Speaker 1: Welcome to you Stuff you Should Know from House Stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Speaker 1: Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuck Bryant's Stuff you Should
Speaker 1: Know with Jerry. Depending where you are in the world,
Speaker 1: you may not be hearing this right now. Yeah, I've
Speaker 1: heard tell that we are banned in China. I don't
Speaker 1: know that that's true. I bet it's true. We're not
Speaker 1: FETs in first Yeah, but well we'll get that. I'll
Speaker 1: bet you couldn't find our Chinese pollution Sniffer episode though. Well,
Speaker 1: that's what I'm saying about. There are certain things um
Speaker 1: or the one child policy episode. I bet you couldn't
Speaker 1: find that, which, by the way, probably banded China. It's
Speaker 1: a little weird that we didn't even mention that episode
Speaker 1: in the zero population episode. Did we not? Not only
Speaker 1: did we not mention that episode, apparently we didn't even
Speaker 1: mention China's one child policy at all. I thought it.
Speaker 1: It doesn't seem like us. Actually, it seems exactly like us.
Speaker 1: You know what I did though public service announcement. I
Speaker 1: said it was okay for poisonous spiders to bite your dog,
Speaker 1: And that's not true. I don't know where I got that.
Speaker 1: I definitely didn't make it up like I read it,
Speaker 1: and I couldn't find it and it's wrong. So um,
Speaker 1: it is not good for your animals to get bitten
Speaker 1: by poisonous spiders, and of all people, for me to
Speaker 1: say that I was shamed. Okay, that's right. I just
Speaker 1: want to correct that up front, because I think that's good.
Speaker 1: That's as long as you correct yourself when you find
Speaker 1: out like, that's great. Chu. Yeah, it just bothered me
Speaker 1: that I couldn't find out where I did it and
Speaker 1: people just thought I was just free wheeling. You know,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter. Uh, So Okay, you feel better now
Speaker 1: you got that off your chest. Are you ready to
Speaker 1: talk about in a censorship in all of its vicious, pernicious,
Speaker 1: nefarious forms. Okay, let's do it. So um. In researching
Speaker 1: this article, fine article by John Strickland, hosts of tech Stuff,
Speaker 1: who has probably covered this eight ways from Sunday. So
Speaker 1: if this floats your boat, go check out tech Stuff
Speaker 1: as the podcast. It's good stuff and it's tech stuff. Um.
Speaker 1: The I found that I knew most of this stuff already,
Speaker 1: but I also found in doing like external research that
Speaker 1: he followed pretty much the standard of explaining censorship on
Speaker 1: the Internet, and that it takes a number of different forms,
Speaker 1: but ultimately its goal is the same. It's just restricting
Speaker 1: access to information, whether that information be in the form
Speaker 1: of a neuty picture or a picture or an essay
Speaker 1: that is that controverts some sort of official policy of
Speaker 1: a government. Um, there's all sorts of different ways that
Speaker 1: you can restrict access to information, and we've been doing
Speaker 1: it for a very very very long time. Like this
Speaker 1: is nothing new. It's just censorship in a new form
Speaker 1: in a new medium. That's right, because I mean we
Speaker 1: did when I book Banning pretty old way form of censorship,
Speaker 1: the m p a A. That was another censorship episode.
Speaker 1: And so now that we have the Internet, there's this
Speaker 1: big struggle over just how much access should people be allowed.
Speaker 1: And a lot of people say unfettered, total access to
Speaker 1: everything all the time. Everyone should have. If you don't
Speaker 1: want your kids looking at stuff, buy a web filter,
Speaker 1: do it yourself. But it's not the role of anybody
Speaker 1: else besides parents specifically with their children, to fetter access
Speaker 1: on the Internet. And I kind of agree with that.
Speaker 1: Well yeah, well, and it's apparent like I wouldn't want
Speaker 1: to leave that to someone else anyway, you know. Point
Speaker 1: like I think a parent should decide when and where
Speaker 1: their kids discover certain things, just have that in their control,
Speaker 1: you know. So I get that part of it for sure. Um,
Speaker 1: so I guess we should go ahead and start there.
Speaker 1: That is One form of Internet censorship is apparent saying
Speaker 1: I've seen the web. I know it's on that thing.
Speaker 1: It gets kind of dark, it gets super dark, like
Speaker 1: by accident sometimes you know, like you've typed the wrong
Speaker 1: thing in in Google images before and been shocked at
Speaker 1: what you found. Imagine like havn then like a ten
Speaker 1: year old kids seeing that kind of thing. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: good no, And you can't stand over your kid and
Speaker 1: put your hand over their eyes or hand over their
Speaker 1: ears or anything like that all the time. So there's
Speaker 1: software for this kind of thing. Yeah, And again I
Speaker 1: don't think it's about like raising your child in a
Speaker 1: bubble where they think that the world is roses and rainbows.
Speaker 1: But um, as apparent, you probably want to be in
Speaker 1: control of what kind of disturbing images they see at
Speaker 1: what age, you know. So Yeah, there's things, uh CYBERsitter. Um,
Speaker 1: there's programs called net nanny and uh right, Now, what
Speaker 1: they do is, um, they have a series of options,
Speaker 1: generally that you can select as a parent on what
Speaker 1: sites that your child can access, and then those options
Speaker 1: till the program to enable certain filters. Then all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, your kids goes to type and YouTube and um,
Speaker 1: a big frownie face pops up like a crying baby's face.
Speaker 1: Shame on you. What did you want to do on YouTube?
