Iran to Replace "The Internet" with "Halal Intranet"

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203513604577142713916386248.html

by pooriaazimi • 15 years ago

148 92 15 years ago

online.wsj.com

Maybe the MPAA boss will propose the same thing next to stop piracy, especially if SOPA passes and still fails to stop piracy.

arkitaip2• 15 years ago

I would like to do something so that Iranians can continue accessing the Internet. I'm thinking contributing money or time to hardware related projects via which Iranians can totally circumvent the Iranian Internet infrastructure completely.

Any ideas, HN?

runn1ng2• 15 years ago

Run more Tor relays, I guess.

Tor is, at least according to Tor stats - https://metrics.torproject.org/users.html?graph=direct-users... - used intensively in Iran and Iran is not very effective in blocking it (unlike China) - 11% of all Tor users are from Iran, which is a lot, considering their population (45664 users daily)

runn1ng2• 15 years ago

Running a tor relay is deadly simple. And statistically, about 11% of the traffic will be used directly by Iran's users wanting to go around censorship.

jacobr• 15 years ago

You might want to get involved with Telecomix, they've done just that. See http://telecomix.org and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecomix

JonnieCache2• 15 years ago

Yep. Telecomix is the perfect place to start if you want to help.

arkitaip2• 15 years ago

Thank you, will look into this ASAP.

eliben2• 15 years ago

There are many intelligent people in Iran, and they have the privelege to see this unrolling in front of their eyes. Wake up, before you become North Korea.

nextparadigms7• 15 years ago

I could say the same thing about US. The unfortunate truth is that most people don't care enough until it's really too late to change anything. And if they do want to change it, then they will need overwhelming numbers to change the policy, and possibly even violence to remove the Government.

But I do think things are starting to change a bit. As the society moves away from the "read-only" type of media, where they only get to think about the "choices" they are presented with, which has led to a lot of people, especially young people, to not even care about voting anymore, because they realized their vote won't change anything when the vast majority of the population could still get mass-manipulated, to a society that is more "read/write" thanks to the Internet, and where they are much more engaged in political issues, and don't want to sit idle on the side. This should ultimately lead to healthier democracies.

Democracies turn rotten when the people don't care about what happens at the top, which tends to encourage politicians to do whatever they want when they are there and seek more power ever faster.

bmuon• 15 years ago

> Democracies turn rotten when the people don't care about what happens at the top

Exactly. Plus it seems there is a global movement of some sort in this direction even in countries with a history that would make you expect the opposite (stable democracy after a long history of military coups). Spain has approved SOPA-like laws. Argentina just passed a "counter-terrorism" law that has nothing to do with our country's reality. And so far we've managed to stop the few attempts by the music industry to lobby for restrictive laws, but they will try again.

Gustomaximus• 15 years ago

Wake up and do what? Don't forget the massive protests over elections earlier this year where police were shooting people. I say this not because I think the Iranian people should do nothing but I feel we must understand the level of commitment it takes to be an activist in Iran compared to the a more liberal country. Would you be willing to put your life on the line to protest this?

eliben2• 15 years ago

If anything, 2011 has proven that oppressed peoples (in the Middle East) are willing to put their life on their line, and actually succeed eventually. Even in psycopatch-ruled Syria the protest is likely to eventually succeed.

AndrewDucker• 15 years ago

Looking at the context in the article, it seems that the government is running scared of dissent, and is now cracking down further and further.

The citizens they talked to seem to be dismissive of the attempts, and one wonders if the government is going to squeeze too hard and cause a backlash.

Monotoko• 15 years ago

I have five tor exit nodes running at the moment... after reading this I'm doubling it to ten!

gioele• 15 years ago

Where are those nodes? I know that in the US running a Tor exit node may be a safe thing [1], but I wonder about the legality of them in the rest of the word, the EU especially.

The problem is not whether you end up guilty or innocent after a trial; the problem is the trial itself. Who can afford the time (years) and money (~10k €) needed for a penal process? And I can imaging you being pictured by the press covering the trial as a dangerous hacker helping terrorists and similar things.

[1] https://www.torproject.org/eff/tor-legal-faq.html

DrCatbox2• 15 years ago

"The video surveillance brings Iran further into the vanguard of nations that have sought to keep tabs on Internet use. Libya under Moammar Gadhafi ran extensive web-monitoring operations. China has sophisticated website filtering and an army of censors patrolling chat rooms. China and Cuba require Internet-cafe users to present identification."

