Gmail blocked in China
reuters.com
reuters.com
gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com (74.125.31.26, blocked)
alt1.gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com
alt2.gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com
alt3.gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com
alt4.gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com
This means China now risks becoming isolated in global email network, not just "access" to Gmail.
And no, your VPN/SSH/whatever_tunnel won't work if all of the MX servers are blocked.
If the Chinese government were shrewd, they would do what the American government does: make using American servers as easy as possible then spy on the contents.
If I worked in Yahoo!'s SOC this'd put me on high alert.
The reason I ask is because that particular network you mentioned is only one of dozens that Google serves up as the A record for gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com. From my location, it's on 74.125.25.26 instead. And the MX for Google Apps hosted domain customers (including google.com itself) is aspmx.l.google.com, which (again from this location) is 173.194.79.27 or 74.125.28.26 or 74.125.20.27 or one of dozens of other IPs.
Saying that they "Blocked Gmail" has an intuitive meaning that they blocked the HTTP interface to it, but they also blocked a part of the SMTP interface.
> No, but they are required for sending email to Gmail
My personal take is that there's a great war for democracy going on right now and the final lines are being drawn. The weaker autocrats have fallen (mideast, Ukraine, etc) and the stronger ones are falling (Syria) but the strongest have double-down on oppression (China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, etc). I think this political dynamic will be the defining narrative for quite some time.
I also think a balkanazation of the internet is slowly happening. China is certainly doing it and Russia might follow. I personally don't have a big problem with this. Probably means less malware and cyberattacks for everyone. I think its obvious that easy access to information isn't this revolutionary thing, at least in autocratic regimes. People just seem to prefer state controlled media or narratives that fit in with their biases. Once China sets the precedent others will follow, especially if there's zero economic fallout from it.
But on the other hand, I must say that your observations described in your first paragraph are correct. Take the recent Hong Kong protest for an example, almost all people I know, including the highly educated people, are "tricked" by the censored local newspaper and are not on the same side of the HK people, and that made me sad and irritated...
However, China has a one party system. There is no counter to the Communist Party.
The USA's political system is substantially less free than many other nations. In turn, China is substantially less free than the US. Whether equating the two is really hyperbolic is debatable - functionally speaking, vested interests are allowed to run unchecked in both countries.
The main difference really lies in the source of power. In China, the Party runs the show and corporations fall into line. In the US it's the opposite, where corporations hold sway over the white house.
China at least has aspirations to lift the living standards of all its citizens. It's not easy but they're getting there - compare China with India for instance. Can't say the same for the US.
The corporations can always bribe into the party, and many of the corporations are owned by princelings (or say Wen Jiaobao mom's jewelry empire that got NYT blocked). I would say that China is much worse in that regard.
> China at least has aspirations to lift the living standards of all its citizens.
Income inequality is only getting worse, not better. All boats are lifting right now, just those with guangxi get lifted much faster, while those at the bottom barely keep pace with inflation. If the economy falters this year, it could get very interesting.
As I understood it, the HK protestors undermined their own support within China with their racism and condescension toward mainland Chinese and the perception* that they never protested autocratic British rule. If I were a Chinese citizen, even if I wanted the same things as the HK protestors, I wouldn't support them out of self-respect.
*I say perception to give HK the benefit of the doubt. A quick Googling didn't yield anything except an unhelpful Quora answer.
The middle class think they're better than the lower and upper class, and the lower class think they're better than the rest. SF thinks it's better than NYC and those finance wonks with our software industry, NYC thinks it better than the rest of the world, and DC thinks I'm the center of power here!
My city's sports team is the best sports team, and screw my city's rivals! Xbox vs Playstation, this vs that. Those scary islamic people vs. my secular atheism or mormonism.
It's the human tribalism instinct, and it's turtles all the way down.
Except when they don't. For example, it is not unreasonable to say that Putin lost the presidential elections in many regions (recall news stories where they showed 150% of the vote). Most importantly this 'perceived' popularity leads to people not turning out to vote, making it a self fulfilling prophecy. Indeed, the basis for Putin's universal popularity is 'precieved' popularity.
Many Chinese support their cultural superiority BUT many will quickly point out problems with their government and the need for reform.
The population that genuinely supports autocratic systems in Russia and China are in the minority, the rest are dis-disorganized, demoralized and confused but they are also in the majority. That why China runs their firewall.
>> I personally don't have a big problem with this. Probably means less malware and cyberattacks for everyone.
