberties nonprofit based in New Delhi, India. Such power stems in part from the Section 144 Criminal Procedure Code that empowers officials to prohibit large gatherings and block the Internet in specific geographic areas in the name of public order. India’s central government also gets regulatory power over the Internet from the Indian Telegraph Act, 1885, which originally gave British colonial officials authority over telegraph lines in India. This provided the basis for India’s government to implement Temporary Suspension of Telecom Services Rules in 2017 that further formalized the way officials could issue orders for Internet shutdowns. As a result, the government needs no advanced kill-switch for the nation’s Internet—local officials have the legal authority to compel individual telecom companies to manually shut down services. When ordering an Internet shutdown, officials typically write a letter and email it to all Internet service providers with regional offices in a specific geographic area, Gupta explains. The Internet service providers then block all incoming and outgoing data moving through cellphone towers and fiber-optic networks in that particular area. More than 90 percent of India’s estimated 451 million active Internet users rely on their phones’ mobile data plans for online access, according to a report [PDF] by the Internet and Mobile Association of India. And India’s network of cellphone towers is dominated by just a handful of major telecom companies, including Reliance Jio, Vodafone Idea, and Bharti Airtel. That makes it fairly straightforward for officials to lean on these big telecom companies when ordering Internet shutdowns. “It’s fairly easy because you don’t have a large multiplicity of backbone providers in India,” Gupta says. In practice, India’s Internet shutdowns resemble a total communications blackout that also blocks phone calls and text messaging services alongside data connectivity. One recent example came from the government ordering the big telecoms to shut down voice and Internet services in the capital of New Delhi and other cities during protests over a new and controversial citizenship law in December. More than 90 percent of India’s estimated 451 million active Internet users rely on their phones’ mobile data plans for online access. The government usually justifies shutdowns as necessary to maintain public order and prevent violence during times of unrest. But Rydzak’s research has found that India’s Internet blackouts have not reduced levels of protest, and may have even worsened violence during such periods. On a similar note, Gupta pointed out that protesters are more likely to use mobile communication and Internet access “to coordinate messages of safety, to organize peacefully, and to challenge the government within constitutional means,” as well as to record and share pictures and videos of any excessive violent responses by law enforcement. Furthermore, government officials have not been very transparent about publishing the written legal orders they’re supposed to provide in the case of Internet shutdowns. The government has typically resisted making such orders public, Gupta says, even in response to lawyers’ requests made under India’s right to information law. That makes it tricky to understand and potentially challenge a given Internet shutdown order. “Without such orders, the public cannot address judicial forums and assert constitutional rights in challenges,” Gupta says. “It prevents people from having their day in court.” That may now be changing. On 10 January, India’s Supreme Court ruled that the ongoing Internet shutdown and other suspensions of civil rights in Kashmir represent a violation of constitutional fundamental rights. Specifically, the Supreme Court of India pointed out that the Temporary Suspension of Telecom Services Rules do not allow for indefinite suspension of Internet services, says N. S. Nappinai, a Supreme Court of India lawyer and a cyber law expert. The Supreme Court ruling requires Indian officials to review the Internet shutdown orders about every five to seven days and publish the orders to demonstrate their legal basis. Such requirements for greater transparency and “adherence to the settled tests of proportionality and due process” would also apply to future Internet shutdown orders, Nappinai explains. Still, the recent court decision did not order an immediate end to Kashmir’s ongoing Internet shutdown, leaving that decision up to the government. “Considering the notoriety that India has acquired towards Internet shutdowns, the perception is that the Supreme Court stopped short of the needed threshold of protecting against future shutdowns,” Nappinai says. “Having said that, one could say that the Supreme Court judgment is still a good first step to a better future.”

iKevinShah 7y ago

Context is super important while reporting such news. "India, the World's Largest Democracy, Shuts Down the Internet " - False. "India, the World's Largest Democracy, Shuts Down the Internet in the disputed Kashmir region between India and Pakistan " (they had it blocked for entire state of Jammu and Kashmir) where terror attacks are (were?) a norm, specially in Kashmir

jMyles 7y ago
I find that context unimportant and the thrust of the headline to be true and worth considering. Even if only for a relatively small region, this government blocked access to information and communications.
yati 7y ago
Internet access was cut off recently also in the states of UP and Karnataka, where terror attacks are totally not the norm. It was done in response to protests against the CAA. Edit: I mention this to call out the tendency of this government to use internet access cuts to suppress dissent regularly as a powerful tool. https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/internet-shutdown-continues-in-several-parts-including-mangaluru-ghaziabad-following-anti-citizenship-protests/story-hnPSSj9oGh2AtZw8TQoxaM.html https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/internet-shutdown-...
- tomThom 7y ago
  Is burning buses just dissent for you?
- sbmthakur 7y ago
  > Internet access was cut off recently also in the states of UP and Karnataka, where terror attacks are totally not the norm. It was done in response to protests against the CAA. Some more context: The Internet was cut off in regions where protestors resorted to violence. And usually, the violence here doesn't just mean fighting among people. It involves burning buses and destroying public property. https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/delhi-anti-caa-protesters-set-fire-on-bbuses-jamia-millia-islamia-students-blamed/videoshow/72683068.cms https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-natio... https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/anti-caa-stir-death-toll-in-up-violence-rises-to-11/videoshow/72912531.cms https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-natio... https://morungexpress.com/index.php/mayhem-bengal-anti-caa-protests-turn-violent https://morungexpress.com/index.php/mayhem-bengal-anti-caa-p... There was no internet shutdown in cities like Mumbai and Pune where protestors remained peaceful.