Sweden is filtering and web-monitoring, it is very easy for the state to know exactly who does what. NSA is not behind in this technology. USA has sock puppet software, they dont need armies of censors.

The internet is dead.

pooriaazimi3• 15 years ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship

I'm a little shocked about Sweden's "web monitoring". From wikipedia it looks like they're just blocking some porn sites... Could you elaborate more?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_by_country#...

DrCatbox2• 15 years ago

A few years ago a law was passed that permitted the FRA (Försvarets Radio Anstalt) (Defense Radio Establishment) to spy on all the traffic that passes through swedish borders, the FRA had been doing so illegaly for the past ten years and that was a scandal too. What constitutes border, in the internet the FRA is monitoring, is not defined.

Swedens #1 ISP, TeliaSonera is on the list of CIA/USA as strategic foreign resource to protect in case of major war due to them being able to spy on much of communications going to russia/east, the list was leaked by wikileaks if I remember correctly.

More: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FRA_law

Zirro• 15 years ago

Other than sites with child-porn, no pages are blocked. However, more or less upon request from the US, we have the FRA who can monitor telephone-conversations, Internet-traffic etc for people they suspect for various reasons. Sadly, it probably can't be done without some peoples privacy being breached.

omegaworks• 15 years ago

Long live the internet!

OoTheNigerian• 15 years ago

Unfortunately, there is no government with the moral credibility to speak up.

Iran's censorship is direct, autocratic and politically motivated

US' censorship is indirect, 'democratic' and commercially motivated.

Dear US goverment, please rethink your decision. Your might and support in the world comes not from your military strength but your perceived moral credibility and being seen as the standard. The right standard.

Do not change it.

PS: Has WSJ written anything against SOPA?

nextparadigms7• 15 years ago

I'm starting to think the indirect, commercial approach is actually worse, because it's so misleading ("we'll save millions of jobs!"). The US Government couldn't have convinced so many countries to start restricting their Internet. It's "thanks" to MPAA and RIAA that they are doing it.

cup2• 15 years ago

There has been an ongoing and pervasive systematic increase in stories portraying a negative light on Iran and Iranian society. This, along with obvious current affair issues, leads me to believe that a 'propaganda war' much akin to the one we saw before Iraq and Afghanistan is slowly coming to life.

The fact of the matter is that amongst all the countries in the Middle East, Iran is the one that most Americans and Europeans would probably find most similarities with. It's incredibly youthful, energetic, entreprenuriel and when it comes to the younger generation, liberal. While I don't doubt that the political establishment might be attempting to curtail free access to the internet I question why It's of concern to us when America is trying to ram SOPA and other bills down our throats and when our "allies" in the mid-east region already have complex and functioning systems in place to regulate and censore access to foreign websites.

I've spent many years living in the mid east and I just can't shake off the unmistaken feeling of an attempt to sway the public into thinking Iran is a monolithic demonic institute.

nextparadigms7• 15 years ago

People should see more videos and images like these, before they are quick to ask for bombing them:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98j0I7e5OHE&feature=youtu...

second_side• 15 years ago

Awwww.... Pretty pictures of an uptake of western culture, consumerism and aesthetics... Must be such a nice place for them.

People should see more videos and images like these, before they are quick to ask for bombing them:

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=2a0_1185106657 WARNING : NSFL!!! Serious, It cannot be unseen!! Its your choice to view the link.

Motivational isn't it.... You think the Iran regime is not interested in spreading and expanding its joyful way of life thoughout the world given the chance? The "incredibly youthful, energetic, entreprenuriel and when it comes to the younger generation, liberal" people of Iran deserve/need your help in overthrowing the regime (with as little blood spilt as possible) that thinks this is how society should live. You can't argue the above away with.... look they have LV scarfs and pretty girls.

pooriaazimi3• 15 years ago

Reporting the facts is not propaganda.

P.S. and, as an Iranian, I can assure you the last thing I want is to be bombed.

zerostar07• 15 years ago

Selectively reporting for facts is. That is not to say that I believe this one is. Another down reported story in American media is the Russian protests.

mooki2• 15 years ago

Iranians ARE youthful, energetic, entrepreneurial and liberal. That's why they're constantly trying to revolt against the ass-backwards represive government they're stuck with. It's a country of huge constrasts.

