Computer and Library Learning (Archived)

Some countries such as China restrict their citizens’ access to the free flow of information on the Internet. A computer research team from the University of Michigan and University of Waterloo has developed an anti-censorship program called Telex. Telex is still in its infancy but a computer user in Beijing was able to download and test the software that informs Telex when servers have reached blocked websites such YouTube. Funding is needed to spread this program to a larger number of computer servers. Ian Goldberg, an assistant computer science professor at the University of Waterloo and a member of the research team, notes that the Telex technology is an attempt to equip the anti-censorship movement with improved tools.

Telex was unveiled last week at a San Francisco-based technology conference. Telex is supposed to work by connecting a computer to a Telex station based on a network outside of a government’s control. To do this, a computer user must install a small key or tag onto her/his computer. A computer user masks the attempt by first establishing a secure https connection on any permissible website with a login and password. Following the log-in, the software connects with a Telex station that provides unhindered access to the internet, following the detection of the hidden tag by a Telex-enabled server. Cryptographers would appreciate this use of steganography to hide the important messages or information through a decoy connection.

Some people in internet-restricted countries have been able to connect to outside proxy servers that grant full internet access. Unfortunately, government censors can detect this activity and deny access to these proxy servers. Professor Goldberg notes that his team’s approach is different and involves using routers within networks rather than servers that can be identified by their IP addresses. Were censors to discover the Telex stations in routers and disable them, a large portion of the internet (including permissible websites) would be inaccessible which could foster economic and political implications. Internet service providers (within countries that are supportive of a freely, open Internet) would need to co-operate to allow Telex to work with their systems and provide a collective front, according to J. Alex Halderman, an assistant professor of computer science and engineering at the University of Michigan. His colleague, Professor Goldberg, notes that Telex could be misappropriated to hide illegal websites (by western standards) but the internet service providers could be compelled by Western-based governments to give the real locations while remaining hidden to trick foreign-based censors.

Anyone interested in censorship and web filtering on the Internet may wish to keep track of Telex and its evolution over time.