China/Saudi use US filtering software to censor the Net

[rainbow4321]

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/bus/columnists/jlanders/stories/041105dnbusworldview.4eb29.html



China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and other repressive regimes are adept at blocking political and religious speech on the Internet. They use filtering software that works just as well to block politics as it does porn, and hardware that can monitor as well as speed communications. But almost as quickly as these tools are distributed, the censors – sometimes using U.S. technology – find them and block them.

Bill Xia, president of Dynamic Internet Technology Inc., sells software to the U.S. government to circumvent censorship in China. DynaWeb provides Internet users with an innocuous proxy address to get beyond the censors and surf whatever sites they want.


"We are fighting with technologies from Western countries, very likely from our own neighborhood," said Mr. Xia. "It's kind of ridiculous that the IBB (U.S. International Broadcasting Bureau), supported by U.S. taxpayers, pays us to fight against technology from the United States."

Secure Computing Corp.'s SmartFilter software is used by the Saudi Arabian government to control Internet access throughout the desert kingdom. A study by the Open Net Initiative found the Saudis use SmartFilter mostly to block access to thousands of pornography sites. But political religious dissent sites are also blocked.