There is definitely some kind of propaganda war going on to, but that doesn't mean Iran's government isn't horrible.

cup2• 15 years ago

Change must come from within though. You can bet your bottom dollar that those youthful, liberal Iranians will be the first to join the resistance movement in the event of an invasion just like I'm sure many HN users and other young Americans would swell to defend their homeland if they were attacked by an equally imperialistic and foreign entity, say China or

bruce511• 15 years ago

From the article:

>> A conservative cleric blogger based in the holy Shiite city of Qum, Ahmad Najimi, said in his blog last week that the government was paying hackers hired in the network known as the "Cyber Army" the equivalent of $7 per hour to swarm the Web with positive comments about the Islamic Republic and post negative comments against dissidents.

So we ask ourselves, are comments here that are mitigating Iran's actions here - or ones that divert the conversation to say SOPA - getting paid by the hour?

but wait - if we assume _all_ positive comments are paid for, then we're denying those that are unpaid to voice valid counter arguments.

Oh my head, my poor head....

nextparadigms7• 15 years ago

That happens in China, too. When there's a new policy or law, they pay thousands of people to write positive comments about it.

fistofjohnwayne• 15 years ago

Generally those commenters stick to Iran-themed websites and blogs but I wouldn't be shocked to find them posting here. You should also consider how often SOPA is being brought up needlessly in conversations across the entire web. I doubt the rate is much different in discussions involving Iran. The causal link is more likely to be "a story discussing Internet censorship of any kind."

JonnieCache2• 15 years ago

>a 'propaganda war' much akin to the one we saw before Iraq and Afghanistan is slowly coming to life.

Yep, it's been going on for a month or two now. Preparing the public for another brilliant war that we can definitely afford. I'm fairly sure we (the US and UK, probably the french) are already at war with iran already, in the form of the various cyber attacks, assassinations and embassy closures that've been in the news in recent months.

Here's a couple of articles on the subject, from the point of view of the war-weary and somewhat disbelieving british left. Trust me, we can't fucking believe they're doing it again either.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/06/iran-war...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/07/iran-war...

avar• 15 years ago

    Preparing the public for another brilliant war
    that we can definitely afford.

I'm going to assume that by "afford" you mean monetarily. In that case how do you know it can't be afforded?

At least the Iraq war was arguably mainly about resource acquisition , have there been any studies about how cost-effective that resource acquisition is in the long term?

The wars cost billions of dollars, but the invading forces now have control over billions of dollars of oil resources as well. Has anyone done a realistic cost analysis on how those two stack up against each other?

rsheridan6• 15 years ago

I've been reading that we're about to go to war with Iran, any time now, since 2004, and it keeps not happening. I would be very surprised if we attacked Iran during the Obama administration.

user97562• 15 years ago

The problem with Iran is not its government, people, religion or culture. It's the fact that Iran is independent from the US and the West in general (but also from the East; "neither West or East").

For those who are curios about Iran, events occurring there, and its relationship with the US (from a "non-mainstream"/"non-demonising" perspective), I can recommend:

- http://www.raceforiran.com/

- http://www.iranaffairs.com/iran_affairs/

- http://mideastreality.blogspot.com/

- http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii/

- http://www.bibijon.org/iranimage/

Those who have questions regarding the 2009 elections:

- http://brillwebsite.com/writings/iran2009election.html (he is also a frequent visitor to the "race for Iran" blog)

xster2• 15 years ago

Nothing new here... more of the same since many decades. Check http://www.amazon.com/Overthrow-Americas-Century-Regime-Chan... and now Libya and Syria while ignoring the most likely more oppressive US ally Saudi Arabia.

mohsen• 15 years ago

After having a long conversation with a close friend in Iran, and also reading this post guess post on Juan Cole's blog [ http://www.juancole.com/2012/01/jahanpour-as-us-and-iran-con... ] I'm starting to realize more and more that the way we have treated Iran since Carter (read: 1979 revolution) is completely wrong. Instead of finding ways to pressure the Iranian government we are hurting the Iranian people. The sanctions we place on Iran hurts the Iranian people and their small businesses much more than the Iranian government and it's abundant(for now) oil resource.

Obama really tried at first to bring in a different approach. First off he understood the structure of power in Iran and so wrote a letter to Khamenei directly. Then he tried to talk to the Iranian people in parallel by sending the message for Norooz (Iranian New Year). Next he offered to sit and talk with the Iranians without any preconditions, but what messed everything up for him was the Iranian elections. That was (read: is) a big pile of mess that no one really knew (read: knows) how to deal with.

neilk• 15 years ago

You're right and wrong.

