BBC websites blocked in China after security change | Hacker News Reader

BBC websites blocked in China after security change

bbc.com

76 pointsparalelogram33 comments

Haha, this sentence:

« It has altered all of its addresses from beginning "HTTP" to "HTTPS", which is widely considered to be a more secure connection »

Widely considered, I love it.

> Widely considered, I love it.

Didn't get this. Any technical issues/anecdote to make this more interesting?

Well, HTTP has zero security, and HTTPS has this big complicated security mechanism (TLS) that tries to ensure no one can snoop on your connection, alter the content, or pretend to be a server they aren't.

There's no subjectivity at stake, here: One is designed without security, the other is designed with security.

It's like saying the Atacama Desert is widely considered to be drier than a thunderstorm.

Having never tried Atacama Desert, I am going to guess it's like other desserts like trifle and mousse, which are in fact rather soggy.

I am not sure if you considered the intended audience of the article at all.

But if you think about that, the statement is about as good as it can be.

No: HTTPS is more secure than HTTP. This is true regardless of the intended audience.

Explaining why may be beyond a particular audience, but that doesn't justify weakening the truth with weasel words.

The journalist could have simply put "is more secure"—this is objectively true!—but then they got nervous, perhaps because they didn't understand the subject well enough, and decided to fall back to hedge phrases.

The statement is not as good as it can be, because it introduces uncertainty where in reality there is none.

but https against the great firewall (and its connection with state run dns/cert roots) is nothing but a nuisance.

It's more than a nuisance to them because they have not yet gotten everyone to use their DNS roots. That's why they're blocking the BBC!

And, widely considered, I believe that being banned by the Great Firewall is a badge of honor.

Why is that so surprising ? Moving to https:// makes it harder for the GFW to identify people who read specific articles. I can see how China feels news platforms that are https:// only need to be blocked.

Out of curiosity: how do other news outlets fare ?

Psiphon looks interesting, but if it's a network of thousands of proxy servers, then it will be trivial for the GFW to block those servers, no?

Every time I read “The Great Firewall” it puts a smile on my face - such a great name on multiple levels :-)

Does the Chinese government refer to it like that as well?

Yep, the characters used are 防火长城. This is literally "Fireproof Greatwall".

Is the app available on iOS in China?

Interestingly, the screencap that's the hero image for TFA includes a comparison between a picture of Xi and Obama and a picture of Winnie the Pooh and Tigger.

The Xi => Pooh comparison is (to my understanding) a common one in China, and one the Party tries to suppress.

The latest Winnie The Pooh movie (containing nothing offensive, suitable for children) has of course been banned in China.

I find it amazing how very powerful people can end up with such delicate egos. Here in the West we mock leaders all the time and it rarely undermines their authority.

This + inifinity

AFAIK there’s not problem with https in China - today most companies use https for their websites and app servers, see Baidu, Taobao, JD, etc. Maybe BBC didn’t register things correctly with the govt or the govt is just specifically targeting them. But the article’s title is a little misleading by implying that https leads to GFW blocking.

"We've seen cases outside the UK, with some of our World Service sites where foreign governments have tried to [track which articles and videos you're looking at or selectively suppress individual pieces of content]."

Is there any more information about such instances or is that insider knowledge?

Isn't this pretty much the definition of the "Great Firewall" ?

You don't have to look outside the UK for that.

BBC News was my captive portal go-to site. Sad to lose the non-redirecting http version.

http://example.com

I know, but BBC News is also one of my regular visits so it was a /useful/ captive redirect.

http://neverssl.com/

http;//n-gate.com

If you fix the semicolon I'll try to upvote this twice.

http://captive.apple.com Another alternative

http://detectportal.firefox.com/ -- seems like every browser is going to have its own :-)

www.mmm.com

Also http://httpforever.com/

http://neverssl.com

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