National intranet

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A national intranet is an Internet Protocol-based walled garden network maintained by a nation state as a national substitute for the global Internet, with the aim of controlling and monitoring the communications of its inhabitants, as well as restricting their access to outside media. [1] Other names have been used, such as the use of the term halal internet in Islamic countries.

Contents

Such networks generally come with access to state-controlled media and national alternatives to foreign-run Internet services: search engines, web-based email, and so forth. [2]

List of countries with national intranets

Myanmar

Myanmar before 2011, while it was ruled by a military junta, used to have a separate intranet for domestic use called Myanmar Wide Web. [3]

Cuba

Cuba has its own state-controlled intranet called national web. [4] [5] [6] [7]

North Korea

North Korea's Kwangmyong network, dating back to 2000, is the best-known of this type of network. Cuba and Myanmar also use a similar network system that is separated from the rest of the Internet. [8] The network uses domain names under the .kp top-level domain that are not accessible from the global Internet. [9] As of 2016 the network uses IPv4 addresses reserved for private networks in the 10.0.0.0/8 range. [9]

Russia

In 2020 Russia tested internal internet known as RuNet (Internet in the Russian Federation). [10]

China

A primary insight flows from our research and it pertains to the stability of China’s internet: the internet in China is a walled garden in terms of structure yet at the same time dependent upon Western Europe and the United States for foreign connectivity. [11] [12] [13] Put plainly, in terms of resilience, China could effectively withdraw from the global public internet and maintain domestic connectivity (essentially having an intranet). [14] [15] [16] This means the rest of the world could be restricted from connecting into China, and vice versa for external connections for Chinese businesses/users. [17] [18] [19]

Iran

The National Information Network of Iran works like the Great Firewall of China. [20] [21] [22] In April 2011, a senior Iranian official, Ali Agha-Mohammadi announced government plans to launch its own halal internet, which would conform to Islamic values and provide appropriate services. [23] Creating such a network, similar to the North Korean example, would prevent unwanted information from outside Iran getting into the closed system. [8] The Iranian walled garden would have its own localized email service and search engine. [24]

See also

Related Research Articles

China censors both the publishing and viewing of online material. Many controversial events are censored from news coverage, preventing many Chinese citizens from knowing about the actions of their government, and severely restricting freedom of the press. China's censorship includes the complete blockage of various websites, apps, video games, inspiring the policy's nickname, the Great Firewall of China, which blocks websites. Methods used to block websites and pages include DNS spoofing, blocking access to IP addresses, analyzing and filtering URLs, packet inspection, and resetting connections.

Deep packet inspection (DPI) is a type of data processing that inspects in detail the data being sent over a computer network, and may take actions such as alerting, blocking, re-routing, or logging it accordingly. Deep packet inspection is often used for baselining application behavior, analyzing network usage, troubleshooting network performance, ensuring that data is in the correct format, checking for malicious code, eavesdropping, and internet censorship, among other purposes. There are multiple headers for IP packets; network equipment only needs to use the first of these for normal operation, but use of the second header is normally considered to be shallow packet inspection despite this definition.

The Great Firewall is the combination of legislative actions and technologies enforced by the People's Republic of China to regulate the Internet domestically. Its role in internet censorship in China is to block access to selected foreign websites and to slow down cross-border internet traffic. The Great Firewall operates by checking transmission control protocol (TCP) packets for keywords or sensitive words. If the keywords or sensitive words appear in the TCP packets, access will be closed. If one link is closed, more links from the same machine will be blocked by the Great Firewall. The effect includes: limiting access to foreign information sources, blocking foreign internet tools and mobile apps, and requiring foreign companies to adapt to domestic regulations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Psiphon</span> Free and open-source internet circumvention tool

Psiphon is a free and open-source Internet censorship circumvention tool that uses a combination of secure communication and obfuscation technologies, such as a VPN, SSH, and a Web proxy. Psiphon is a centrally managed and geographically diverse network of thousands of proxy servers, using a performance-oriented, single- and multi-hop routing architecture.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Freegate</span> Internet software utility

