Previous Politech messages: http://www.politechbot.com/p-02283.html http://www.politechbot.com/p-02275.html Politech archive: http://www.politechbot.com/cgi-bin/politech.cgi?name=china ******** Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 18:38:10 +0800 From: John Tanner <tannerat_private> To: declanat_private, politechat_private Subject: Re: FC: China can use Net for control; response from Adam Powell Hi Declan, Regarding the Politech posts about control of the Internet in China, etc, here's an item from AFP (cribbing a story from state news agency Xinhua, so watch out) with an update on the cyber-cafe crackdown announced by the government last April. Friday, July 20 12:19 AM SGT China shuts down nearly 2,000 Internet cafes: Xinhua http://english.hk.dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/technology/afp/article.html?s=hke/headlines/010720/technology/afp/China_shuts_down_nearly_2_000_Internet_cafes__Xinhua.html By the way, here's one interesting side effect of the Chinese government's concerns over "pernicious information" and other harmful content on the Net: it's evidently inspired a cottage industry for scam artists selling "black boxes" and software to ISPs, Internet cafe owners and end users that promise to block access to or otherwise censor pernicious content that could get you in trouble with the authorities. This is according to an analyst from BDA China I met in Shanghai recently -- and, unsurprisingly, these censorship products work just about as well as you might expect them to (which is to say, not very). Regards, John C. Tanner Global Technology Editor Telecom Asia/Wireless Asia Advanstar Telecoms Group Tel: +852 2589 1328 Fax: +852 2559 7002 Email: tannerat_private URL: www.telecomasia.net ******** Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 11:58:51 +0800 From: robert clark <rclarkat_private> To: declanat_private Subject: Re: FC: China can use Net for control; response from Adam Powell Declan Two comments on this as it relates to China: 1. I think the Internet is over-rated as a tool of social and political emancipation for developing countries. Certainly as far as Chinese are concerned, few people can afford a computer. And for the majority who live in rural areas it's hardly a priority. Besides, Internet connections leave an electronic paper trail. Basic telephone connections are more important - they are cheaper, everyone can use them and they are hard for even the most determined spooks to tap. China now has more than 150m fixed line connections and 120m digital mobile phones, compared with (officially) 26m Internet users. Thanks to these, for the first time in history Chinese people have a mostly secure means of communicating with each other, beyond the scope of the many supervising authorities. 2. At the same time China, like the Internet, is full of workarounds. Internet cafes, ISPs and the geek around the corner will enable users ways of skirting the controls. Very often Chinese laws are for show only - no-one even bothers enforcing them, let alone obeying them. The last time I looked in a Beijing Internet cafe, I could easily log onto Taiwanese newspapers. This may have changed, but even now, with the government cracking down on the Internet, newspapers and supposedly dangerous foreign academics ahead of next year's party congress, the flow of important Chinese language documents on to the Net continues, either out of Beijing or from abroad - The Tiananmen Papers being a recent example. Robert Clark Group Editor Telecom Asia Hong Kong http://www.telecomasia.net ******** From: "Jack Dean" <JackDeanat_private> To: "Declan McCullagh" <declanat_private> Subject: China Shuts Down 2,000 Internet Cafes, Paper Says Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 22:16:21 -0400 In case you haven't seen this . . . http://news.excite.com/news/r/010720/07/net-china-internet-dc China Shuts Down 2,000 Internet Cafes, Paper Says Updated: Fri, Jul 20 7:35 AM EDT SHANGHAI (Reuters) - China has shut nearly 2,000 down Internet cafes across the country and has ordered 6,000 to suspend operations and make changes, state media said on Friday. Anonymous cybercafes are popular because they allow people to evade tough content laws, whose infringement on a personal homepage or message board authorities are likely to track to its source. The Shanghai Daily said the move, China's second major clampdown on the popular cafes in a little more than a year, aims to regulate the Internet service market in line with rules set by the Ministries of Information Industry, Public Security and Culture and the State Administration of Industry and Commerce. [...] ********* From: "Lokman Tsui" <lokkieat_private> To: <apowellat_private> Cc: <chineseinternetresearchat_private>, <skalathilat_private>, <declanat_private> References: <001401c110df$7baf9320$0200005a@eriko> Subject: in reaction to Adam Powell Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 