The White House probably has not called up the WSJ and said to print articles against Iran. But there is an consensus forming among the USA's elites, that Iran is the next enemy that needs to be dealt with.

In this environment, Iran becomes more interesting to the editors of the WSJ and other agenda-setting newspapers, like the New York Times. And, they will find that government agencies are far more likely to help with stories about Iranian oppression.

That said: the Iranian government is really making it easy to write such stories. SOPA is horrible, in that it upsets the balance between free speech and copyright holders. Installing cameras in every internet café, with the open objective of enabling the secret police to control everyone's thoughts and actions, all the time? I think that's in a different class of behavior. (Although, the USA is sadly inching in the direction of authoritarianism and unlimited government surveillance, there's still a big, big difference.)

So let's be skeptical of a rush to a conclusion that we must bomb the evildoers, but neither should we be complacent about Iranian internal oppression.

snowwrestler• 15 years ago

It's of concern to us because we like the parts of Iranian society you mention, and we'd like them to succeed. This action will most likely harm them.

sleepyhead2• 15 years ago

"start collecting detailed personal information on customers" This has been the norm in Iran for a while. I visited there for three months in 2008 and was always asked for my name and passport number when going to internet cafes. But usually they were relaxed about it so did not have to show my passport so I usually wrote "George Bush", "Johnny Cash" or other fake names. The staff would also usually help me with finding a proxy as Facebook and some email services were blocked. There were not a central filter but filtering was done individually by the ISPs. For example Facebook was blocked in Tehran but not in the rest of the country.

Edit: By the way, you should all visit Iran. It is a safe country with interesting architecture, culture, history and very friendly people.

josefresco• 15 years ago

Sounds good, you want to go hiking when we get there? On second thought, maybe we should stay home.

sleepyhead2• 15 years ago

I went hiking there. And I went snowboarding in the mountains. Was fantastic. But if you plan to cross the border from a country occupied by the same state that enforces sanctions on Iran then I would advise against that, in the same way as I would advise against crossing the border from Mexico to the US while hiking without any proper entering visa.

roshangry• 15 years ago

I second your edit. I'm in Iran right now and I'm having an excellent time.

hippich• 15 years ago

It is like deja vu:

- Belarus March 2011 - national currency drops by more than 50% to USD due government failure.

- Since you can not get together more than 3 persons in public places (it will be illegal meeting/petitioning), people used social networks (twitter, vkontakte.ru) to get together every Wednesday's evening at some announced location and just stay there (no talking, no doing anything illegal, not causing any trouble for anybody). Occasionally - clap in hands. So it is like flashmob, just scheduled :)

- After second such event - access to twitter.com, facebook.com, vkontakte.ru, etc sites was blocked nationally each Wednesday. Organizer's account in vkontakte.ru was hacked somehow by Belarus police/KGB (probably, not hacked, but "enforced" - it is easier for them just to call to organization and request information instead)

- After 3 months our government tried to pass updates to a law about public meetings trying to make "public not-doing" illegal (this is what these people were "doing" each Wednesday). Thanks god, this did not pass through 'cos it is insane.

- Next - the law discussed there - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3415897 - was introduced and quickly after that was approved :)

Belarus currency to USD exchange rate, January 2011 - 3200 brb for 1 USD Belarus currency to USD exchange rate, December 2011 - 8500 brb for 1 USD

xster2• 15 years ago

USA to replace the internet with SOPA intranet

riffic• 15 years ago

This isn't an Onion story?

mahmud• 15 years ago

Has nothing to do with "Halal". NOTHING about Islamic jurisprudence (Fiqh) makes a mention of anything but edibles when it comes to Halal. If you hear some autocratic douchebag call something Halal or Haram when speaking of non-food items, you know you're being bullshat.

This is nothing but good ole consolidation of power. Iranians call it Halal, Americans call it counter-terrorism and intellectual property, others call it enforcement of rightous morals, upright character, national concensus, surprise non-consensual posterior-sex or whatever label one assigns to power-grab. This is it.

Fuck the ruling Mulahs and fuck the business, political and military-industrial engines that are conspiring against the People everywhere on earth.

nazar5• 15 years ago

Muslim's here, Halal as in حلال and Haram as in حَرَام do not limit themselves to stuff related to food. Really it's not. I am not implying that Internet can be haram or halal, but there are things besides food that are considered either halal or haram. For example, sexual intercourse without nikah is considered haram, and the opposite is considered halal. ‎ ‎

darklajid• 15 years ago

I'm completely clueless and wanted to know what 'nikah' is here.

