Hi Stil!

I’m writing from Beijing, and as you may know I’ve been here for 6 months studying Mandarin Chinese, and I’ll be here for about another year.

The internet filter is a very interesting and variable thing to observe! My personal method of bypassing is to run an SSH connection to a shell server overseas, and establish a SOCKS proxy over the SSH connection. It’s very easy to do, the standard ssh client has this capability built in. I have set up keyfile authentication for my SSH session, so all I need to do is click one icon to bring up my SSH session and SOCKS tunnel. And from there all I need to do is set my application/s to use the SOCKS proxy. On my Mac it is very easy to do so, as there is a central preference setting for proxies.

I soon found this a bit too slow for all my connections, however, so I wrote a Proxy Auto-Configuration File (.PAC) file which sends connections to only certain URLs via the SOCKS tunnel, and sends the rest direct. If the SOCKS tunnel is unavailable, it attempts to go direct.

In case anyone is interested, here is my current PAC file.

I have had no problem reading your article and accessing those links, I even downloaded RSF’s little “Blogger’s Handbook” without incident.

I think some of the most interesting things that you raise are the elements of the system that encourage “self-censorship” as well as simple shifts in behaviour. For example, the seemingly random nature of some blocking does give the impression that someone is watching. I can talk for 30 minutes on MSN with a friend and mention topics like Tibet and Xinjiang / Urumqi etc, but then inexplicably, the connection might stop working… was it because I said something I shouldn’t have? And you think to yourself… well, to avoid the hassle next time, I’ll just talk about something else.

Access to most overseas sites is very very slow here. I supposedly have a 512KB cable (ethernet) connection here, but accessing anything overseas is like dial-up speed. You eventually think “why bother waiting?” and look at more local content instead. This is probably particularly so if you’re Chinese, and you find it a whole lot easier to read Chinese than English (even if you’ve studied it). A good case is Google – the overseas editions of Google are painfully slow to access (even though Google use Akamai, so they should be well optimised), so even when searching in English I’ll often prefer to use Google’s local site, which has been censored.

You do have to wonder how much the slow overseas access is due to congested links, and how much is on purpose. It certainly has an effect on behaviour.

The practice of impairing your access for a short time after you do something “naughty” also encourages self censorship. For example, occasionally the BBC Chinese website is accessible through the firewall, and I can read a couple of articles. But if I happen to click on one of the articles that has some “controvertial” content, then my whole access to the entire site (including the English language pages) is gone for a while. It seems easier to avoid the trouble and just click on some less-controvertial article.

Try freedur.com, it’s the easiest solution around.

This is a very old thread, but I feel I ought to tack on more for anyone else who comes along. Take a penny, leave a penny, etc. If the GFC was really as monstrous and godlike as everyone thinks, my expat friend and myself would not be able to comment so freely, would we?

Thank you for this information, fellows. This confirms what I always suspected, but of course, I shall behave in my usual manner all the same. I love China, and wouldn’t ever want to be a lousy guest. I don’t think the GFC is anything more than a method to keep an extra billion people from hurting their own selves. A lot of western criticism would have you believe that the majority of people here are miserable, or should be. Contrast will do that to a point of view. What I do think, though, is that the way it is set up right now looks too suspicious, even if it isn’t intended to be. It’s embarrassingly clunky, but it’s all they have to work with. The hard-headedness implies the illusion of sophistication.

I couldn’t imagine any entity being able to monitor internet activity of a community 24/7. Even if there are devices put in place and even if there is a system designed to narrow their monitoring for specific “naughty” behaviour, there are just too many people in China.
It is normally offline activity that gets someone in trouble for something they do online, unless it is something super-serious, or unless you’re completely careless.

Catching the people behind the Google phishing snafu is something everyone can say is impossible, after all. They’re either super-evasive, or they’re the killers OJ has been looking for for over fifteen years. I don’t believe this country is directly responsible for that incident, but they are accountable, and they must set things right (I think they know it’s in their best interest to).

• Proxies get zapped regularly, but they’re like buses. A new one comes along. Some suggest that the proxies themselves are gov’t-run, so they can really nail the careless folks, but I sincerely doubt it. Some suggest that you can get viruses easily through them, and that is something I am illiterate about. The one I am using gives me a mountain of pop-ups on Firefox, but Chrome stifles them (it does not “block” them in the parlance of making the non-existent).
• YouTube might be banned, but there is a simple method to watching YouTube videos made available. Type “cn” after you type “www.youtube” and before “.com”. You cannot log in, you cannot comment (obviously), and you cannot click to continue onto other videos. You can, however, use the search engine, which opens in a new tab in your browser (Firefox and Chrome, at least).

I don’t know about the legality of any of these things, mind you. Chinese law is cryptic to me, and I don’t know if any one local person can offer me sufficient second-hand information. One can stumble onto some sketchy content here, like in any country, and I wonder if it is only a matter of time if curiosity killed the cat. Considering my awareness and my self-control, I feel confident. I imagine accidental stumbling would be as likely dismissed here as it would anywhere else in the world, if it’s ever brought to light in the first place.

I hope this helps, and if I am wrong on anything, I urge you to correct me. As I said, I am not here to cause a fuss. I love this country for many reasons; one of them being the incredible harmony for such a large populace.

RC