Minister signals a move to resurrect a national internet gateway and stronger online controls

[richard_smith237]

4 hours ago, webfact said:

give the government the tool kit it has long sought to exercise more efficient control over public commentary and online debate.

This… just this…  a wholly accurate comment by the author of the article highlighting Thailand’s draconian freedom of speech laws & the government continued attempts to control criticism & remove free opinion. 
 

Like China and other nations which choke basic human freedoms, Thailands approach to these issues are simply backwards. 

[tgw]

35 minutes ago, Pedrogaz said:

Will you be able to get around the firewall with a VPN? 

certainly

if not, it will be the end of business in Thailand.

[tgw]

1 minute ago, richard_smith237 said:

This… just this…  a wholly accurate comment by the author of the article highlighting Thailand’s draconian freedom of speech laws & the government continued attempts to control criticism & remove free opinion. 
 

Like China and other nations which choke basic human freedoms, Thailands approach to these issues are simply backwards. 

this is what it is about

[malibukid]

Chiland

[JayBird]

5 hours ago, Thaiwrath said:

Another poll with fictitious numbers, I would imagine it is nearer 97% nowadays !

77% have lost confidence.

 

20% never had it to begin with ????

[klauskunkel]

5 hours ago, webfact said:

put in place a national internet gateway to control access to the internet in Thailand

just counting on their their usual competence and aptitude to implement this...

[hotchilli]

5 hours ago, webfact said:

Last Friday, the Thai Digital Economy and Society Minister Chaiwut Thanakhamanusorn appeared to resurrect plans first mooted by the military junta up to 2015, to install a national internet gateway in Thailand to control and restrict access to external online content as an issue of national security.

To cocoon everyone from the outside world and only be fed the indoctrinated word from within?

[hotchilli]

5 hours ago, Hayduke said:

Wonder where they might be able to find a monolithic, aggressive, immoral, unethical, repressive, totalitarian police state to help out….

Just across the border?

[sawadee1947]

5 hours ago, Bkk Brian said:

The generals are in fight mode and pulling out all the stops to curb free speech and access to every persons right to information available. This is not looking good. Amnesty International, Thailand, also getting kicked out last I heard.

Well, as you can see in all dictatorships......so no surprise at all. They should ask China how to do. Easy as that.

I personally would not live here.????

[Aussieroaming]

Welcome to the totalitarian future, where true democracy has gone. The people need to vote these muppets out and then fight for democracy if the continue to linger around. Let the people decide whether they want to be controlled by their "democratically" elected political parties.

 

The politicians in every democratic country have forgotten that they are supposed to be "civil servants", voted in to represent their constituents best interests. 

[Millcx]

Hitler and SS did something similar “;0)

[Chongalulu]

There’ll be no legitimate function allowed to vote for a significant change in direction- we all know how that works. The question is will the average Joe here cast aside his apathy ,or even inform himself properly to understand the noose is tightening. Not the sharpest tools in the shed nor  sufficiently educated/aware of the world outside Thailand. Will those that do be sufficient to create the necessary momentum? 

[Cake Monster]

If Thailand ever put in place a "Firewall " , it would almost certainly spell the end of Tourists from the free speaking Countries around the Globe.

I dont think Digital Nomads or High Flyers from Digital Tech Companies, would be open to such abuse of power, so Thailand could also kiss their much sought after Investments Goodbye 

Xenophobia and Paranoia are still very high on Thailands Mind Set, and without changes to this, the Country is going to be left way behind in the Digital Race.

[Mike KIWI]

Wonder if starlink will get around this?

[herfiehandbag]

4 hours ago, clivebaxter said:

Next will be facial recognition and social credit scores to keep the peasants obedient ????

Won't bother us then - we all look the same!

[dogfish180]

Don't these luddites know how a VPN works? A child could navigate past their Gateway! They really are out of touch with reality.

[herfiehandbag]

2 hours ago, Guderian said:

I wonder when the PM is going to start calling himself Chairman Prayut, lol?

Probably after the next election runs into the sand trap in and a Committee for Public Order ( or something equally "Orwellian") is established, with Prayut, to everyones' surprise reluctantly agreeing to serve as Chairman!

[Purdey]

It isn't that easy to read millions of mails and chats daily. 

[GrandPapillon]

6 hours ago, JonnyF said:

The Great Firewall of Thailand.

 

Wonder where they got that idea?

it has been already functioning for years, not sure what else they want to add

[GrandPapillon]

5 minutes ago, dogfish180 said:

Don't these luddites know how a VPN works? A child could navigate past their Gateway! They really are out of touch with reality.

Any government gateway can break the encryption of a VPN, so not really helpful. Ask the Chinese. All government agencies have "agents" on VPNs. It's only useful to have a different IP address to "fake" your location.

 

That's what VPN are built for, an extension of an IP network you can join without being part of the local network, by "faking" or "tunneling" the network protocol.

[Meat Pie 47]

6 hours ago, Gottfrid said:

Welcome to China.

or North Korea

[fdsa]

10 minutes ago, GrandPapillon said:

Any government gateway can break the encryption of a VPN, so not really helpful. Ask the Chinese. All government agencies have "agents" on VPNs. It's only useful to have a different IP address to "fake" your location.

