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Re:Year of the storm by drostie on Wednesday February 01, 2012 @08:05AM (#3537739)
I'm at work at the TU Delft right now, which lets me access thepiratebay.se, but I might test this with my Internet connection at home to see whether it is blocked.

If it's censored at the DNS level, you can get around it by using an open DNS server rather than your internet server. If it is censored at an HTTP level, then you can get around it by using HTTPS. (Although I just tried this and thepiratebay.se uses thepiratebay.org's security certificate.)

But if it's censored by IP address, then the problem is much more pressing and you'll have to use a proxy. One project that I will shamelessly plug makes your traffic indistinguishable from HTTPS connections, but it gets to be a bit slow (read: use it for twitter and text websites and metadata files, but not for downloading gigabytes of stuff), it is at https://www.torproject.org/ .

Open question for other Nederlanders: Is there any political activity focused on dismantling Brein's censorship that I can join? Is there a Dutch-centric EFF?

Re:Year of the storm by danieldk on Wednesday February 01, 2012 @08:42AM (#3537863)
They also filter traffic to TPB IP adresses. I am aware of the methods that can be used to circumvent such censorship. In fact, I could easily do it with my VPS.

But that is all besides the point, because the average citizen does not have the technical knowledge to circumvent blockades. They were shut off from a part of the web yesterday. And this is probably just the beginning.

Re:Year of the storm by warp on Wednesday February 01, 2012 @08:19AM (#3537779)
The closest thing to a dutch EFF is probably Bits of Freedom, https://bof.nl
Re:Year of the storm by rickmb on Wednesday February 01, 2012 @08:53AM (#3537889)
Which does absolutely fuck all as soon as the magic word "piracy" appears. They're barely acknowledging this is happening.

Ask yourself: what has BoF done for us lately? Or ever?

Re:Year of the storm by wladimir on Wednesday February 01, 2012 @09:29AM (#3538034)
what has BoF done for us lately? Or ever?

Educate people about the need for internet freedom / privacy, which is a good way to get broader popular support.

Re:Year of the storm by rickmb on Wednesday February 01, 2012 @10:33AM (#3538326)
Educate who?

BoF barely communicates externally besides preaching to the choir. Lobbying seems to be limited to relatively powerless left-wing opposition politicians. Getting broader support is exactly what they very much don't do.

And so far the result has been exactly what you would expect: we've been railroaded with measures violating privacy and limiting online freedom, with very little protest.

Re:Year of the storm by wladimir on Wednesday February 01, 2012 @11:22AM (#3538583)
I don't claim to know the details, and I'm certainly not trying to defend them or something. But even if they're not as effective as they could be, every "bit" helps.