Freegate is a software application developed by Dynamic Internet Technology (DIT) that enables internet users to view websites blocked by their governments. The program takes advantage of a range of proxy servers called Dynaweb. This allows users to bypass Internet firewalls that block web sites by using DIT's Peer-to-peer (P2P)-like proxy network system. FreeGate's anti-censorship capability is further enhanced by a new, unique encryption and compression algorithm in the versions of 6.33 and above. Dynamic Internet Technology estimates Freegate had 200,000 users in 2004. The maintainer and CEO of DIT is Bill Xia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Internet censorship</span> Legal control of the internet

Internet censorship is the legal control or suppression of what can be accessed, published, or viewed on the Internet. Censorship is most often applied to specific internet domains but exceptionally may extend to all Internet resources located outside the jurisdiction of the censoring state. Internet censorship may also put restrictions on what information can be made internet accessible. Organizations providing internet access – such as schools and libraries – may choose to preclude access to material that they consider undesirable, offensive, age-inappropriate or even illegal, and regard this as ethical behavior rather than censorship. Individuals and organizations may engage in self-censorship of material they publish, for moral, religious, or business reasons, to conform to societal norms, political views, due to intimidation, or out of fear of legal or other consequences.

The internet in Cuba covers telecommunications in Cuba including the Cuban grassroots wireless community network and Internet censorship in Cuba.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kwangmyong (network)</span> North Korean "walled garden" national internet

Kwangmyong is a North Korean "walled garden" national intranet service opened in the early 2000s. The Kwangmyong intranet system stands in contrast to the global Internet in North Korea, which is available to fewer people in the country.

The Cuban government directly prevents access to certain websites. While preventing access to certain websites is present, it is not particularly extensive. Limited access to the Internet through limited internet infrastructure is the main problem with Internet access in Cuba.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Splinternet</span> Characterization of the Internet as splintering and dividing

The splinternet is a characterization of the Internet as splintering and dividing due to various factors, such as technology, commerce, politics, nationalism, religion, and divergent national interests. "Powerful forces are threatening to balkanise it", wrote the Economist weekly in 2010, arguing it could soon splinter along geographic and commercial boundaries. The Chinese government erected the "Great Firewall" for political reasons, and Russia has enacted the Sovereign Internet Law that allows it to partition itself from the rest of the Internet. Other nations, such as the US and Australia, have discussed plans to create a similar firewall to block child pornography or weapon-making instructions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fang Binxing</span> Chinese internet engineer; father of the Great Firewall

Fang Binxing is a former Principal of Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications. He is also known for his substantial contribution to China's Internet censorship infrastructure, and has been dubbed "Father of China's Great Fire Wall". Fang is also known for his role in Russia's Internet censorship due to his relationship with Igor Shchyogolev, former Russian communications minister and Russian President Putin's deputy on Internet issues.

The Golden Shield Project, also named National Public Security Work Informational Project, is the Chinese nationwide network-security fundamental constructional project by the e-government of the People's Republic of China. This project includes a security management information system, a criminal information system, an exit and entry administration information system, a supervisor information system, a traffic management information system, among others.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ultrasurf</span>

UltraSurf is a closed-source freeware Internet censorship circumvention product created by UltraReach Internet Corporation. The software bypasses Internet censorship and firewalls using an HTTP proxy server, and employs encryption protocols for privacy.

Internet censorship circumvention, also referred to as going over the wall or scientific browsing in China, is the use of various methods and tools to bypass internet censorship.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">VPN blocking</span>

VPN blocking is a technique used to block the encrypted protocol tunneling communications methods used by virtual private network (VPN) systems. Often used by large organizations such as national governments or corporations, it can act as a tool for computer security or Internet censorship by preventing the use of VPNs to bypass network firewall systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lantern (software)</span> Internet censorship circumvention software

Lantern is a free internet censorship circumvention tool that operates in some of the most extreme censorship environments, such as China, Iran, and Russia. It uses wide variety of protocols and techniques that obfuscate network traffic and/or co-mingle traffic with protocols censors are reluctant to block. It also uses domain fronting. It is not an anonymity tool like Tor.