The internet has a cultural program of uniting humanity which fosters understanding leading to practical things like trade and a less tit-for-tat aggression.
Even one county with 100% votes for Obama is a sign of fraud.
You are hooked on simple journalistic reporting mistake and this hook does not do good for you reasoning.
To be clear, I think that Western people through all their hiatory enjoed a wast energy surplus. There were reports by early US settlers about buffalo herds that was to ride around in a day! The same is true for Europe.
This means where westerners can get away with some freedom, russians have to be very tight in their energy budget. For China it is about same - small group rules huge and diverse population and has to schedule resources mindfully. The situation hasn't changed since forever.
If you want to help Russia and/or China, open your IP to them. Take profits from not-energy-constrained West, help energy constrained East.
If yes, Russia has lots of oil, and China (and anyone else) can just build nuclear power plants. Problem solved.
Sun energy in heat form is accesible for everyone. Oil require substantial investment.
Also keep in mind that all this is historical and that even replacing all people in bureacratic machine will make the dame machine to rwappear. E.g., government of energy/resource constrained country will be prwtty much same as previous. Orherwise many people will die.
If you can evict a person to streets at SF, you cannot do so anywhere in Russia. Rhere's not enough sun light. In China it is the same, except evicted person cannot use land, it is occupied.
As a russian/chinese government official you have to behave differently. You either will punish strongly to prevent bad behavioe, or you will prevent bad behaviour by other means.
And remember, if by some magic you made into chinese govt, you will start to behave more or less same as as current one. Just because gpvt reproduce themselves in same circumstances and for same goals.
Now on other issues, Chinese are also demanding to be protected. From things like corruption. However, because of the way things work in China... this desire to be protected from corruption, at times, actually ends up strengthening the central government as well. This is because the people who are normally... say... appropriating land illegally... are local officials. The local people, on the other hand, know that if they protest long enough, and loud enough, that Beijing will come. At which point things will go in a decidedly bad fashion for the local bosses. So Beijing comes off as their 'savior' in a lot of these cases as well.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that, I really think Chinese are looking at the problems they have from a different perspective than you do. From their perspective... Beijing is a help with a lot of their issues... not a hindrance or the cause. From their perspective, oppression hasn't 'doubled down', Beijing is ALLEVIATING a lot of oppression. Getting a better understanding of how Chinese people feel about things... in addition to an understanding of which issues they believe Beijing to be the cause of, might go a long way towards alleviating your frustrations.
Beijing also prevents information (as well as people) flowing from one part of the country to another, both physically and digitally, to prevent outbreaks (typically against the government).
These are just two examples. Please tell me how Beijing is alleviating oppression.
Citation? Unrest in Xinjiang seems to rank pretty high on NYTimes' headlines.
Is this surprising or weighty to you considering that censored brainwashing culture they've grown up in?
> They buy into the anti-Western narrative
They do not "buy into the anti-Western narrative", they are tricked into it.
All of this makes
> The people have chosen an autocratic government and
Really silly.
Autocracy over a state in chaos anyday.
My point is not that banning GMail is good, but that you are judging an institution without knowing their intent. They could be wrong, but not for the reason that you do not give them.
I certainly agree on the balkanisation, though. Ebbs and flows, I hope.
As for your more general point: Western values are great in Western countries; Western inequality in a country with red envelopes and little over-sight of officials is less ideal. Western alcohol is fun in a fancy restaurant with a French ceremonial Maitre d´ that frowns on excess; it is less ideal in a country without a tradition for moderation. The subsequent lash out can be amusing where a hen party ends trying to act sober and cute in front of a jaded cop; it is far less so to see your touchy-feely employer come home drunk in a country where domestic employment is akin to servitude. I'm obviously exaggerating, but Westernisation (and simultaneous but unrelated issues, like working class disempowerment) has left many people wondering, and they found reasons to doubt.
If you are a traveller who mainly faces empowered businessmen , it is difficult to conceive good examples of this -- but many stories would make you pause. Vice.com (has a very criticisable editorial line, but) offers a unique look in many such examples: I remember a couple about plastic surgery that were very telling (and unexpected for people more used to judging people´s coding style on a screen than their physique on a dance floor), one in Korea the other in the Caribbean. International style magazine has lead Koreans to go under the knife and unreasonable amount of time to look more Westerners: nothing to do with SMTP in theory, but enough to let family members amalgamate Yahoo! editorial choices and their shame over a daughter´s botched operation. I have no idea what aspect of Western world leads women in the Central America to inject motor oil in their… Well, try to look for that episode if you care and care stand far more than gore (it is incredibly gross) but in it, you'll hear people accuse International standards and social media a lot. It is sad for Westerners living in an Emirate when that only bar where you can kiss in public without being scorned gets closed for `indecency´ but I suspect there are more nefarious things that have happened there than diplomats remembering their honeymoon in Paris. My experience is pushing on "What do you mean by corrupt Western values?" doesn't usually lead to a detailed description of a working democracy.
