True Blanket Censorship
We recently spoke about the arbitrariness of Thai censorship in this post. TrueMove now takes the issue to a new height with an in Thailand yet unseen “blanket censorship.” Chances are that if you’re using TrueMove GPRS or 3G with your mobile phone some of your favorite WordPress.com blogs are turned into “The page cannot found/Error 404.” The 404-page has meanwhile been replaced with a referencing “Access Denied (policy_denied)” message. Travel blogs, lonely heart blogs, flower blogs, meditation blogs from all over the world: in Thailand they’re blocked. Nothing to do with content. You could write about the beauty of bananas. And you’re still blocked.
Error messages above are not genuine Apache or other webserver error messages; the actual server response is 200: OK. And note the very Thai syntax. Affected by this arbitrary blocking are all, I repeat, all WordPress.com blogs, not WordPress.org, but – again – only on TrueMove, not True HighSpeed, and I’m not aware of any other ISPs. So don’t try to access ThaiCrisis, Thai Intelligent News, FACT or Political Prisoners with your True iPhone – all you get is “Access Denied” and the disclaimer “Your system policy has denied access to the requested URL. For assistance, contact your network support team.”
Incompetence at True? Yes, in the sense that if you wanted to block a blog like highlyoffensivesite.wordpress.com then to block everything at wordpress.com is either stupidity, laziness or points out some very flawed blocking software or server technique. No, in the sense that the error message has changed once, so it’s not just a simple oversight; it’s obviously deliberate. Let’s not forget the good Doctor Vejjajiva, the father of our dear PM, sits on the board of directors of CP Group, the parent of the the True conglomerate.
The potential for a bit of conspiracy is there. But as Napoleon is credited as saying: “Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence.” One really doesn’t know what to make of it, does one. The takeaway of course is that it illustrates that True is not monolithic or fully integrated. Sites that work with DSL but not 3G indicates that the blocking (or, more charitably, misconfiguration) is done somewhere before the network joins to go to the international gateway.
Or you simply get into the tunnel.
This is very interesting. My provider is True on my iPhone but since I never access these sites directly through a browser I hadn’t noticed the censorship.
An easy way around this (and more practical on the iPhone) is to grab the RSS feed from any of these sites and subscribe either in a dedicated RSS reader app (such as Reeder or Net News Wire) or add the feed to Instapaper.
Technology triumphs over communism!
I am sure my blog is likely to be blocked! But not for the reason you have given. It has more to do with the fact that from time to time I have posted some videos which for some are bound to be unbearable to watch.
We are a small web hosting company based in Europe who recently received a request from Thai authorities via email to close a blog that was apparently criticizing the Thai government. I replied to the mail explaining that the site does not violate our TOS and therefore only a court order would make me close the service. It would appear that the site has now been blocked by all Thai ISP’s as 99% of requests are coming from proxy servers.
What the hell is wrong with Thailand? This is 2010 and globalization is in full swing. From my limited research on this subject, it would appear that Thai people are living a suppressed fairy tale life that in the not too distant future will be the undoing of those in power.
[...] PPT missed this article at absolutely Bangkok.com a week or so ago. Worth reading as it is about the censorship of phone-based browsers, seemingly [...]
[...] your I-phone PPT missed this article at absolutely Bangkok.com a week or so ago. Worth reading as it is about the censorship of phone-based browsers, seemingly [...]
Just for the sake of it, I’d like to encourage the author of this to actually contact True and see what information he/she can find. What will happen if you specifically request the site be unblocked? Cancel your service with this as the reason? I’d like to know.
PS – Jed, what was the blog, I’d really like to know that as well.
[...] http://absolutelybangkok.com/true-blanket-censorship/ [...]
[...] on 08 April 2010, following further closures of the mainstream opposition media sources, even if censorship does not make news in the country. Further mass rallies in the centre of Bangkok would be plainly illegal before 20 April 2010, and [...]