Speaker 1: Your man? Um, So what you're talking about is a
Speaker 1: web filter program. Yeah, it's a software add on, right,
Speaker 1: and um. Web filters use one of two techniques to
Speaker 1: censor the Internet. Right. They use blacklists, which is a
Speaker 1: list of specific domain names that you are not allowed
Speaker 1: to access keywords um. And then there's also well no,
Speaker 1: that's different. That's the other one is keywords. Okay, So
Speaker 1: a blacklist is like, um, how stuff works dot Com?
Speaker 1: Yea on the list, and so if your kid tries
Speaker 1: to go to how stuff works dot com or any
Speaker 1: of its subdomains, it's gonna be blocked. Yeah, those are
Speaker 1: the filter options that I was talking about, but with
Speaker 1: the keyword yeah, it's a different type of filter option
Speaker 1: where um, there's keywords, Uh that if when, when the
Speaker 1: kid tries to go to a website this um. The
Speaker 1: web filter scans the page to see if there's any
Speaker 1: of these keywords, and if there are, then it'll block
Speaker 1: that site. Yeah, because those keywords are what are put
Speaker 1: there so you can find those things. Like if you
Speaker 1: see the keyword to like some porn video, it'll have
Speaker 1: a whole list of words describing what you're seeing. And
Speaker 1: so if you have those keywords, um, it'll it'll root
Speaker 1: it out. And so you can't go because that site
Speaker 1: said I had the keyword ejaculate. It's probably once. It's funny.
Speaker 1: I meant to tell you when we did the male
Speaker 1: Puberty UM episode. I went onto the computer, the public
Speaker 1: computer at the clubhouse. UM, and my clubhouse, right, why
Speaker 1: don't you do that? It's a print. I don't have
Speaker 1: a printer at home. You still don't have a printer. No,
Speaker 1: that's a good printer at the clubhouse. There's a big
Speaker 1: difference between printer at home and like a good printer
Speaker 1: and the clubhouse printer. This printer is a good printer.
Speaker 1: You know what they say, club can't beat the clubhouse printer. Right.
Speaker 1: But I tried to go on and it was like, no,
Speaker 1: you can't. You can't open this web page really because
Speaker 1: it was had I'm sure it was erection is what
Speaker 1: blocked it. And it said Josh Clark and unit can't
Speaker 1: go on to read about male puberty. Uh. But then
Speaker 1: I tried it again, I refreshed and it was like okay,
Speaker 1: and it let me on. So it wasn't the best
Speaker 1: web filter ever. But and you didn't get a strongly lettered,
Speaker 1: uh worded letter shoved under your door that night, not
Speaker 1: that night. All right, that's good. So yeah, blocking out
Speaker 1: these keywords, um these blacklist keyword blocking, that's a It's
Speaker 1: a great way to filter out nefarious websites. There's also firewalls,
Speaker 1: and I've been trying to get to the bottom of
Speaker 1: the difference between a firewall and a web filter. I
Speaker 1: heard you in Strickland talking about it earlier. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: you had to ask that the pro Yeah, and uh yeah,
Speaker 1: it's pretty cool. I can go to the author of
Speaker 1: the article and ask Yeah. I almost went down there
Speaker 1: and I was like, Josh, I'll tell me. So. A
Speaker 1: firewall basically protects the computer or the local network from
Speaker 1: the rest of the Internet, not just websites, but um
Speaker 1: internet relay chats like instant messaging, uh, email, all that stuff.
Speaker 1: It protects it and it says you can come through,
Speaker 1: you can come through, but you can't come through, and
Speaker 1: protects from viruses and malware and attacks and that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff, whereas a web filter is um it more
Speaker 1: says you can't go onto these things, so they still
Speaker 1: exist like technically on your computer. Right, is that the difference,
Speaker 1: like the firewall is further upstream. No, no, am I
Speaker 1: misunderstanding it. It's it's actually the nuances is difficult to understand.
Speaker 1: If you go and type been difference between firewall and
Speaker 1: web filter, it doesn't bring up a lot of stuff,
Speaker 1: and this stuff that does bring up, it's it's kind
Speaker 1: of hard to understand. So basically, the firewall protects your
Speaker 1: entire computer or network from the rest of the Internet.
Speaker 1: A web filter restricts access from your computer to the
Speaker 1: rest of the Internet. It's almost directional difference going out
Speaker 1: or coming in. We don't have to bring him in
Speaker 1: here doing I'm gonna go kid, no, no, it'll be
Speaker 1: like the necronomic episode all over again. So um. One
Speaker 1: of the problems with web filtering software that opponents like
Speaker 1: to harp on is that they don't. Um, it's just
Speaker 1: like keywords and things. They can't talk about context and
Speaker 1: filtering context. So you might not be able to get
Speaker 1: a recipe for chicken breast because as we're breast in it, um,
Speaker 1: which you know, I guess if your kid let's cook
Speaker 1: chicken breasts, he's out of luck, right, you know, because
Speaker 1: it's only like the network, it's just for the kid, right,
Speaker 1: Like they have to log on and that enacts the software.
Speaker 1: It's probably on all the time. And then if you're
Speaker 1: the parent, you can be like, uh, no, I need
Speaker 1: this chicken brest recipe, right, or you're you have it
Speaker 1: on the one computer that your kid uses and you
Speaker 1: trust them to not use your philip frog, your filthy computer.
Speaker 1: You know. Uh, it's got flies buzzing around. That's um,
Speaker 1: that's the home version. When you're just trying to protect
Speaker 1: your kiddies from seeing the darkness that is the web.