08:33:14 +0200 My reaction to the problems Adam Powell has, in reaction to Kalathil and Boas's article. > For every registered user we met in China, we met several who were not > registered. So instead of the official Beijing number of 26.5 million people > on line (that's the *official* number from China Internet Network > Information Center reported today, up 56.8% from last year - details at > http://www.freedomforum.org/templates/document.asp?documentID=14423) most > experts we contacted said the ratio of unregistered to registered users is > 4:1, yielding a total of well over 100 million. In defense of Kalathil and Boas: The problem of internet statistics in China is notorious. I would like to ask Adam Powell, who the experts are he contacted that states the ratio of 4:1, bringing the number of internet users in China over 100 million. I am a bit skeptical, because other internet statistics / metrics companies, such as IAMAsia and Netvalue, actually /downplay/ the numbers of CNNIC, each reporting a few million less. I think the Chinese government has no incentive in reporting less internet users, since it wants to use the internet to stimulate the economy. Arguably, the government has every incentive of over-reporting the number of users. > These are people who go to great pains *not* to be counted or found by the > government, but somehow they are expected to respond to an official survey. > And if they do not complete the survey, these people do not exist. I have my doubts that these people, who hide from the government, account for a difference in the scale of millions. > We also are receiving email from people in countries where, according to > this paper, all such traffic is monitored and all users are registered. Not > so. Students all seem to know how to use proxy servers and anonymizers and > avoid official scrutiny -- and are not reported by those relying on official > numbers. One of the points in my thesis, is how proxy servers and anonymizers are overrated, with regard to avoiding filtering and monitoring. In short: Anonymizers are either slow to operate and/or flawed (bad javascript exposing the identity of the user), or demand payment (a big barrier for the Chinese because there is barely electronic payment in China). And even if the use of proxy servers is common in China, they suffer from a few flaws: - they still form a technical barrier to operate, preventing people with not enough technical knowledge from using them. With the internet getting more popular, the number of people with not enough technical knowledge will grow. - the Chinese government is, supposedly, deploying fake proxy servers, so-called honey pots. - the proxy server can be blocked too. If more people will use proxy servers, that means the barrier needs to be set lower, but that also means it will be easier for the government to track them. - there is no commercial incentive in running a proxy server, continuity of the service is thus not guaranteed. > But more broadly, the problem is with the "one machine, one user" model of > the Internet that most in North America and Europe assume is the standard > worldwide. Not so: in Africa, Asia and South America, the standard is "one > machine, many users." This I agree with. We really need to come up with a more satisfactory model for defining an 'internet user' (in China and in general). > Otherwise, what are we to make of the reports by the BBC and the NY Times > that China has been forced to change "official" versions of news stories > because Chinese can send email to each other (and to those outside of China) > with first-hand accounts of what actually happened? I would rather mention the BBS as a source of unofficial information, than e-mail. Regards, Lokman Tsui ********** From: "Ben" <bmwat_private> To: <declanat_private> Subject: Re: China can use Net for control; response from Adam Powell Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 13:53:44 -0400 Cipherwar.com has a long-running story related to this issue; the first-hand accounts of an American teacher in China. Apparently he uses encrypted email to report his experiences. There are 3 parts... http://www.cipherwar.com/news/01/liberator_0501.htm http://www.cipherwar.com/news/01/liberator_0508.htm http://www.cipherwar.com/news/01/liberator_0625.htm ********** From: "Shanthi Kalathil" <skalathilat_private> To: <chineseinternetresearchat_private>, <apowellat_private> Cc: <chineseinternetresearchat_private>, <declanat_private> References: <001401c110df$7baf9320$0200005a@eriko> <003301c110e5$de9d23c0$0200005a@eriko> Subject: Re: [chineseinternetresearch] in reaction to Adam Powell Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 12:34:03 -0400 Hi, Just a couple of responses: First, I'd like to thank Adam Powell for pointing out that the subject matter of our report was mischaracterized in the subject line on the politech list. My