More importantly, my point was that "claim" is very far from a single, consistent argument about how 'Asia' works (I do not think that 'Asia' is really a consistent entity). It's more a convenient accretion of reaction to local experiences, often negatives. Western values work fine say, on Pacific islands that have had an incredibly different culture.
In any case, Gmail is just one of many email tools - if Chinese people are so culturally unprepared to deal with Gmail, how are they culturally prepared to deal with QQ Mail, or Weibo/Weixin for that matter? This is just further censorship of a tool either for economic/protectionist reasons, or because it protects the CCP's hold on power. I'd struggle to see this as part of any plan to gradually implement democracy or as part of any uniquely 'Chinese' democratic development.
I also know about the hugely chauvanistic social culture, the very traditional "women cook, clean and look after kids, men go out and work" family culture that exists in most places, the huge amount of undocumented domestic violence, a massive prostitution industry and a very weak legal framework through which women can seek redress for pay imbalance, domestic/sexual abuse etc. I also know that there's zero paternity leave, and typically only 3-4 months maternity pay for women, a long history of forced abortions and until 2003 women had to specifically ask permission from their (usually male) boss before they could get married! So yeah, I do know a bit about China's "gender equality" :)
OTOH the "western values" on the Internet as we've recently observed include total worldwide surveillance, hacking everything at will, manipulation of social networks and so on, so maybe your "democratic" high horse is not so high after all.
I can't imagine if my government blocked my gmail . I'll lose not just my email,play, my app engine websites etc etc.
I teach a basic web development workshop to university and vocational school students. One of the things we teach is how to look up things for youself on the internet. (Is that a cry of disbelief I hear? You can't imagine how confused I was before we specifically modeled and taught this.) Baidu search results, when it comes to searching for technical answers, are really lame. Google's search results are better, mostly because they tap heavily into the stackexchange network. It's disappointing and frustrating to try to encourage students to search for things via Baidu because the answers to their questions are so difficult to find. I've had students tell me that they turn on a VPN in order to access Google because those search results are that much better.
And it's not just a problem with having poor search results, but blocking the actual sites that have information is mind-boggling to me. I /know/ that China can do finer grain filtering than on a per-domain basis; I've seen specific articles blocked on wikipedia while wikipedia itself remained accessible.
SOCKS proxies will get cut off after ~1h or so, you'll have a 'cool down' period of a few minutes, and then they'll come back.
Presumably this is to irritate, or perhaps to have a chance to see which requests slip through during the disruption.
Speaking to locals they don't care. There is an alternative for everything and they are better suited to Chinese culture too.
Well good for them, either way with this policy the Chinese government enforces, I don't think China will be able to compete internationally in the software industry.
You don't need to compete internationally when you can get that kind of userbase domestically, and the Great Firewall is absolutely and to some extent intentionally a big part of that.
That is a very self-centered point of view, in recent european TED talks there were speakers like Mikko Hypponen from F-Secure, that there should be "european" versions of Google, Facebook, so we can avoid all the dragnet datamining etc. unethical web development solutions and NSA spying that somehow pass in the US.
Bear in mind that it won't just be Western markets they target.
Of course, this way it's only going to get worse over time.
Locals don't care that they can't use certain American sites, or don't care that they are intellectually oppressed?
Well, there's a few options left, no?
That's the problem that any would-be Chinese or Russian revolutionary faces. Earlier revolutions could be conducted with the involvement of only 10-15% of the population, but these days, you can't do much to change things even with 80% of the population behind you.
I'm also wondering what would happen if the U.S. takes this to the World Trade Organization. Arbitrarily blocking some company's services could well be interpreted as unfair trade practices. And a more aggressive U.S. government, perhaps with a more protectionist president in 2016, might well decide to retaliate.
At the same time though, Chinese people are fairly used to censorship. It's pervasive at every level in China, so much so that it can sometimes be difficult to see.
I think there is a stymying effect here, but there is no way that the Communist Party will give up censorship of the internet over nothing.
There might be at least some possibility that using the WTO could help this. It did have an effect on the rare earth trade when China was restricting rare earth exports [1]. I suspect China would fight _far_ harder against this though.