Speaker 1: A lot of people can't argue with that. Um. There's
Speaker 1: also business censorship, which we don't have really here because
Speaker 1: we have to research all kinds of things. Part of
Speaker 1: our job is to be on social media. But um,
Speaker 1: if you work for a big corporation, you may not
Speaker 1: even be able to get on Facebook at work. Well,
Speaker 1: from what I could tell, Facebook is probably the most
Speaker 1: censored website on the entire Internet. Yeah, I believe that. Um,
Speaker 1: like far and away, Yeah, there's like, uh, there was
Speaker 1: this list from I think it was like two thousand
Speaker 1: leaven which is just totally out of date for this
Speaker 1: kind of stuff. Sure, but Facebook was like four and
Speaker 1: the rest of them. I think the next one was
Speaker 1: maybe my Space or something like that, and like ten
Speaker 1: of all businesses banned that or something. So like far
Speaker 1: and away, Facebook is the most banned, which makes sense
Speaker 1: because it's a time suck. Yes it is. And if
Speaker 1: you if your job has nothing to do with social
Speaker 1: there's no reason for you to be on Facebook for
Speaker 1: any reason whatsoever. Now they really didn't um and uh,
Speaker 1: since we're talking about Facebook. For the followers of stuff
Speaker 1: you should know who are listeners to this show, I
Speaker 1: apologize for all the non listeners that have invaded our
Speaker 1: Facebook page. Oh what happened every there? Well, we just
Speaker 1: we really grew a ton remember on that like one
Speaker 1: year span, and I don't know how, but we got
Speaker 1: blasted out and a lot of people who have no
Speaker 1: idea who we are that we even have a podcast.
Speaker 1: Just started following the page. I guess it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is interesting things, you know? And just follow the feed?
Speaker 1: And are they a lot of fun to have on
Speaker 1: their jerks man And you can spot him a mile
Speaker 1: away because the stuff you should know. Army is well
Speaker 1: known to be very understanding, smart, compassionate, forward thinking people,
Speaker 1: and these people are trolls. And it really stinks because
Speaker 1: I have to heavily moderate it now and I used to.
Speaker 1: It just used to be a fun place for open
Speaker 1: minded people to exchange ideas in a respectful way. And
Speaker 1: it's just not like that anymore. No, shut that one
Speaker 1: down and start over. No, you shouldn't shut it down.
Speaker 1: But I was talking with someone on one of our
Speaker 1: fans on Facebook the other day because they were commenting
Speaker 1: about that, and I said, I wish there was a
Speaker 1: brief quiz you had to pass um in order to
Speaker 1: like like this page, like where Josh and Chuck what's
Speaker 1: the largest manufacturer of tires in the world? Now even easier,
Speaker 1: like what's a podcast? Because they be they throw up
Speaker 1: some meme that says like you you know, yeah, anyway,
Speaker 1: I just want to throw that in there. I'm sorry
Speaker 1: for people have had a bad experience there lately. That
Speaker 1: is why our fans are so nice to us, because
Speaker 1: stuff like that we care. Um. So anyway, it's a
Speaker 1: big time suck emphasis on suck. Uh. And so that's
Speaker 1: the reason they shut it down the others to avoid harassment,
Speaker 1: which makes sense. Um, your co worker might bring up
Speaker 1: a porn image. Uh, you know, some dude might say,
Speaker 1: who took this out? Hostile work environment? Hostile work environment,
Speaker 1: and a company cannot risk that at all because they'll
Speaker 1: get sued, sued, sued, And so the easiest thing to
Speaker 1: do is just to shut it down. YEA restrict access.
Speaker 1: Restrict access. So that makes sense in a way. It does.
Speaker 1: And if you want to know more about your employer
Speaker 1: governing your work computer, yeah, you go check out our
Speaker 1: episode is your employer Spying on you? That was a
Speaker 1: good one. It was a good one. Um. We're gonna
Speaker 1: keep going right after this, so chuck, We've we've covered
Speaker 1: parents censoring the Internet for their kids, employers censoring the
Speaker 1: Internet for their employees. Kind of difficult to argue with
Speaker 1: either one of those, especially if the employer is censoring
Speaker 1: the Internet for their employees work computer. That the employer
Speaker 1: provided during work hours. It's tough to it's tough to
Speaker 1: be like, no, it's wrong, it's wrong. But again, we're
Speaker 1: coming from a place where we have like basically unrestricted
Speaker 1: access to the Internet, so it might suck to work
Speaker 1: under those draconian measures of stuff. We look up you know,
Speaker 1: it's drawn some lists made for um the third censorship,
Speaker 1: the third level, I guess is much greater. And this
Speaker 1: is the one where people really start to go berserk.
Speaker 1: And I think rightfully so. And that's government control. Government
Speaker 1: censorship of the Internet. And pretty much every country that
Speaker 1: allows access to the Internet, which is basically every country
Speaker 1: these days. Um, there's some level of censorship to some degree.