I'm sure I'm missing subtleties, but it might help other readers to think of 'marriage' or 'marriage contract' etc..

I wasn't sure what to make of it and thought for a second that it's an accessory or something like that.

Jun8• 15 years ago

Thanks for correcting the mistake in the parent comment. For the uninitiated: as a simplification things you can do fall into three categories: halal (you can do it and it's a good thing), makruh (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Makruh, مكروه) (smt that's not a clear sin but should best be avoided), and haram (you shouldn't do it, it's sin), these all have subclasses and it's complicated, so this is a rough guide. The non-Muslim population generally encounters only the food aspect of this distinction, due to notices on restaurants and food items.

Now, many (orthodox) Muslims would consider lusting after women who are not your wife (or wives where that applies) as haram, and see the Internet as a thing that facilitates this. This is not a new thing, e.g. the Internet is heavily filtered in Saudi Arabia. You can't subscribe to, say, Playboy from that country or have it sent to you, because they check the mail items.

Now, whether all this makes sense in year 2012 is another question.

Aloisius• 15 years ago

Interesting. The Jewish equivalents of kosher (proper), parve (neutral) or treif (bad) also originally only applied to food (Kashrut dietary laws), but going as far back as the 3rd century, kosher came to mean "virtuous." It is pretty easy jump once you start talking about utensils used for food being kosher or not.

ithought• 15 years ago

Jew here. I'm willing to give up my religion if I can find a Muslim friend to pledge to give up his religion.

We could become deists and agree to stop allowing religion to influence government, culture and education.

nodemaker• 15 years ago

No True Scotsman!

pooriaazimi3• 15 years ago

It's been called 'Halal Internet' by the government for the past two years (they're both in Persian):

- http://irna.ir/NewsShow.aspx?NID=30339700 (IRNA is Iran's Official News Agency, and this guy is Vice President’s deputy of Supervision and Coordination of Economic Strategies)

- http://www.tabnak.ir/fa/news/158720

You can google 'اینترنت حلال' to see for yourself.

[edit: also check http://www.fastcompany.com/1748123/iran-launching-halal-inte... out.]

eternalban• 15 years ago

>> Fuck the ruling Mulahs and fuck the business, political and military-industrial engines that are conspiring against the People everywhere on earth.

Some of us (Iranians) are convinced that they are one and the same, Mahmud!

Shorn of their regime specific insignias, they appear to be interchangeable. Can you, for example, tell the difference between the cops beating on G7 protesters and IRI's riot corps? Same equipment, same training, same uniforms, and the same attitude towards the dissenting citizen.

Certainly nothing in Islam (partisan of Ali or not) even remotely allows for the establishment of an all powerful 'Pope' like figure of the Velayateh Faqih [1]. So whether halal is applicable or not is irrelevant. The very foundation of the entity that is issuing these religious directives is based on a lie (or at best a grave theological error by the self-styled "Signs of God" aka Ayat'o'llahs) and [must] be dismantled.

Follow the money is as always applicable. They are all business partners, and yes, apparently they are globally announcing that they will shy of no measure to hold on to their loot and power. "All options are on the table".

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Velayat-e_faqih

vijayr• 15 years ago

Either one of these is gonna happen:

a) people's patience runs out, they revolt and win and we end up keeping open/decentralized internet b) idiot politicians and greedy corporations win, and everyone gets a number tattooed on his chest, and all of us become no more than a few rows in a bunch of databases

I sure hope it is the first that happens

feralchimp• 15 years ago

Run Tor exit nodes (or donate to someone who will).

https://blog.torproject.org/blog/support-tor-network-donate-...

dazbradbury• 15 years ago

Halal, is it .me you're looking for...

j45• 15 years ago

So, Iran is doing the same as SOPA wants to, and China is doing with filtering the internet.

tlogan• 15 years ago

I know a little about Iran (I have friends living there and my father was working there), and it seems like the only reason why mulas are in power is America (there is joke that FoxNews is Iranian TV network).

Also, Iran's government is very corrupted (even ridiculously obvious) and in many many cases decisions are based on economical interests told with verses from Kuran.

Of course, there are some people who genuinely believe in ideas of Iran's revolutions but they are already old senile and mainly used as tokens.

In short, the second Iranian revolution will come soon.

Iran to Replace "The Internet" with "Halal Intranet"

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