

Iran readies domestic Internet system, blocks Google - pooriaazimi
http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFL5E8KN2S420120923?sp=true

======
pooriaazimi
I can confirm this. <http://www.google.com> still works, but
<https://mail.google.com> or <https://www.google.com> don't.

~~~
w1ntermute
What's your plan once you're cut off from the internet? A satellite
connection?

~~~
zerostar07
A revolution

~~~
pm90
Yeah, because that really worked out so well the last time

~~~
chimeracoder
Which one?

No, seriously, I'm not sure which one you're talking about (or if you're
joking). Iran has had so many revolutions (many named after colors,
interestingly).

There was the one that everyone knows about (1979 - 'Islamic Revolution'), but
there was also the White Revolution, the Persian Constitutional Revolution,
and most recently the Green Revolution.

I have a friend who is Persian and she often jokes that 'this next one had
better succeed because we're running out of colors!'

------
dmix
I always hear people say Iran has a significant amount of freedom-loving and
mostly moderate people living there (for ex as seen in the green movement).

How come we haven't heard of any protest against these moves to suppress the
internet?

~~~
nsns
You'd probably find these on Tor, and in Persian (and putting the protesters
in great personal risk). Show me one country whose people think like its
government.

~~~
dmix
I've tried Tor with a 24mbps connection, it's about as slow as 56k.

While Tor is great, it's not a suitable replacement for the open internet
until it gets faster.

------
azth
> Iran threatened in May to take legal action against Google over its decision
> to drop the term "Persian Gulf" from its Google Maps and leaving the
> waterway between Iran and the Arabian peninsula nameless.

A search on Google Maps yields: We could not understand the location arabian
gulf.

Persian Gulf though shows up.

~~~
Sahebi
No, Iran just run this project for "Against freedom of expression"

------
kapitalx
'Google Doodle' by Mana Neyestani in response to blocking google

<http://i46.tinypic.com/4k9wcm.jpg>

------
ya3r
I'm from Iran.

I can confirm that https is blocked on google.com domain.

But contrary to what the title suggests, it is not really related to the
domestic internet(small i).

To my knowledge it is more related to the new Anti-Islam movie that was
published on Youtube, and Google's rejction of taking it down as whitehouse
asked them to.

------
epscylonb
This could be seen as retaliation for stuxnet, widely believed to be a joint
US and Israeli creation.

I wonder if the creators of stuxnet are surprised by this. We tend to think of
cyber warfare as being less harmful than the conventional kind. But could Iran
doubling down on online security be more dangerous in the long run?.

~~~
pliny
Could Iran filtering the internet be more dangerous than a conventional war
between Iran and Israel or Iran and the US?

No, absolutely not.

~~~
epscylonb
I chuckled, the point I was trying to make is that I think this may make a
conventional war more likely.

The iranian regime seems pretty adept at holding on to power, and the
ramifications of online warfare seem to helping them.

~~~
shimon_e
The far east seems more likely to explode. If you have been following the news
going on in that region. China/Taiwan vs Japan (Islands) Hong Kong vs China
(British Hong Kong flag and related anti-PRC demonstrations) South Korea vs
North Korea (Missiles) Japan vs North Korea (Military threats)

If a war was to break out in the far east it wouldn't take long to get to
world war status as America will be pulled into any war involving Japan or
South Korea.

~~~
tisme
It's pretty risky and grim to try to predict where war will break out but my
money would be on Pakistan/India. Extra nasty because both are atomic powers.

~~~
pm90
>Extra nasty because both are atomic powers

That is exactly why there will be _no_ war between Pakistan and India. It just
cannot happen. If they do fight a nuclear war, the entire region will be
irreversibly damaged.

In fact, the possession of nuclear weapons has actually prevented conventional
wars from taking place, although skirmishes do take place quite often.

Although the tensions do go high when another terrorist attack hits one of the
major cities, it has yet to have caused an actual war

------
ilaksh
This is not about an evil government in Iran desiring to suppress the
internet.

There is an economic, informational, and covert war going on right now between
the US hegemony (and its allies) and Iran. Overtly Iran has been surrounded on
all sides by US/allied occupation.

Google is not only the best information indexing resource ever created, it is
also the most important tool that the hegemony has in its cyber-intelligence
and propaganda arsenals.

<http://metaexistence.org/theatre.htm>

~~~
pooriaazimi
I'm quite used to that "conspiracy theory" tone (that's the tone our
government always uses), but honestly I wouldn't have imagined I'd read
something like that on HackerNews...

I sincerely hope you don't really mean what you wrote. :(

~~~
ilaksh
The US invaded and occupied Afghanistan. Fact.

Afghanistan is adjacent to Iran. Fact.

The US invaded and occupied Iraq.

Iraq is adjacent to Iran. Fact.

The US and allies directly supported the overthrow of Libya. Fact.

Libya was one of Iran's most important allies in the area. Fact.

Iran is currently undergoing massive economic sanctions by the US and allies.
Fact.

Iran has been subject to cyberattacks including Stuxnet.
[http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/world/middleeast/obama-
ord...](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/world/middleeast/obama-ordered-wave-
of-cyberattacks-against-iran.html?pagewanted=all&_moc.semityn.www) Fact.

Google is used for a significant portion of internet searches in Iran. Fact.

Internet search results are a key source of news and other information. Fact.

News and information are very important aspects of information warfare
(propaganda). Fact.

Propaganda is a very important aspect of war. Fact.

You know what people, believe whatever you want. Go back to your nice happy
little Silicon Valley tech bubble. You're right, there is no hegemony. The
greatest, most ubiquitous and far-reaching information system in the world has
no connection whatsoever with the cyber-intelligence and information warfare
systems of a country that outspends its nearest competitors in military
spending by a factor of 5 to 1 and has troops in 150 countries. The United
States only fights for freedom. There is no real war, just people being freed
from evil oppressive rulers and sometimes relieved of the massive burdens of
their excessive oil supplies.

~~~
pooriaazimi
I'm not living in Silicon Valley tech bubble. I'm currently living in Iran,
and probably know more ( _much more_ ) than you about what's happening, and
why. I can assure you it's got nothing with more security, and everything with
trying to limit people access to free media.

And just FYI: I access Internet through a 256kbps (with lowercase k)
connection that's heavily filtered. Sites like YouTube, Facebook, twitter, and
almost every other social network, along with almost all major news gathering
websites (BBC, CNN, NYTimes, Washington Post, ...) and now google and gmail
are blocked. Last week it took me 1 hour and 40 minutes (yes, i timed it) to
download a mere 12MB zip file from my email inbox (it was a beta software I
wanted to test) because the connection just kept resetting 6.5 MB through.
After that I gave up and asked them to upload their beta, unreleased software
to droplr.com so I can download it.

I'd take US hegemony everyday instead of this. And am more than willing to
switch my place with you.

------
whacker
This is pretty much the equivalent of the Berlin Wall. We know how _that_
worked out.

~~~
zalew
> This is pretty much the equivalent of the Berlin Wall.

elderly citizens of Berlin would probably beg to differ. or just punch you in
the face.

------
magoon
When this comes online I'm definitely switching.

------
Sahebi
Now google not work :) :-"

------
CountSessine
Good luck with that.