Speaker 1: Some are much worse than others, but basically, all governments,
Speaker 1: in one way, shape or form censor what there citizens
Speaker 1: can access on the Internet. Yeah, and um, even before that,
Speaker 1: like search engines themselves sensor because if like Google and
Speaker 1: Yahoo didn't censor anything, the search results you would get
Speaker 1: would just be no good, it would be like something. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so they do their own censorship. But that's um. As
Speaker 1: far as the government goes. Uh, there's something called the
Speaker 1: Open Net Initiative. Oh and I and they're an organization
Speaker 1: that UM. Their dedication is to inform the public about
Speaker 1: web filtering and surveillance around the world. I want to
Speaker 1: dedicate this to the UH. And they have four categories
Speaker 1: of UM web filtering. Political, which is when you, let's say,
Speaker 1: you want to speak out against your leaders and your
Speaker 1: country may not allow that. You know, if you have
Speaker 1: a blog, they may censor your blog. UH. Yeah, there's
Speaker 1: a pretty good UM example of this recently in China
Speaker 1: and India. They both followed the same trajectory but two
Speaker 1: different ends. UM. In China there was a documentary about
Speaker 1: Chinese pollution called Under the Dome. It went viral and
Speaker 1: like it got two hundred million views in the first
Speaker 1: day or something like that, and it was government approved.
Speaker 1: The documentary was right, but it took off, and UM
Speaker 1: the Chinese government took it down and they did so successfully,
Speaker 1: Like you couldn't find that anywhere in China after that.
Speaker 1: India there was a documentary around the same time that
Speaker 1: was about that very infamous UM public transportation rape case UM,
Speaker 1: and it went viral and got a ton of us too,
Speaker 1: and it also got people talking in India about this
Speaker 1: again and UM the government tried to take that down,
Speaker 1: but in a very clumsy manner, and it was very
Speaker 1: ineffective as well. But both both both governments tried to
Speaker 1: do the same thing. There was something that was going on,
Speaker 1: it was stirring up the populace, and they tried to
Speaker 1: center it by taking down a restricting restricting access to it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and the China one, to me is just crazy because,
Speaker 1: like I said, it was government approved, the documentary was,
Speaker 1: so they didn't even have a problem with the documentary.
Speaker 1: But in China they will censor things. They will censor
Speaker 1: anything that seems likely to spur any kind of activism
Speaker 1: at all. Right, Well, there was a study that UM
Speaker 1: found that a post if you have a couple of
Speaker 1: posts that are say, critical to the government, but one
Speaker 1: so both are critical of the government, but one of
Speaker 1: them advocates collective action like getting people rolled up, like
Speaker 1: let's go meet in Tianamen Square or something like that,
Speaker 1: that's the one that's gonna get taken down. So they're
Speaker 1: they're really concerned not necessarily just with criticism, but more
Speaker 1: so about um fomenting popular unrest. And China gets picked
Speaker 1: on all the time, and and rightfully so. They probably
Speaker 1: are the world's most prolific censor at least biggest because
Speaker 1: of the size of their population and the measures they take.
Speaker 1: They they have what's called the Great Firewall of China.
Speaker 1: But I think especially in countries in Western democracies, it's
Speaker 1: a bit of a red herring because it's kind of like, God,
Speaker 1: look at what China is doing, Look at how much
Speaker 1: it really kind of detracts from the censorship that goes
Speaker 1: on here in the United States and other Western democracies. Um,
Speaker 1: that's just as pernicious, if not worse, because this is
Speaker 1: taking place in what's supposed to be an open, liberal democracy.
Speaker 1: Yeah you know, Yeah, you're right, But it is kind
Speaker 1: of easy to pick on China. Well, of course it is. Um.
Speaker 1: They also will There was a post in two thousand
Speaker 1: eleven that, um, there was a rumor that salt could
Speaker 1: stave off radiation poisoning from the Fukushima reactor, and China
Speaker 1: quash that because people were going out and buying a
Speaker 1: bunch of salt. I remember that. So again, Um, they
Speaker 1: just squashed that because people are buying up too much salt,
Speaker 1: because it would supposedly pack your thyroids so full that
Speaker 1: your thyroid couldn't absorb the radiation. That was why Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it basically just bounced off. If you're famous in China,
Speaker 1: you're going to be heavily scrutinized, so you gotta watch
Speaker 1: what you post and if you're way away, oh yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a good point. Um. And then the thing I
Speaker 1: saw said that like small time users and bloggers that
Speaker 1: that complain about the government, it's not like, uh, such
Speaker 1: a police state that they'll like take down all of that. Um,
Speaker 1: if you have some influence, you're much more likely going
Speaker 1: to be censored. You know, like if you're not getting
Speaker 1: a ton of web hits and you're speaking out about
Speaker 1: the leadership, then uh, the you probably will just go unnoticed,
Speaker 1: you know. So that was the open net initiatives. That
Speaker 1: was just one of the four political Um. The next
Speaker 1: one is social and that's web pages that are have
Speaker 1: to do with like drugs, gambling, sex, poor and all
Speaker 1: that stuff. UM that's very frequently censored. For example, like
Speaker 1: in um a lot of Muslim countries. Iran supposedly is
Speaker 1: working on what they're calling a Halal Internet, which is
Speaker 1: very much sanitized version of the Internet with all of
Speaker 1: that that stuff. The social censorship being enacted um, and
Speaker 1: from what I understand, Iran is not so. Uh. I
Speaker 1: don't know if am business is the word or deluded
Speaker 1: maybe that they're thinking they can replace the actual Internet
Speaker 1: in Iran. I think their ultimate goal, of what outsiders
Speaker 1: are thinking. Uh, their ultimate goal is to create like
Speaker 1: a side by side Internet. Yeah. Like, here's the Halal
Speaker 1: version that any like any practicing Muslim can can access
Speaker 1: and feel good about. Here's the other one that um
Speaker 1: is connected to the rest of the world economically and informationally. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that was um you sent in this great article
Speaker 1: web censorship colon the Net is closing in wherein the
Speaker 1: writer basically proposes that this is the future of the
Speaker 1: Internet is a bunch of separate internets. Yeah, it was um.
