NEWS: Chinese effort to gag the Internet

Internet censorship in China is poised to take a technological leap forward, dramatically eroding the free exchange of ideas possible in that country. In addition to the current government control of Internet gateways, new control over DNS Servers will allow sweeping control of which web sites censorship officials will allow citizens to access.

Here is a story that makes me realize how much I take discussion forums like AboveTopSecret for granted. As a U.S. citizen I can log onto this site and post anything I want, no matter how critical of the government my statements might be or how low my opinion of the President is, without fear of official reprisal. It is easy for me to forget that what I see as a basic human right is not afforded to much of the world population.

BEIJING : A Paris-based media rights group has slammed new Chinese regulations aimed at policing the Internet and accused a US-based Internet management company of colluding with the government to stifle activism on the web.
Media rights group slams China's Internet policing

The media watchdog group also questioned a move by the US-based domain name management group VeriSign to assign China a DNS (domain name server), a move the group said would give Chinese Internet police the ability to render unwanted web addresses inaccessible. DNS is the Domain Name System which translates Internet host names into IP addresses.

"The Chinese authorities regularly use DNS hijacking, a technique that makes a site completely inaccessible by redirecting its domain name to a false IP address, resulting in an error message such as 'site unavailable'," the group said.
"Verisign's decision to involve China in the management of global Internet traffic appeared extremely dangerous."

Links:
www.rsf.org...
China gags chat room users


[Edited on 29-2-2004 by Spectre]

[Edited on 29-2-2004 by Kano]

Why is this even questioned?

They are a Communist country. Big suprise. Try reading the history books over there.

Originally posted by KrazyJethro
Why is this even questioned?

They are a Communist country. Big suprise. Try reading the history books over there.

I don't think anyone is questioning the situation. This report serves only to demonstrate that China is now moving from monitoring chat rooms and filtering email to gaining a complete stranglehold on web traffic. The question should be put to VeriSign, who claims to have no financial incentive in the venture, why install DNS servers in a country with a proven track record of Internet censorship?
More information:
VeriSign to Deploy DNS Internet Constellation Site in Beijing, China
Google keywords knock Chinese surfers offline

I would hope that our government would take action or at the very least speak out against ignorant (c) like this, especially when they allow so many of our businesses to utilize their state controlled slave labor. This is the nature of this "Globalized Economy" most of the worlds leaders are trying to cram down our throats, constantly choosing profit over principle. I hope that someday, we have the leadership (not some "never met a commie he did'nt like to take money from" yellow dog democrat, nor a blinded by the almighty dollar republican) willing to show some backbone in helping Taiwan in officializing its independence on the world level.

This one-China policy I keep hearing about is absurd, seeing how it depends on the Maoist trash in Beijing to cede control of China to elected officials not handpicked by party hardline communists. Its great that most of the people over there genuinely want to be a Democracy, but no matter how much you protest or how many petitions you sign, at the end of the day, the guys with the guns are going to have all the say in a country like that. And I seriously doubt getting rid of them once and for all could be done without any sort of bloodshed (be it from an uprising or the U.S. 6th Fleet).

thats not right.....lets nuke em even though im chinese...