From Techdirt, 2012-12-17:

China Tries To Block Encrypted Traffic
from the collapsing-the-tunnels dept

During the SOPA fight, at one point, we brought up the fact that increases in encryption were going to make most of the bill meaningless and ineffective in the long run, someone closely involved in trying to make SOPA a reality said that this wasn’t a problem because the next bill he was working on is one that would ban encryption. This, of course, was pure bluster and hyperbole from someone who was apparently both unfamiliar with the history of fights over encryption in the US, the value and importance of encryption for all sorts of important internet activities (hello online banking!), as well as the simple fact that “banning” encryption isn’t quite as easy as you might think. Still, for a guide on one attempt, that individual might want to take a look over at China, where VPN usage has become quite common to get around the Great Firewall. In response, it appears that some ISPs are now looking to block traffic that they believe is going through encrypted means.

A number of companies providing “virtual private network” (VPN) services to users in China say the new system is able to “learn, discover and block” the encrypted communications methods used by a number of different VPN systems.

China Unicom, one of the biggest telecoms providers in the country, is now killing connections where a VPN is detected, according to one company with a number of users in China.

This is the culmination of at least 35 years of official concern about the effects of personal computers.

I’m old enough to remember. As soon as computers became affordable to individuals in the late 1970s there was talk about “licensing” computer users. Talking Heads even wrote a song about it (Life During Wartime).

The good guys won, the bad guys lost.

Then, even before the Web, we had the Clipper chip. The EFF was created in response. And again the good guys won.

Then we had the CDA, and then CDA2. And again, the bad guys lost and the lovers of liberty won.

In the West, the war is mostly over (yet eternal vigilance remains the price of liberty).

Not so in the rest of the world, as last week’s ITU conference in Dubai demonstrated.

I say – let them try it. Let them lock down all the VPNs, shut off all the traffic they can’t parse. Let’s have the knock-down, drag-out fight between the hackers and the suits.

Stewart Brand was right. Information wants to be free. I know math. I know about steganography. I know about economics.

I know who will win.

I love when seemingly disparate things synchronize in unexpected ways.

According to The Legal Underground, Nobel laureate Friedrich von Hayek (1899-1992) “was exceedingly fond of t-shirts, especially those portraying images of Mick Jagger…”

Surprising enough; doesn’t fit our image of Hayek.

But it gets better. Sir Mick is a fan of Hayek (see 3:35 in the clip below):

Before quitting to start the Rolling Stones, Jagger attended the London School of Economics, where Hayek had taught.

Supposedly, Jagger’s adviser at the LSE “said that Mick Jagger did a careful net present value analysis of the value in attending LSE as compared to the foregone revenue from playing rock and roll. When the dollars came out higher for music, Mick came by and apologized to the adviser, but said he couldn’t afford to continue in school; LSE was just costing him too much money.”

Did I mention that Jagger also owns an Enigma machine? The rare 4-rotor type.

Now if I could just work Salma in there somehow, it would be perfect.

It’s the day before the US presidential election. I’m going to be voting for Barack Obama.

Why?

I appreciate Mr. McCain’s genuine love of country, independence on some important issues, and willingness to confront his party’s leadership on matters of principle.

And I don’t have any problem imagining Gov. Palin in the presidency – in a free country the presidency isn’t a very important role anyway. The president does not “run the country”, the people do. The president’s job is to run the government, and Gov. Palin seems unlikely to be worse at that than most of the presidents we’ve had in the last century.

Further, I disagree with most of Obama’s domestic policies. I disagree with less of McCain’s.

However, Mr. McCain has a reputation for stubbornness, arrogance, and poor insight into the longer-term consequences of his actions. Probably the best example of this is that, despite being told so in clear terms, he is still unable to understand (or care?) that McCain-Feingold has the effect of limiting political speech and the competition of ideas, rather than enhancing it.

If this were the worst that could be said about Mr. McCain, I’d probably still prefer him to Mr. Obama’s creeping socialism.

But. Mr. Bush – who campaigned in 2000 on a platform of a more humble, less arrogant foreign policy – has transformed the last vestiges of America’s reputation as an advocate and example of freedom into that of a thuggish, war-mongering bully, trampling the freedoms of its own citizens and a menacing invader and occupier of nations. And Mr. McCain promises to continue those policies.

As well, the last 8 years have destroyed any claim of the Republican party to stand for limited government, constrained spending, efficient administration, or defense of the Constitution. After 8 years of such performance, the Republicans simply deserve to lose.

Mr. Obama is clearly intelligent, is said to genuinely listen to and consider counsel, and appears to value reason and pragmatism.

I do hope the Democrats don’t get a filibuster-proof majority of 60 seats in the Senate – I’m a fan of divided government, and think that that a government that “can’t get anything done” is the best kind.

I expect Mr. Obama to disappoint me. Nonetheless, I will vote for him. It’s time for a change.

Update, April 2011: Mr. Obama has disappointed me. Can’t say I didn’t see it coming.