Speaker 1: Eric Schmidt from Google his bff Jared Cohen wrote it. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and they basically envisioned a future where there isn't a
Speaker 1: worldwide Web so much as there is a Russian Internet,
Speaker 1: an American Internet, a Halal Internet. And uh, it used
Speaker 1: to be I didn't even know this. There was an
Speaker 1: English only language standard for a while, but um, that's
Speaker 1: all changing now. Uh. And now you have internationalized domain
Speaker 1: names that uh, you know, like they can have a
Speaker 1: Sunni only Internet that they can read in their language
Speaker 1: and their characters, and UM has no English whatsoever. So
Speaker 1: where are people going to go? If they speak that language,
Speaker 1: They're going to go to that internet, right, And Eric
Speaker 1: Schmidt foresees this time when the UM the Internet very
Speaker 1: much resembles the world. So if you want to go
Speaker 1: on to another country's website, you're gonna need some sort
Speaker 1: of virtual passports something like that. It's super interesting, UM.
Speaker 1: And you may have to pay a fee to go
Speaker 1: on there, and you're gonna be subject to that country's
Speaker 1: rules and laws and regulations, just like you would if
Speaker 1: you were traveling physically to that country. UM. And that
Speaker 1: all of this is going to arise from censorship from
Speaker 1: this society saying we value you this, and we find
Speaker 1: this evil, UM, some government saying this challenges our official stance,
Speaker 1: so we have to have that taken out. So all
Speaker 1: of these competing different international interests UM will ultimately fracture.
Speaker 1: The Internet will will still be interconnected, but it will
Speaker 1: be compartmentalized. Yeah. He even envisioned the future where someone
Speaker 1: would have to seek Internet asylum, which was I don't know, man,
Speaker 1: it's just it's crazy. He I mean, he basically says
Speaker 1: this is already underway, uh in some in some former fashion.
Speaker 1: So where it goes, we'll see. Oh yeah, definitely is
Speaker 1: He was saying. The ultimate outcome of this will be
Speaker 1: when some government or some country can figure out an
Speaker 1: alternate to the domain naming system, which is the directory
Speaker 1: for the entire Internet right now, if you can figure
Speaker 1: out a way to not have to use that, you
Speaker 1: can disconnect from the Internet, and you would basically create
Speaker 1: a separate Internet just for your society, and that would
Speaker 1: be that would lead to the ultimate censorship. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: almost It's not even the Internet at that point. It's
Speaker 1: like a set of widely published guidelines and things. That's
Speaker 1: all it is. It's just a big collection of articles
Speaker 1: and things they deem Okay, because to me, internet means access,
Speaker 1: so whatever. Yeah, I mean, but you're you're you grew
Speaker 1: up as the Internet grew up, so you understood what
Speaker 1: it or you understand what it was originally meant to be. Yeah, Like,
Speaker 1: you can't just publish the World Book Encyclopedia online and
Speaker 1: call it the Internet. That's just a specific set of information,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? Good point, Now there's anything
Speaker 1: wrong with World Book Encyclopedia. It's a great encyclopedia. They
Speaker 1: should sponsor us. All Right, we're gonna take another break,
Speaker 1: and right after we're gonna talk a little bit more
Speaker 1: about some of the the countries that are the biggest
Speaker 1: defenders in Internet censorship. All right, before we left, we
Speaker 1: were talking about China. Uh. There's a group called Reporters
Speaker 1: Without Borders and they cover much more than Internet censorship,
Speaker 1: but they do have a list of offending countries and
Speaker 1: uh it reads like this, Belarus, China, Cuba, which have
Speaker 1: some more stuff on Cuba, Iran, um Minimar, Me and
Speaker 1: mar Me and mar What I say, Minimar Minimar Apparently
Speaker 1: they've gotten a lot better, Um Burma has well, they
Speaker 1: opened up big time their society. Yeah, in September two
Speaker 1: thousand eleven is when they really like made a bunch
Speaker 1: of big reforms and um. But the problem there is
Speaker 1: only one percent of the country our internet users to
Speaker 1: begin with. Well, supposedly those people that do use the
Speaker 1: Internet are have um screenshots taken of what their computer
Speaker 1: use every couple of minutes by government sensors. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: think that a lot of that's changing now though. Great
Speaker 1: since two thousand eleven, UM, a few more Saudi Arabia,
Speaker 1: North Korea, Avi, Syria, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Vietnam, and Uzbekistan. That's
Speaker 1: where you're gonna find a lot of censorship going on.
Speaker 1: And Cuba is really interesting. Um. They used to not
Speaker 1: have private internet at all, Like you had to go
Speaker 1: to an internet cafe, government run internet cafe and everything
Speaker 1: was monitored, cameras in there. Even Um. Apparently Cuba is
Speaker 1: even coming into the New World a little bit because
Speaker 1: now five percent of Cubans have home access. UM. But
Speaker 1: it is slow. Yes, this one writer went there and
Speaker 1: he said it took him an hour to upload a
Speaker 1: thirty megabyte image. Um, that took like five seconds at
Speaker 1: home on Google Drive. So they don't have broadband obviously.
Speaker 1: Now when that embargo gets lifted, there's no telling how
Speaker 1: fast things are going to change there. Well, the U
Speaker 1: S and the U N are already working with them
Speaker 1: to try and improve their internet in their internet access.