desipenguin 7y ago

The article starts with: "Update 27 January 2020: News reports state that India's government has restored Internet access to the Kashmir region" RESTORED (albeit partially)

yipbub 7y ago
"though residents there can currently only browse 301 websites approved by the government and still cannot use social media" It's also worth noting that this started in August 2019.

nnq 7y ago

Uhm, maybe it's time we work harder to put communication infrastructure in the hands of corporations and other non-state non-nation transnational entities that are powerful enough so governments don't have much power over them? Maybe monopolies and tech giants could be a good thing you know... Under a few big "Unbrella Co."-s you could have a nice pseudo-anarchic libertarian global system. Whatever happened with the idea of a future where corporations would be truly transnational and would have private armies and police forces and such and really dwarf governments in power? ...it sounded like a dystopia back then, but nowadays I'd really wish we'd be in that variant of the future instead of the current one!

ErrantX 7y ago
I mean. In case the downvotes arent clear, you are aware of the history of e.g. the British East India Company?
- twherw4234 7y ago
  Ah yes, 'we need to go there, steal all their money, and then teach those pagan devils that we're doing this to civilize them!'.
- nnq 7y ago
  ...wasn't that familiar with the gritty details this part of history, but from a simple skimming, I see that things sort of worked-out fine until BEIC shifted its focus from trade and profit to territory grabbing, waring around, and administration. And it started behaving as a nation, probably because it was... all its owners where British nobility, right? That seems to be also when things turned bad for them - they practically went bankrupt but were still artificially kept a float by the then British Empire? Probably a good lesson to be learned from BEIC for future transnational megacorps: (1) keep your focus on making profit and growing (growing in the do-lots-of-R&D to increase your technological supremacy sense - you probably can't grow marketshare after you're already a monopoly), (2) let governments do the "drawing borders" and maintaining local civil order part, and (3) diversity, diversity, diversity - if all your owners are from one nation and one social-class / race / whatever, you'll be phagocytized or subverted by that nation and/or sub-group.

minewastaken 7y ago

Realistically, what are the options to access Internet in a region where government blocks it on an ISP level? Or is it back to carrier pigeons?

brokenmachine 7y ago
People smuggle usb sticks into North Korea... I've also read about still using the usb sticks or something similar for the transport but using ipfs or dat so you can propagate updates to files, eg an archive of news or resistance communications. You could actually do this with carrier pigeons.
- minewastaken 7y ago
  What is 'dat'? I couldn't find anything that would make sense in this context.
  - self 7y ago
    These should help: https://datprotocol.github.io/how-dat-works/ https://datprotocol.github.io/how-dat-works/ https://www.datprotocol.com/ https://www.datprotocol.com/
bestouff 7y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over_Avian_Carriers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over_Avian_Carriers

cat199 7y ago

can anyone with any insight into indian governance comment on why this wouldn't somehow be a massive legal liability? I realize states typically have full autonomy w/r/t 'fighting terror', but the economic implications for just about everything seem like this could result in all kinds of lawsuits and also wouldn't be tenable from the perspective of 'political capital'

rusticpenn 7y ago
Its a complicated problem to solve. There is extensive use of internet to spread false alarms in India using Whatsapp, facebook forwards. Mostly without any malicious intent. Combine that with an extremely right wing government which is holding on to power with "saving hinduism" as one of its main "goals".
sbmthakur 7y ago
India is massively under policed, which makes maintaining law and order a daunting task in volatile situations[1]. For Kashmir, the situation is far more complicated due to the presence of external terror. 1. https://www.livemint.com/news/india/india-s-police-force-among-the-world-s-weakest-1560925355383.html https://www.livemint.com/news/india/india-s-police-force-amo...

ismail 7y ago

We need to realise that the internet/social media shutdowns will now become normal to “control” populations and ensure people cannot mobilise or protest. Governments are putting in place the methods to avoid protest. The problem with this if you have a maniac in charge it’s going to be a helluva thing to get theM out. The only way around this is to develop tools and solutions. Otherwise democracy as we know it is dead.

torified 7y ago
>The only way around this is to develop tools and solutions. It's an interesting thought experiment what those tools would be like. Maybe something like freenet mixed with ipfs over a wifi mesh network? Not sure how that would work with that much latency. You could have throwaway wifi dropboxes to propagate between people. One project I read about was a raspberry pi wifi "grenade". It boots off a usb with the encryption key then it runs off a ramdisk. Then you "pull the pin" and leave it. If it's discovered then nobody can analyze it to find out what it was doing or who it was communicating with.

croon 7y ago

I understand why this is flagged, but I wish it wasn't. Regardless of the proposed merits of the shutdowns (I don't consider them valid), the concept of this is horrifying.

known 7y ago

India is developing due to $160 billion/year FDI + NRI remittance; And Modi regime destroyed the economy/credibility of India https://mobile.twitter.com/TimDraper/status/1207674025616519173 https://mobile.twitter.com/TimDraper/status/1207674025616519...