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<p>Hello,</p>
<p>Today the Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI) project
published a new report, titled: "<b>Measuring Internet Censorship
in Cuba's ParkNets</b>"</p>
<p>You can read the report here:
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://ooni.torproject.org/post/cuba-internet-censorship-2017/">https://ooni.torproject.org/post/cuba-internet-censorship-2017/</a></p>
<p><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://twitter.com/OpenObservatory/status/902229490495053824">https://twitter.com/OpenObservatory/status/902229490495053824</a><br>
</p>
<p>Last May we traveled to Cuba and performed a variety of network
measurement tests across eight vantage points in Havana, Santa
Clara, and Santiago de Cuba, with the aim of measuring internet
censorship.</p>
<p>As part of our study, we were able to confirm the <b>blocking of
41 websites</b>. Many of these sites include news outlets and
blogs, as well as pro-democracy and human rights sites. Many of
the blocked sites, directly or indirectly, express criticism
towards the Cuban government. Interestingly enough though, various
other international sites which also express criticism were found
to be accessible.</p>
<p>Web proxies, like Anonymouse, were amongst those found to be
blocked, potentially limiting Cubans' ability to circumvent
censorship. The Tor network though was found to be accessible
across the country, likely because Cuba has relatively few Tor
users.</p>
<p><b>Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology was found to be
resetting connections and serving (blank) block pages.</b>
Through latency measurements, we were able to confirm that the
blocking server is most likely located in Havana (and in any case,
for sure in Cuba). Only the HTTP version of sites was found to be
blocked, potentially enabling users to circumvent the censorship
by merely accessing them over HTTPS. Most blocked sites, however,
do not support HTTPS.</p>
<p><b>Skype was found to be blocked. </b>By examining packet
traces, we were able to determine that the DPI middlebox blocked
Skype by means of RST injection. Other popular communications
tools, such as WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, were found to be
accessible.</p>
<p><b>Chinese vendor Huawei was also found to be supporting Cuba's
internet infrastructure.</b> The server header of blocked sites,
for example, pointed to Huawei equipent. It remains unclear though
whether they are actually implementing internet censorship in the
country.</p>
<p>Lastly, we accidentally discovered that <b>Google is blocking
Google App Engine from Cuba (when trying to run NDT).</b></p>
<p>Overall, internet censorship does not appear to be particularly
sophisticated in Cuba. The high cost of the internet and the
limited availability of public wifi hotspots across the country
remain the main barriers to accessing the internet. But as Cuba's
internet landscape evolves, so might techniques and practices
around internet censorship. Therefore, we think it's important to
continue to measure networks with ooniprobe in Cuba and elsewhere
around the world.</p>
<p>Thanks for reading our latest report - happy to address any
questions you may have!</p>
<p>~ The OONI team.<br>
</p>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://ooni.torproject.org/">https://ooni.torproject.org/</a>
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E</pre>
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