Looking forward to see this issue escalate, as it's the only way to deter the Chinese Gov't.
> a government that
A litany of complaints against the Chinese government can go on and on and on, but it's not (anymore) a single person dictatorship, nor is it an obvious kleptocracy despite robust corruption. Its claim of being a government for and by the people stands up to scrutiny, even if its methods and outcomes are oppressive and aren't democratic.
> rolls tanks against its own citizens
[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/09/us/war-gear-flows-to-polic...
It would be an administrative simplification for me if China would block itself from my port 25.
That doesn't help employees who need Mobile email access. As of now, companies can't count on remote access to corporate gmail by Chinese employees. We have about 2500 Chinese employees with sanctioned BYOD phones - it's a huge problem!
Has Google made any statement about whether these will be operable or not?
It seems to me the US doesn't have much leverage regarding this particular issue. We would be best served working harder towards more affordable and flexible manufacturing automation so we can be more self-reliant.
The great firewall project is a big business for a lot of people (e.g., billions dollars business if not much more). Hardware providers look for the deals. Professors in universities look for funds (for themselves and for their students). And the biggest cut would be bribes for officials and commissions for pimps. The worst part is this business is sort of under table and there is not much control.
All these people want this business to stay and grow under the name of glorious "reasons", and there is just zero motive for people to get in its way.
It's not necessarily completely self serving; many Chinese leaders do have their people's interests at heart. (Not all do, of course.) It's easy to argue that the many of the former Soviet republics are doing much worse now than they were in 1989.
1 - Prevent the people from reading and discussion sensitive issues - there are so many of them.
2 - Prevent the people from knowing universal values.
But on the bright side, looks like China will begin a struggle to stop "organ harvesting", a euphemism if I've ever seen one. (Not that the effort is forecast to be successful.)
From a meta narrative, it's interesting that there was a great push for centralization of everything, which Google benefited from. Now, due to political realities, we may be seeing another huge push for localization, even if it means owning one's own cloud server somewhere that one can VPN into.
Apart from a vocal minority of patriots, most people are quite aware of the lack of democratic freedoms, crackdowns of dissidence, or restrictions on speech. But most people are very satisfied with the prosperity of the status quo. Case in point: in response to the very public Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong, the Mainland Chinese response was either "meh" or that Hong Kong people were overly optimistic that the Chinese government would allow universal suffrage in Hong Kong. Source: HK national.
It won't cause everything to get blocked - if they were going to block everything, they could have done that already.
Python website has since added another download link written in Chinese on their website.
[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_19... , called 六四事件 in Chinese, literally means six-four incident since it happened on 4th of June
We live in this amazing world and yet we have all these geopolitical issues (Eastern Europe, Middle East, Tibet, Kashmir, etc.) caused by various factors we vehemently believe/oppose (we humans have an brilliant capacity to rationalize any of our actions/beliefs). This past summer, I traveled across Kashmir with my two high school friends to visit the areas where the Indo-Pakistani[3] and Sino-Indian[4] wars took place. The landscape was beautiful, especially in the Ladakh regions. But overall, these regions are occupied by villages and small towns dwarfed by the huge military bases. Why can't these local people live by themselves without the fear of another war? Most of you already know, it's the same textbook example: a new ruler comes in town, finds the need to distract/rally his or her country - what better than a war (this "war" could be extended to politics/tech/biz, not just the old Roman wars)? History is littered with the similar plots and it works every single time.
Sometimes, I wonder if an ET contact would be good for our world so we could put down our differences and realize we are all in this together so we could take care of each other, our neighbors, and our amazing planet! Also, solving Fermi's paradox [5] would be icing on the cake!
[1]http://freetibet.org/news-media/na/full-list-self-immolation... [2]http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/12/26/uk-china-tibet-idUK... [3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indo-Pakistani_wars_and_confli... [4]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-Indian_War [5]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8796270
I mean, I suppose Americans are terrified of the Pakistani children their military is killing with drones too.
i've already started a backup strategy long ago (about 8 months ago) as the frustration was just started to drive me crazy, I migrated all my services to either local equivalents or microsoft (outlook.com), but there's only a matter of time before those perhaps also get blocked.
of similar relation, ever since the snowden leaks, it seems that china has started looking to ban or outright limit foreign technology services used by the china government which is basically almost like everything, the nickname is qu ioe, qu which stands for out/oust, ioe stands for ibm, oracle, and emc.
note that vpn still seems to work, and if you're traveling on a roaming mobile service, you can still access google services (and others like facebook, twitter, youtube), but if you're plugging into the hotel wifi without vpn, good f'ing luck. note that i also work at a foreign national software company in china, the office can access these services uninhibited since we have an mpls to the main office in the valley.
if you're living in china and dependent on foreign services/apis like google then it's really hard because you must have vpn or some equivalent. i suggest even using a jumpbox.