Speaker 1: But um, as a nation, they rank a DW five
Speaker 1: out of one in telecom development. So um, they're uh.
Speaker 1: The nice way to say it is there behind the curve,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. Well, that's um, that raises
Speaker 1: a kind of a good point. You're talking about how
Speaker 1: slow it is. You couldn't even buy a computer there
Speaker 1: until two thousand seven, you could not purchase a computer.
Speaker 1: Man A lie. Yeahn't crazy. Um, but with with very
Speaker 1: slow internet, that in and of itself is considered a
Speaker 1: form of censorship. Yeah, I guess so. So you know
Speaker 1: this whole thing about net neutrality that was going on, Yeah,
Speaker 1: so that deserves its own show, of course it does.
Speaker 1: But let's just briefly say, with net neutrality the Telecoms UM,
Speaker 1: the Internet service providers managed to petition the Supreme Court
Speaker 1: basically say the f c C can treat you guys
Speaker 1: in the same way that they you treat websites as
Speaker 1: information services and an information services basically, it's like an
Speaker 1: independent business that creates or provides content for the web. UM.
Speaker 1: Under the Telecoms Act, the Internet service providers were what
Speaker 1: are called common carriers and were to be treated just
Speaker 1: like a telephone provider, which is, you have unfettered, unrestricted
Speaker 1: access to the telephone lines. Yeah, not like I'm a
Speaker 1: T and T. I'm gonna pay a lot for a
Speaker 1: phone line that works. But this other company if they
Speaker 1: don't pay as much you won't be able to get
Speaker 1: your calls place exactly. Um. Or I'm a T and
Speaker 1: T and I don't think you should be saying what
Speaker 1: you're saying or talking to this person, so I'm going
Speaker 1: to restrict your ability to call that person, right. Um.
Speaker 1: That's what was going on with this, uh, the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court decision, and with the idea that telecommunications companies were
Speaker 1: anything other than common carriers. Right, So they were almost
Speaker 1: getting to the point where they were going to be
Speaker 1: allowed to restrict access to um throttle speeds so that
Speaker 1: you could pay for a faster speed if you were
Speaker 1: saying Netflix or something like that. But then a new
Speaker 1: startup company wouldn't have that kind of money and would
Speaker 1: be strangled in the cradle. Was was how the idea went. Well,
Speaker 1: fortunately the idea was overturned by the SEC. The SEC
Speaker 1: said what amounts to we're going to treat the telecoms
Speaker 1: like common carriers from here on out, and that means
Speaker 1: that they have to provide unrestricted access to the Internet
Speaker 1: for everybody. And it was a really big deal. It
Speaker 1: was very close. It was it maybe like the biggest
Speaker 1: thing moving forward in in well clearly with like the
Speaker 1: Internet but um, and it touches all kinds of business
Speaker 1: and personal privacy and everything, like we need to do
Speaker 1: a show on that. I agree in full, Yeah, that neutrality.
Speaker 1: But the point was was that if you throttle speeds,
Speaker 1: those things that load more slowly than others are going
Speaker 1: to in effect be censored, because I mean, how long
Speaker 1: do you sit around for a website to load before
Speaker 1: you just close the tab and move on six or
Speaker 1: eight minutes? What? Okay, I met six or eight nano
Speaker 1: second and you got me. Um. So that in and
Speaker 1: of itself, as a form of censorship that was avoided
Speaker 1: by the SEC. Adopting this common carrier approach to the
Speaker 1: I S P S well, would just create monopolies. People
Speaker 1: would be squeezed out, Smaller companies would never have a chance,
Speaker 1: true to you know. Yeah, well, I guess we should
Speaker 1: talk about some of the opponents of internet censorship. UM.
Speaker 1: The A c l U is a big one obviously. UM.
Speaker 1: They have taken they pretty much squashed the Children's Online
Speaker 1: Protection Act and its tracks. This was introduced, it was
Speaker 1: actually passed the eight but it was never implemented because
Speaker 1: it just was pounded on year after year basically, UM,
Speaker 1: and as unconstitutional. And that was a law that made
Speaker 1: it illegal to present materials that, um, we're deemed harmful
Speaker 1: to minors, even if it was valid for adults. Right,
Speaker 1: And they basically time and time again it was taken
Speaker 1: to court and they said, no, you can't do that,
Speaker 1: No you can't. And another one that they tried was
Speaker 1: called SOPA to Stop Online Piracy Act, remember that, and
Speaker 1: it basically said that if you even link to uh,
Speaker 1: somebody that provides pirated material, your entire website can be
Speaker 1: taken down, if you even link to that that site. Um,
Speaker 1: and that came very close and you think, well, I mean,
Speaker 1: what's wrong with with protecting copyrighted material? Seawan Austin's in
Speaker 1: favor of it, you know, Yeah, he was like the
Speaker 1: face of that campaign for a while. Um a Gooney
Speaker 1: right or Rudy yeah? Or he was Um was he Froda? No,
Speaker 1: he was Sam Wise Gamgees. I think, yeah, so, um,
Speaker 1: you had the SOPA, you had COPA, you had SIPPA,
Speaker 1: you had all these things that we're protecting the children
Speaker 1: or protecting intellectual copyrights. But a lot of people kind
Speaker 1: of saw through these as smoke screens and said, ultimately,
Speaker 1: what you're doing is creating a law that gives blanket
Speaker 1: right to governments, to the US government, to police what
Speaker 1: we do on the internet. You're you can you're dressing
Speaker 1: it up to protect intellectual property rights or to protect children,
Speaker 1: but ultimately what you're doing is setting in motion government
Speaker 1: censorship of the Internet. And it got stopped. But it's
Speaker 1: a from what I understand, it's a there's no resting
Speaker 1: on your laurels kind of stuff going on, Like you're
Speaker 1: that this fight is not going away anytime soon. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean that's that's how it always works, is that
Speaker 1: will sell it to you as some thing that you
Speaker 1: need and I think you should have, but what it
Speaker 1: really is is something else. So chuck um. There's this
Speaker 1: you win report recently, a special report that basically said
Speaker 1: internet kill switches are a violation of human rights. Yeah
Speaker 1: that was two days ago or yesterday. Hot breaking news,
Speaker 1: breaking news, hot breaking news, fresh from the oven. So
Speaker 1: an internet kill switch is kind of a misnomer because
Speaker 1: it's not like there's a buttoner switch that any country
Speaker 1: or government could just turn off the Internet. What you
Speaker 1: can do is, especially say like with um cell phone providers,
Speaker 1: it's usually self cell phone and internet access that's falling
Speaker 1: under this. And in the United States, there is something
Speaker 1: called Standard Operating Procedure three oh three s o P.
