The Dec. 1, 2006, release of the anti-censorship computer program, ‘Psiphon,’ marked the start of controversy and violence as it took another step in transferring citizen activism to the Internet. Psiphon is used to serve as a loophole for those who live in countries with censored Internet access. The program is installed on computers in a country without Internet restrictions, such as the United States or Canada. Installing the software transforms the computers into access points for users in censored countries.
Users in the censored countries can then be given a URL, username, and password, in order to gain unrestricted Internet access through an uncensored computer.
Currently, there are approximately 40 governments that censor Internet access for their citizens including China, Vietnam, Iran and Saudi Arabia. Web sites that are censored include political blogs, anti-government sites, e-mail, and even Web sites having to do with American pop culture.
Palestinian first-year, Deena Zaru, says that some Middle-Eastern governments censor the Internet in order to prevent the spread of Western culture.
“Countries like Iran are so strict on what people view. They view the Western world as corrupt with things like homosexuality,” said Zaru. “Things like racy pictures or music videos . you can’t see those there.”
Zaru said that the differences between cultures that are made apparent on the Internet are seen as bad rather than different in most middle-eastern countries.
“They don’t see it as a difference, they see it as something that will corrupt their culture,” said Zaru. “They fear that the western world is going to try to change Arabic society, and take away their values and traditions. That’s in all things: politics, pop culture, religion.”
Contrary to these views, human rights organizations are still fighting for all people to have equal access to information. Psiphon was created at the University of Toronto and was funded by the Open Society Institute, a foundation dedicated to giving grants to projects that work for human rights.
Ron Diebert, head developer of Psiphon, said that the Internet community has responded well to the release of the software.
“We released Psiphon on Dec. 1, and within a week, I think we had 30,000 downloads of Psiphon software,” said Diebert to On the Media.
The software is said to work well and be virtually undetectable. Because the software is installed in a non-censored country, it cannot be used to incriminate a user in a censored one.
The development of the software has put its creators in danger. Diebert had a run-in with two agents from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.
“Their explanation for why they got in touch with us was that we were a possible target for foreign agents,” said Diebert to MacLean’s Magazine.
Another man helping in the development of Psiphon was found dead while doing some investigative work in Asia for the software. He was reported to have committed suicide but was found with two bullet wounds to the head.
In Atlanta, two men who were suspected to be Chinese agents beat up a programmer for Psiphon. The men also stole the programmer’s computer.
Diebert knows that his project has been quite dangerous.
“Everybody involved in this project has stories,” said Diebert. “It’s certainly the nature of the business, in the parts of the world we deal with, that people who challenge authority in this way are ‘taken care of.’