 

That's what VPN are built for, an extension of an IP network you can join without being part of the local network, by "faking" or "tunneling" the network protocol.

you are wrong (or partially right) - government have "agents" and/or can break encryption of public VPN services only, which handed the encryption keys to those governments. If you properly setup your own VPN server then no one would be able to break it. (except NSA ofcourse :D )

[ardsong]

quote government have "agents" and/or can break encryption of public VPN services only; If you properly setup your own VPN server then no one would be able to break it. unquote

indeed, sofar there is not one report of breaking a good encryption algorithme!. Where governments get to encrypted messages is through backdoors, (secretly) handed over encryption keys, or using other intrusive methods to capture a message before it is encrypted on your computer/phone or after is has been delivered  and decrypted and the receiver of encrypted message is not handling it secure.

My advice is:

-to stay away from American software and hardware products, as all have a backdoor from NSA.CIA etc, notwithstanding their promisses of not, they are all subpoena-ed to tell it!

-to stay away from proprietary software but use only OpenSourceSoftware, where the possibility of build-in backdoors is minimizes as the code is open to check for these leaks. e.g. not use Windows , but any Linus distro, use Tor-Browser and Tails as your operating system.

-to use good reliable VPN services, again not any american VPN services, but I would suggest Suisse or German are thought to be the most thrustworthy

-use E2EE (end to end encryption) for sensitive messages, from reliable providers, e.g. Session, Protonmail,

-use your common sense to stay safe as much as possible.

 

and than (maybe) you can stay private.

Edited February 22, 2022 by ardsong

[Stevemercer]

Have a look at the 'Paween statutory declaration' if anyone doubts how such laws can be misused.

 

Paween was the policeman investigating human trafficking and indicted a general and several army offices. According to Paween he exposed corruption in the ranks and is under a death threat. He is currently in Australia seeking asylum. 

 

His statutory declaration (it is a public document freely available on the internet) is a fascinating insight into corruption. The declaration was prepared and signed by him to support his application for asylum.

[MrJ2U]

7 hours ago, Gottfrid said:

Welcome to China.

Awful thought.

[MrJ2U]

8 minutes ago, ardsong said:

quote If you properly setup your own VPN server then no one would be able to break it. unquote

indeed, sofar there is not one report of breaking a good encryption algorithme!. Where governments get to encrypted messages is through backdoors, (secretly) handed over encryption keys, or using other intrusive methods to capture a message before it is encrypted on your computer/phone or after is has been delivered  and decrypted and the receiver of encrypted message is not handling it secure.

My advice is:

-to stay away from American software and hardware products, as all have a backdoor from NSA.CIA etc, notwithstanding their promisses of not, they are all subpoena-ed to tell it!

-to stay away from proprietary software but use only OpenSourceSoftware, where the possibility of build-in backdoors is minimizes as the code is open to check for these leaks. e.g. not use Windows , but any Linus distro, use Tor-Browser and Tails as your operating system.

-to use good reliable VPN services, again not any american VPN services, but I would suggest Suisse or German are thought to be the most thrustworthy

-use E2EE (end to end encryption) for sensitive messages, from reliable providers, e.g. Session, Protonmail,

-use your common sense to stay safe as much as possible.

 

and than (maybe) you can stay private.

Hopefully it doesn't get to that.

 

Even the juntas most ardent supporters wouldn't like to be spied on.

 

What a paranoid government.

 

 

[Burma Bill]

8 hours ago, webfact said:

to install a national internet gateway in Thailand to control and restrict access to external online content as an issue of national security.

Breathing space for us across the border!

Reference (15th February 2022)

 

"Cambodia is delaying an internet gateway that had raised concerns around privacy and free speech, halting its planned mid-week implementation due to Covid-19 related disruptions, a government official said Tuesday"

"The gateway, due to come into effect February 16, appeared to be taking Cambodia down a path beaten by Phnom Pehn's major economic partner China -- which keeps the online world behind a "Great Firewall" 

 

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220215-cambodia-delays-controversial-internet-gateway

[tlcwaterfall]

1 hour ago, Purdey said:

It isn't that easy to read millions of mails and chats daily. 

They will be looking for key words such as Cha Cha is a <deleted>. That phrase will be repeated millions of times every day!

[KhaoYai]

Due to the amount of hate crime, the spreading of mis-information, fake news, conspiracy theories and all the other nasty parts of the internet my support for it being unregulated has been dwindling.

 

If this proposal was actually being done to address those issues, it might just possibly be understandable but given this government's other behaviour, this is going to be used to get rid of some of the few remaining parts of democracy that Thailand has left. It totally fits with everything else this government has done to control dissent.

 

It was pleasing to see Thailand's youth express their opposition to being conned last year but equally as displeasing to see them make the fatal mistake of bringing the monarchy into the equation.  They were starting to gain support amongst the older population until then and Prayuth siezed upon their mistake to garner support against them.

 

This is just one more step towards total permanent authoritarian control - the first was the new constitution. That document ensured military control forever but most of the population have no idea what it did to their so called democracy. Some don't even know they have a new constitution.

 

Welcome to The People's Republic of Thailand....... what was it that someone called it yesterday.......Chailand?

[soalbundy]

5 hours ago, tgw said:

it won't affect them.

What about gathering intellectual information....like porn for instance.