co-author Taylor and I had hoped people would go on to read the actual report and form their own conclusions, and I'm happy that Adam has done so. Second, I'd like to reinforce Lokman's point that accurate statistics on Internet users in China are hard to come by. The official CNNIC methodology has been questioned by a number of sources, which is why we also included the 17 million figure, an IDC estimate. We thus tried to provide a range, rather than relying solely on government data, as Adam says we do. Undoubtedly, Adam is correct to emphasize the question of access; unfortunately, the disparity in reported figures and metholodologies means that it will be hard to draw a truly accurate picture for the time being. Adam also notes that many students know how to use proxy servers and anonymizers to avoid scrutiny. This is true, but as Lokman points out in his email and his thesis, the technological savvy needed to access a proxy server may be out of reach for the majority of Internet users. Indeed, I'd argue that by putting politically sensitive sites out of easy reach by the majority of Internet users, the government has restricted the sites' viewers to those who a) are willing to; and b) know how to make a special effort to reach outside sources of political news. Such users are a relatively small proportion of the population of Internet users, who in turn make up a small proportion of the Chinese population. (A new study by Guo Liang at CASS has found that in fact a majority of Chinese Internet users show little interest in using proxy servers.) Finally, Adam notes that "this is to say that (the Internet) is an important influence in totalitarian countries, enabling a still small but rapidly growing minority to access information directly from outside of their countries -- and to relay that information and their personal views via email to others." I agree. We note in our paper that challenges to government control in China are mounting, and we specifically cite the case of the Jiangxi schoolhouse explosion as an example. Our paper simply tried to point out that authoritarian governments are aware of these challenges, and are constantly (and, for the time being, successfully) shaping their approaches to meet these challenges head on. We're certainly not wishing for or predicting their ultimate success (quite the opposite); it's our hope that this contribution to the understanding of government strategies will help lend a more nuanced tone to the current debate. Thanks for the comments, Shanthi ********** Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 06:19:45 -0400 From: Nick Bretagna <onemugat_private> Reply-To: afn41391at_private To: apowellat_private CC: zDeclan/Politech <declanat_private>, Pmcmastersat_private, azeitlinat_private Subject: The INet & China While I have not yet read the paper which initiated Mr. Powell's missive, I have to say that his arguments and questions seemed the likely ones to be missed by the authors of the paper, and many occurred to me when I read the abstract posted by Declan. Increased communications is anathema to totalitarianism everywhere. Totalitarianism has a substantial foundation in keeping people ignorant -- of the wealth and status of "the competition", of other ways, of means of resistance, of others who wish to resist -- There could be a whole host of papers written about how the increase in fax machines and copiers affected the fall of the Soviet Union. The internet is that same communcation system boost writ paperless, trace-resistant, and almost instantaneous. Further, tech stimulates hackers, hackers stimulate alternate solutions, and alternate solutions stimulate a desire for use of them. To suppress hackers is to suppress some of the best and brightest minds in any group -- the very ones who, once they "settle down", become highly productive, highly capable engineers and programmers. If you suppress them, you suppress your country's techno-economic future. In a world where a tech innovation can change any paradigm virtually overnight, a suppressed techno-economy is a recipe for disaster. China cannot and will not be able to compete in the world economy if they suppress hackers. No amount of population thrown at a true problem can counter the efforts of one lone genius, in terms of solving said problem. Destroy that genius, and you will be left behind, forever playing catch-up, as the country which did not destroy its geniuses leaves you in the dust. -- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- Nicholas Bretagna II <mailto:afn41391at_private>mailto:afn41391at_private ------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- Declan McCullagh's politics and technology mailing list You may redistribute this message freely if you include this notice. To subscribe, visit http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------
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