GreatFire (GreatFire.org) is a website that monitors the status of websites censored by the Great Firewall of China and helps Chinese Internet users circumvent the censorship and blockage of websites in China. The site was first launched in 2011 by an anonymous trio. GreatFire is funded by sources inside and outside China, including the US-government-backed Open Technology Fund.

IT-backed authoritarianism, also known as techno-authoritarianism, digital authoritarianism or digital dictatorship, refers to the state use of information technology in order to control or manipulate both foreign and domestic populations. Tactics of digital authoritarianism may include mass surveillance including through biometrics such as facial recognition, internet firewalls and censorship, internet blackouts, disinformation campaigns, and digital social credit systems. Although some institutions assert that this term should only be used to refer to authoritarian governments, others argue that the tools of digital authoritarianism are being adopted and implemented by governments with "authoritarian tendencies", including democracies.

The National Information Network (NIN) (Persian: شبکۀ ملی اطلاعات, Shabake-ye Melli-ye Ettelā'āt), also known as National Internet in Iran and the Iranian intranet, is an ongoing project to develop a secure, stable infrastructure network and national intranet in Iran.

References

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  4. Scola, Nancy. "Wait, Cuba has its own Internet?". Washington Post. ISSN   0190-8286 . Retrieved 2021-03-20.
  5. "Cuba - The World Factbook". www.cia.gov. Retrieved 2021-03-20.
  6. "More Cubans have local intranet, mobile phones". Reuters. Retrieved 2021-03-20.
  7. Harrison Jacobs (Sep 6, 2018). "Is there internet in Cuba?". Business Insider. Retrieved 2021-03-20.
  8. 1 2 Christopher Rhoads and Farnaz Fassihi (May 28, 2011). "Iran Vows to Unplug Internet". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 2012-09-24.
  9. 1 2 Mäkeläinen, Mika (14 May 2016). "Yle Pohjois-Koreassa: Kurkista suljetun maan omaan tietoverkkoon" [Yle in North Korea: Peek into the Network of the Closed Country] (in Finnish). Yle . Retrieved 15 May 2016.
  10. "Russia Takes a Big Step Toward Internet Isolation". Wired. ISSN   1059-1028 . Retrieved 2021-03-20.
  11. Denyer, Simon (2016-05-23). "China's scary lesson to the world: Censoring the Internet works". Washington Post. ISSN   0190-8286 . Retrieved 2021-02-21.
  12. Chao, Loretta (2010-12-21). "'Father' of China's Great Firewall Shouted Off Own Microblog". Wall Street Journal. ISSN   0099-9660 . Retrieved 2021-02-21.
  13. Martina, Paul Carsten, Michael (2016-04-08). "U.S. says China internet censorship a burden for businesses". Reuters. Retrieved 2021-02-21.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  14. "How China's Internet Police Control Speech on the Internet". Radio Free Asia. Retrieved 2021-02-21.
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  17. Dave Allen (July 19, 2019). "Analysis by Oracle Internet Intelligence Highlights China's Unique Approach to Connecting to the Global Internet". Oracle. Retrieved 2020-07-30.
  18. Mozur, Paul (2015-09-14). "Baidu and CloudFlare Boost Users Over China's Great Firewall (Published 2015)". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2021-02-21.
  19. "How China's social media users created a new language to beat censorship on COVID-19". www.amnesty.org. 6 March 2020. Retrieved 2021-02-21.
  20. "Iran To Work With China To Create National Internet System". www.rferl.org. Retrieved 2021-02-21.
  21. Refugees, United Nations High Commissioner for. "Refworld | Freedom on the Net 2018 - Iran". Refworld. Retrieved 2021-02-21.
  22. "What You Need to Know about Internet Censorship in Iran". Centre for International Governance Innovation. Retrieved 2021-02-21.
  23. "Iran clamps down on Internet use", Saeed Kamali Dehghan, The Guardian, 5 January 2012
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