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How is it possible for two non-Iranians (in a geographic/telecom sense, not ethnic sense) to lose the connection on WhatsApp due to Iranian government? Surely t

by lupire 4y ago

How is it possible for two non-Iranians (in a geographic/telecom sense, not ethnic sense) to lose the connection on WhatsApp due to Iranian government? Surely the blocklist isn't implemented inside Facebook, it must be based on cellphone carrier. Edit: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32937782 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32937782 links to claims that the Iranian government hacked WhatsApp or one of its networking providers.

timcavel 4y ago
NoImmatureAdHom 4y ago
Facebook is working with the Iranian government, of course.
londons_explore 4y ago
Normally the government (in this case Iran) contacts the service provider (in this case FB/Whatsapp)and lets them know that unless they self-block their service, the government will do blocking at the network level and might issue fines. Normally, that makes the service provider implement blocks on their end, because then at least they can present the user with a sensible error message, and other services that the government isn't trying to block are not impacted (eg. services hosted on the same servers - for example Whatsapp voice calls might be banned, but text chat not banned).
- aasasd 4y ago
  To my knowledge, Iranian government doesn't have power to dictate FB's actions outside Iran. So FB could block by the IPs, but blocking everywhere by the nationality makes no sense (at least by the standards of a normal person).
  - weard_beard 4y ago
    I can only send email 500 miles and my nationality seems to impact my cell service
    - aasasd 4y ago
      Github once managed to ban accounts of Iranians, even students in the US. Afaik shortly after that GH went to the US government and convinced them that sanctioning every Iranian even outside Iran was technically and politically dubious, which resulted in the sanctions being relaxed in some way.
- stickfigure 4y ago
  There is zero chance that FB/Meta is complicit in this. The occam's razor answer is that the Iranian government has figured out an attack, and a bunch of FB employees are frantically trying to mitigate it instead of reading HN.
  - nindalf 4y ago
    I doubt Iran needs to go to the extent of hacking Meta to block a few random users in Italy? They've achieved their main aim of quelling protests by simply blocking at the network level. I'm skeptical about the original bug report.
    - toyg 4y ago
      There are tons of Iranians abroad, figuring out a way to cut them off from the local population is definitely a worthy goal for the regime.
    - panarky 4y ago
      > blocking at the network level How could any network-level block by Iran prevent a user in the UK from calling a user in India?
- hnaccount_rng 4y ago
  Sure, but if Meta/Facebook/Whatsapp would react to such an order from _Iran_ they'd be in very big trouble _very_ quickly. That's violating US sanctions level stuff. Ignoring the Iranian government might make them loose some users. Trying to ignore the US government will make some people go to prison. If that's what happens.. someone made a _very_ bad decision
- lupire 4y ago
  It is illegal in USA for Meta to pay fines to Iran government. The government is blocking at network level anyway. The app provider should detect the network outage and provide a good UI, not proactively block users who aren't using the affected network at all.
  - wyldfire 4y ago
    > The app provider should detect the network outage and provide a good UI, Can the blocking be adequately distinguished from packet loss? If not it seems like it would be embarrassing for the app to declare Government blockage when it's not really the case.
    - ffk 4y ago
      It’s probably validated by a human before the message is deployed.

by lupire 4y ago

timcavel 4y ago

NoImmatureAdHom 4y ago

Facebook is working with the Iranian government, of course.

londons_explore 4y ago

Normally the government (in this case Iran) contacts the service provider (in this case FB/Whatsapp)and lets them know that unless they self-block their service, the government will do blocking at the network level and might issue fines. Normally, that makes the service provider implement blocks on their end, because then at least they can present the user with a sensible error message, and other services that the government isn't trying to block are not impacted (eg. services hosted on the same servers - for example Whatsapp voice calls might be banned, but text chat not banned).

aasasd 4y ago
To my knowledge, Iranian government doesn't have power to dictate FB's actions outside Iran. So FB could block by the IPs, but blocking everywhere by the nationality makes no sense (at least by the standards of a normal person).
- weard_beard 4y ago
  I can only send email 500 miles and my nationality seems to impact my cell service
  - aasasd 4y ago
    Github once managed to ban accounts of Iranians, even students in the US. Afaik shortly after that GH went to the US government and convinced them that sanctioning every Iranian even outside Iran was technically and politically dubious, which resulted in the sanctions being relaxed in some way.
stickfigure 4y ago
There is zero chance that FB/Meta is complicit in this. The occam's razor answer is that the Iranian government has figured out an attack, and a bunch of FB employees are frantically trying to mitigate it instead of reading HN.
- nindalf 4y ago
  I doubt Iran needs to go to the extent of hacking Meta to block a few random users in Italy? They've achieved their main aim of quelling protests by simply blocking at the network level. I'm skeptical about the original bug report.
  - toyg 4y ago
    There are tons of Iranians abroad, figuring out a way to cut them off from the local population is definitely a worthy goal for the regime.
  - panarky 4y ago
    > blocking at the network level How could any network-level block by Iran prevent a user in the UK from calling a user in India?
hnaccount_rng 4y ago
Sure, but if Meta/Facebook/Whatsapp would react to such an order from _Iran_ they'd be in very big trouble _very_ quickly. That's violating US sanctions level stuff. Ignoring the Iranian government might make them loose some users. Trying to ignore the US government will make some people go to prison. If that's what happens.. someone made a _very_ bad decision
lupire 4y ago
It is illegal in USA for Meta to pay fines to Iran government. The government is blocking at network level anyway. The app provider should detect the network outage and provide a good UI, not proactively block users who aren't using the affected network at all.
- wyldfire 4y ago
  > The app provider should detect the network outage and provide a good UI, Can the blocking be adequately distinguished from packet loss? If not it seems like it would be embarrassing for the app to declare Government blockage when it's not really the case.
  - ffk 4y ago
    It’s probably validated by a human before the message is deployed.