Speaker 1: Three oh three. You might not have heard of it
Speaker 1: because boy, it didn't have much banfare around it and
Speaker 1: quietly passed. The Department of Homeland Security is UH fighting
Speaker 1: tooth and nail to keep them the details of it
Speaker 1: under wraps. Yeah, completely. But basically what happened is in
Speaker 1: two thousand six, the Bush administration, and it was later
Speaker 1: supported by the Obama administration, said the the federal government
Speaker 1: needs to have the ability to turn off the Internet
Speaker 1: in some way, shape or form whenever it deems an emergency. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And the whole thing was borne out of these um
Speaker 1: London bombings, London underground bombings. Yeah, in two thousand five,
Speaker 1: when the subway attacks happened, we actually did this. We
Speaker 1: threw the kill switch on in the Holland Tunnel and
Speaker 1: the Lincoln Tunnel in New York on cell phones, cell
Speaker 1: phone because these bombers used their cell phones to trigger
Speaker 1: the bomb. That's right. So the problem was but that
Speaker 1: it didn't work. No, it did, Like even the Department
Speaker 1: of Homelands, I mean it worked. They cut him out
Speaker 1: but the DHS even said there was disorder for both
Speaker 1: governmental and private sectors at the time when the use
Speaker 1: of communication infrastruct sure was most needed. Right. So, so
Speaker 1: that is one very big argument against the an internet
Speaker 1: or cellular kill switch. More chaos it does, and like
Speaker 1: you really need to be able to get in touch
Speaker 1: with friends, family, coordinate, absolutely to a safe place, what
Speaker 1: have you. So to just cut out that kind of
Speaker 1: that level of communication, that's one argument against it. Another
Speaker 1: one is that it can be very easily used by
Speaker 1: a government to quell um popular unrest to protest, which
Speaker 1: happened as well in San Francisco. Yeah, with the h
Speaker 1: at the the subway, the bart shooting of Oscar Grant
Speaker 1: at fruit Bale station. Um, they learned in August two
Speaker 1: thousand eleven that was going to be demonstrations going on,
Speaker 1: so they shut off cell phone service at the subway
Speaker 1: station so people couldn't organize. And that was, you know,
Speaker 1: supposedly just going to be a peaceful protest, right, So
Speaker 1: that was n dude, we're talking about that same exact
Speaker 1: play was used by hose Ni Mubark during the popular
Speaker 1: uprisings in Egypt. I mean, like the same exact thing.
Speaker 1: So the upshot of this is that DHS is protecting
Speaker 1: the secrets of s o P. Three oh three, but
Speaker 1: it very much does exist, and the government does have
Speaker 1: the power and the capability to turn off the Internet
Speaker 1: in entire cities, uh, if it deems it necessary. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And there's very important ruly coming down here in the
Speaker 1: next couple of weeks because in two thousand to the
Speaker 1: Electronic Privacy Information Center follow the suit in federal court
Speaker 1: seeking disclosure about the basic guidelines and policies of this
Speaker 1: s o P. Three oh three, and they're gonna be
Speaker 1: ruling on it soon. And they're not saying open the
Speaker 1: books on everything because we want to compromise our safety.
Speaker 1: They're saying, like what what what triggers this decision? As
Speaker 1: one big question? Yeah, and who is who is doing this?
Speaker 1: They're not, you know, basically right now it says that
Speaker 1: there is um It can come from a state Homeland
Speaker 1: Security advisor, their designies, or representatives of the d h
Speaker 1: US Homeland Security Operations Center, nothing president or anything like that. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then there's a sub agency called the National Coordinating
Speaker 1: Center for Communications and they are the ones that says
Speaker 1: that are tasked with a series of questions to determine
Speaker 1: if a shutdown is necessary, and like youre are these
Speaker 1: people and what are the questions? And what are the questions?
Speaker 1: And again they're not saying this um while some people
Speaker 1: are saying this should never happen in any circumstances, including
Speaker 1: the U. But um and in the United States, it's
Speaker 1: a prior restraint on free speech. It's as simple as that.
Speaker 1: So it's automatically unconstitutional to do this. But the fight
Speaker 1: right now at least is for more transparency and an
Speaker 1: understanding of the policy at least, so we'll see where
Speaker 1: that goes. But man, that is scary. Yeah, it is
Speaker 1: San Francisco shutting down. I mean it sounds like China
Speaker 1: or Egypt. Yeah, it's unbelievable. And no one knows about
Speaker 1: this stuff much because I don't know people are on Facebook, k.