Some select quotes:
"The problems with Gmail access this time may be caused by the China side, by Google itself or a combination of the two. But Western media pointed the finger at Chinese authorities immediately, accusing them of strengthening its cyber censorship. This is far too simple a hypothesis. It should be noted that Google voluntarily quit the mainland market in 2010. The issue at heart is to what extent Google is willing to obey Chinese law, on which China's attitude is steadfast."
"In this sense, it's dubious that China "blocked" Gmail simply over security concerns. Since both Google and China haven't given an explanation and meanwhile Gmail is a technically complex system, there may be some puzzling reasons behind the incident.
"If the China side indeed blocked Gmail, the decision must have been prompted by newly emerged security reasons. If that is the case, Gmail users need to accept the reality of Gmail being suspended in China. But we hope it is not the case."
The article's original Chinese version can be found here: http://tech.huanqiu.com/internet/2014-12/5313893.html
Curiously, the English version is missing the following two paragraphs:
"中美围绕互联网既有合作，亦有摩擦，双方的相互适应过程仍在继续。由于中美关系庞大而复杂，互联网问题只是其中一部分，外部变数的影响也是存在的。"(Third to last paragraph)
My translation: In regards to the Internet, China and the US both cooperate and experience some frictions, so the mutual adaptation process of the two sides continues. Due to the complexity of the Sino-US relationship, Internet issues are only a part of it, and there also exist other external variables.
"因此无论Gmail“失联”是谷歌还是中方的原因，或者是复合原因，使用者们不妨顺其自然，做多手准备。中国发展有过多难以计数的磕绊和插曲，这个故事又算得了什么。"(Last paragraph)
My translation: Whether Gmail's "losing contact" is caused by Google or China, or a combination thereof, users should just go with the flow, and be prepared with other backup plans. China's development process has been met with countless stumbles and other interludes, so this story doesn't really matter in the end.
I'm thinking of switching over but my primary concern is whether Fastmail encounters similar problems to Gmail. (You might recommend using a VPN all the time, but that doesn't always work for me).
Could anybody shed light on this?
Why is an entire program needed just to run a simple ssh command? I couldn't find any info on the matter.
The best tool I've ever used was https://github.com/apenwarr/sshuttle , because it was far lower level than a proxy. Unfortunately, it's super unstable on modern OSX versions.
Tor is semi-blocked here, you won't be able to establish a connection to the network without a tunnel.
1) Since China effectively blocked most of Google's services (and uses Google's mobile operating system for free and makes a ton of money off it - look at Xiaomi), Isn't it basically that China was able to rob Google, and doesn't suffer any consequences from it?
2) Also most US websites are blocked in China (Google, Facebook, Dropbox, Youtube, Twitter, Wikipedia, NYTimes, the list goes on and on...) Why is it that the US government doesn't take any action against that, where as China is freely dumping cheap manufactured products that are made in factories that violate human rights?
Because the US goverment is in league with China[1], and American voters have a non-pragmatic view of unilateral free-trade? [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_United_States_campaign_fin...
It's funny that they even hosted a world internet conference recently.
As it stands end users are reduced to pawns in the emerging power struggle between governments and multinationals.
I also don't think you understand HN very well. What is supported is not supported on grounds of legality but on what is viewed as good for people as a whole. "What is legal is what is right and what is right is what is legal" is the antithesis of how most hackers think.
In all reality, Google, Facebook, and others would _love_ to have even the smallest presence in China to get access to that user base. It's a gold mine just waiting to be cracked. Until they are, it will be referred to as "The Great Firewall", when in reality, Chinese internet users probably aren't really missing a lot, outside of politically charged sites, perhaps.
I expect this to be especially true with Twitter, which is often a very valuable back channel for many communities of interest (for example, a lot of prominent engineers in several programming language communities use Twitter as a way to share novel ideas and libraries).
When you cut off Chinese users from these sites, you cut them off from a lot more than just inconvenient political content.
Sure, there are social and political issues, but most Chinese Internet users are very happy with what's available to them. The reality is, there are two "Internets", and China's Internet is a very large one.