There is a lot to be said about the Great Firewall of China. Also known as the Golden Shield Project, this baby has been intact since 2003, but has been in design since as early as 98. The goal of this is to restrict any information that might jeopardize their control over the current media mediums. The easiest of this is by blacklists, but there are other items such as keyword blocks and selective routing.
DNS poisoning anyone? Funny that many of the so-called features were and are tactics for simplistic network hacking and misdirection. All of which is done at the router level.
So the big question however on everyone’s mind is… is 8Asians influential enough to even gain a block from the Golden Shield? So far, I’ve heard mixed reviews so I decided to put it to the test. Other 8A authors have said that it indeed is blocked. Yet John Kennedy from Global Voices, tested the link from Beijing University and had no issues getting through.
So which was it?
The Great Firewall of China test site came back with a block. Yet Website Pulse’s China test site came back from their servers in Hong Kong, Beijing, and Shanghai all with flying colors. The partial block straight out would mean that we are probably not blacklisted. In fact, it could only be a localized or separate blacklist provision since you would think that any type of routing that is blocked by Golden Shield would be blocked regardless of where the servers are due to how the main routing tables are set up in China.
One day perhaps we’ll actually see that 8Asians has risen to the top of the block list. But for now, we’re still getting through.
Photo Credit: (Isaac Mao)
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Bertie wrote:
My old website, superhyperdemonchild.com, when it was in existence, was blocked. It only got around 350 visitors a day, i.e. my site was highly UNinfluential. Back then, I used to rant a bit about Taiwan independence. Maybe that was why I was blocked.
Tear down that firewall!
Posted on 18-Nov-07 at 9:51 am | Permalink
jp 吉平 wrote:
The GFC exisists, but I think the GFC test site is a hoax. And I say that because I’m reading from Shanghai, China.
Posted on 18-Nov-07 at 2:13 pm | Permalink
jp 吉平 wrote:
you’d think I know how to spell “exists.” obviously I don’t.
Posted on 18-Nov-07 at 2:14 pm | Permalink
John Y wrote:
“localized or separate blacklist provision” is probably right, plus content filtering, so the same site could get blocked or not blocked based on the page you try to bring up. Content filtering should be expensive, but it has been in use for sure.
Posted on 19-Nov-07 at 7:19 am | Permalink
Robertson wrote:
I’m glad your not blocked, I’m finding this an interesting site, and the more people who see it the better–especially those in mainland China.
What’s even better is that you’re not concerned about your site being blocked, and practicing self-censorship because of that.
I’ll have to keep checking back here. Keep up the good work!
Posted on 19-Nov-07 at 7:21 am | Permalink
Zozo Manno wrote:
You can try http://www.proxychina.org to access blocked sites. It is a non profit organization supporting freedom of surf. Their servers are very fast and optimized for Chinese connections.
Posted on 19-Dec-07 at 4:46 am | Permalink
The Future of Internet wrote:
Cracks in the Great Firewall of China…
Hopefully, the Internet will become freely available to everyone who needs it, sometime in the future. Right now, the roughly 160 million Chinese Internet users are monitored by the Great Firewall. According to Wired, President Hu Jintao last year said…
Posted on 11-Jan-08 at 2:31 pm | Permalink