Speaker 1: Yeah they might be where you learn about something like that.
Speaker 1: In fairness, but plus, I would say the national media
Speaker 1: is at its lowest point as far as being a
Speaker 1: public service in its history in the United States. It's
Speaker 1: just shameful where the popular media is. They're just laptogs
Speaker 1: and stenographers. Is disgusting. Yeah, it's pretty pretty bad. Scene
Speaker 1: these days. Really, it's Chuck. I'm waiting for the pendulum
Speaker 1: to swing in the other way towards responsibility, and yeah,
Speaker 1: that's happening soon. Detected sarcastic. You never know, man, Sometimes
Speaker 1: things go bad in one direction and people wake up
Speaker 1: and go back to Uh, it's like a farm to
Speaker 1: table now. You know, people like trash for so long
Speaker 1: and now it's like the complete opposite. People really care
Speaker 1: about the food they eat and where it comes from.
Speaker 1: Oh that's true. Do you got anything else? Internet censorship
Speaker 1: is just like the farm to table movement. That's the takeaway.
Speaker 1: Just make that connection, and you're John Hawkinberry. If you
Speaker 1: want to know more about that censorship, you should type
Speaker 1: those words into the search part house to works dot com.
Speaker 1: You should just type those words into some search engine
Speaker 1: somewhere and learn more about it. Absolutely, you can visit
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know dot com and the podcast page
Speaker 1: for this episode, and it's got tons of links to
Speaker 1: good stuff about this. Um And I said, search bart
Speaker 1: in there somewhere. So it's time for listener mail. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna call this you saved the beginning of my honeymoon.
Speaker 1: Um Gods, we're from Seattle and We just got married
Speaker 1: a week ago. This is a man and a woman,
Speaker 1: he said. We left right away after the wedding for
Speaker 1: a honeymoon. Flew to Maui on a six hour flight. Boy,
Speaker 1: that's not bad at Seattle. Huh no, that's nice. Like,
Speaker 1: what do you gotta fly that's like ten hours twelve
Speaker 1: and you gotta stop in California probably. I think there's
Speaker 1: direct flights from Atlanta this to say that along flight. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's about like twelve hour flight. One of the many
Speaker 1: benefits of living in Seattle. My dad um So, we
Speaker 1: flew to Maui and during the flight out to set
Speaker 1: it in front of us was a Russian family with
Speaker 1: three one year old triplets. I don't know why it matters.
Speaker 1: They were Russian. They were crying in Russian, I guess,
Speaker 1: and he said they were very disturbing. Uh. One would
Speaker 1: set the other one off, and it led to the
Speaker 1: mom rocking the kids, and then the kids would start crying,
Speaker 1: and kids didn't like being rocked, and he ended up
Speaker 1: kicking me in the head. He said, did I get mad? No, guys,
Speaker 1: because I was listening to you the entire flight. On
Speaker 1: the return flight, a woman in the row in front
Speaker 1: of us, proceeded to get more and more drunk throughout
Speaker 1: the entire flight, and ended up drunkenly shouting and other
Speaker 1: passengers talking politics and religion, pushing other people's seats, and
Speaker 1: staggering to the bathroom every couple of minutes. What is
Speaker 1: wrong with people? Wow, you're on a plane. You're not
Speaker 1: in your home. Put your shoes on. Don't get drunk. Hey, Hey,
Speaker 1: there's nothing wrong with taking your shoes off on a plane. Yes,
Speaker 1: there is. You're not in your living room. There's nothing
Speaker 1: wrong with as long as your feet stay in your
Speaker 1: little section while your feet are you should never take
Speaker 1: your shoes off in public. All right, that's fine, she's
Speaker 1: a rout right now. I'm disgusted. Um again, my stress
Speaker 1: levels at zero because I was still learning about snakes
Speaker 1: and water slides and clowns. Other than saving my sanity,
Speaker 1: I wanna. I think you saved several lives. Without your
Speaker 1: common voices, I would have undoubtedly thrown the woman from
Speaker 1: the plane halfway over the Pacific Ocean. It would have
Speaker 1: been like the good Shepherd. What's that that Matt Damon
Speaker 1: movie about the beginning of the CIA? Or he throws
Speaker 1: his sons. Oh yeah, seem to be wife out of
Speaker 1: the plane. Yeah, and that was disturbing. What's wrong on
Speaker 1: that day? And that was disturbing. I hope you guys
Speaker 1: realized the public service that you do. Thanks Jesse and wife.
Speaker 1: That clown episode was one of our better ones. If
Speaker 1: you ask me, I have it all agreed. Chills, thrills, clowns.
Speaker 1: H uh. If you want to get in touch with
Speaker 1: us like Jesse and uh his wife, he didn't mention
Speaker 1: her because Jesse is selfish. Well, congrats to you guys.
Speaker 1: Yes regardless. Um. You can tweet to us at s
Speaker 1: Y s K podcast. You can join us on Facebook,
Speaker 1: dot com, slash Stuff you Should Know, especially if you're
Speaker 1: not a troll. You can send us an email to
Speaker 1: Stuff podcast at how stuff Works dot com and has
Speaker 1: always joined us at home on the web, Stuff you
Speaker 1: Should Know dot com For more on this and thousands
Speaker 1: of other topics, is it how Stuff Works dot com