relying on a simple domain block-list. There’s domain blocking where I live too. I imagine it’s handled similarly on a technical level
To block a domain, it requires looking at the HTTP headers, though. So the only ways to do this with HTTPS is by either somehow breaking SSL or blocking based on domain’s IP, which causes high collateral damage due to cohosting, especially if the infringing domain is behing clourflare or is on amazon/azure/google infra. Oh and you can’t just block whatever IP’s the DNS is responding with, they got burned by it already when someone intentionally got their domain into blocklist and made DNS server resolve to 127.0.0.1. If your place also does this and it has a working democratic and judicial systems, I would suggest starting to raise questions about it.
This just says blocked, not outlawed. I also couldn’t find any other articles about Tor being outlawed. As long as it’s not illegal it’s no practical problem for me/you. According to this article, Tor and someone else is suing, which they wouldn’t do if they didn’t have a legal basis for operating. It even says it’s unconstitutional.
You’re right. I’ve looked into it and it seems that the reasoning behind the ban isn’t that it allows anonymity but the fact that exit nodes don’t restrict access to blocked sites, which is not at all possible for Tor. So I imagine they will soon, if not already, start going after it using DPI methods like they do with VPN’s already.
Based on what you’ve provided, it sounds like the anonymous computer in a cave scenario in the meme would go completely unnoticed by an averagely aggressive and averagely competent police state.
Well, based on what this computer is actually doing, it’s going to get cut off from all communications the moment anyone in that police state notices it. If it’s just pirate stuff then it’ll happen fairly quickly based on the amount and the obscurity of the sites in the blocklist. If it’s political - the owner of the server will be called for questioning. They’ll throw some of the bullshit laws at them to stack up (Got camera on your phone? Spy equipment! $2000 fine + confiscation! Liked any racist meme at any point in time? bam, extremism, 6 years in prison!) possible fines and jail time, but it’s all just to coerce them into cooperation.
Come on. I’m not planning to spy on the Russian military for the MI6! That’s several levels of shady beyond ‘anti-establishment website’.
Who knows what you might want to do with that server in the cave. This was just to show that they can and do reach outside the country in some cases. It’s not just for spies, though, they tried to do the same with Navalny and Kara-Murza, and a bunch of other less prominent figures. Also note, that all of those are botched attempts. In case of success, there will be no signs of poisoning as those chemicals are designed to break down quickly and leave no traces.
It can also be mitigated with a VPN and not using the state’s DNS
True, if your VPN protocol of choice isn’t banned already. But then, renting a box in Russia just to break out of it using a VPN kind of defeats the whole purpose.
Overall, you put it fairly accurate at “averagely aggressive and averagely competent police state”, we’re just going back and forth over specific details, but the point is that if you’re dealing with anything in Russia, you’re basically dealing with said police state, and the more you get involved with it, the harder you’ll eventually get rolled over by it. That’s why I suggest not getting involved with it at all in the first place. Having said that, I myself have certain obligations to visit Russia at some point in the future and I honestly dread of that moment. Wish me luck, I guess, but do you happen to know any good “dead hand” kind of software?