When I figured out that SourceForge has blocked users of banned countries like Iran to access its services (downloading/uploading content), it made me really angry that it has followed in google code’s footsteps… but at that time I had not noticed that FedoraHosted is already blocking ANY access to such users. At least SourceForge STILL allows everyone to browse content, but if you are comming from an IP address belonging to Iran, you can’t access FedoraHosted at all. And this is not new, as there were always problems accessing FedoraHosted from inside Iran AFAIK, but I was not sure if it is blocked from inside Iran or outside of it (some people have said that they had problems accessing some HTTPS sites from inside Iran).
But today, that I was looking for SourceForge alternatives in this wikipedia page, I noticed the actual reason. FedoraHosted just blocks any access from Iran and other banned countries, just like Google Code. So disappointing… 😦
Who knows, maybe soon I will be hosting some linux projects on Microsoft CodePlex 😉 (I was joking! It might do the same thing sooner or later!).
Well, the world is far from Ideal even in the Free/Open Source world, so I’ve decided to stop relying on any USA based product or services and be prepared for “Access Forbidden” messages.
So, for project hosting I’m currently looking at some promissing options: BerliOS, SourceForge.JP, KnowledgeForge, etc. But things will not stop here, who knows when GMail and other USA email providers will stop providing services to Iranians? I’ve started looking for non-USA free email providers too. However, USA might prefer to keep track of our email content, and also it might prefer us to have access to services like email and twitter which can be used in the ways they like (remember a few months ago that USA government asked twitter to postpone their hardware upgrade a little so that their service will be unavailable when it is midnight in Iran; so that Iranians can use it to communicate. But I think twitter should ban Iranians from accessing their services in the legal point of view!!!).
Have Fun!
Posted by Mostafa Daneshvar on February 4, 2010 at 11:21 pm
it (http://www.ustreas.gov/offices/enforcement/ofac/programs/ascii/iran.txt) can be helpful.
and also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_in_the_United_States
Posted by Hedayat on February 5, 2010 at 12:37 am
Helpful about what?! 😛
Posted by Mostafa Daneshvar on February 5, 2010 at 1:31 am
understanding why they are behaving in such a manner
Posted by Hedayat on February 5, 2010 at 1:39 am
Aha! Thanks. 🙂
Well, I knew that (but not with such details!), but that doesn’t change anything.
Posted by مصطفی دانشور (Mostafa Daneshvar) » بایگانی وبنامه (وبلاگ) » تحریم های اینترنتی on February 5, 2010 at 1:50 am
[…] هدایت و باز هم […]
Posted by Paul Frields on February 5, 2010 at 4:40 pm
The Fedora Board is not satisfied with this situation either, although we have no power to change it. We wrote a position statement here on our wiki:
https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Embargoed_nations
Posted by Hedayat on February 5, 2010 at 5:16 pm
Thank you for your consideration. I can understand that these are because of legal reasons, and I just hope that things will not get worse. But I wonder if it is really needed to ban access to fedorahosted.org web pages (e.g. project descriptions!).
Posted by bochecha on February 5, 2010 at 5:18 pm
Unfortunately, it doesn’t stop at FedoraHosted. See:
– http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Distribution/Download/ExportRegulations
– http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Legal/Export
😦
Posted by Hedayat on February 5, 2010 at 8:51 pm
Yes, unfortunately. If everybody wants to follow the rules strictly, Iranians will be banned from many services including: all USA based blog providers (including wordpress!), all USA free email providers (which is the email service of many Iranians), services like facebook and twitter (which are restricted by the Iranian government anyway! and maybe this is why Facebook didn’t restrict access of Iranians as it wanted to do), and many other services! What a funny world is this!!!
USA government regularly says that it is not the enemy of Iranian people and it is with them, but these activities are solely against the people. None of these restrictions will affect the government.
Posted by foo on February 6, 2010 at 1:34 pm
BerliOS doesn’t exactly fill me with confidence, best avoid them:
http://lwn.net/Articles/369633/
Posted by Hedayat on February 6, 2010 at 3:04 pm
Thanks for the comment. While this doesn’t mean that others are necessarily more secure, I’ll keep this in my mind. It is still much better than USA based services, and provides a set of nice features. Other services rarely provide all of the services provided by BerliOS. BTW, sourceforge.jp is an interesting option.
Posted by foo on February 6, 2010 at 1:37 pm
http://tim4dev.blogspot.com/2010/02/sf-cuba-iran-mirror-subversion.html
Posted by Dennis Gilmore on July 6, 2010 at 7:59 pm
AFAIK fedora has never actively blocked any counties from accessing anything. Fedora Does post the notices its required to by law. however the user is left to obey them or not
Posted by Hedayat on July 6, 2010 at 9:02 pm
It does: fedorahosted.org is blocked for Iranians.