Thailand scraps unpopular Internet 'Great Firewall' plan

[webfact]

Thailand scraps unpopular Internet 'Great Firewall' plan
REUTERS
BANGKOK

BANGKOK: -- Thailand's military government has scrapped a plan to create a single Internet gateway, a deputy prime minister said on Thursday, putting paid to a system aimed at allowing authorities to monitor content.

The plan to consolidate Thailand's 10 Internet gateways into one central government-controlled point had been one of the government's least popular ideas since it came to power following a bloodless coup last year.

Deputy Prime Minister Somkid Jatusripitak, a former finance minister, said the plan had been halted.

"We will not talk about this any more. If we say we won't do it, we won't do it," Somkid said during an a economic forum in Bangkok.

The single gateway plan was approved in August. Some feared the proposal would destroy competition and was reminiscent of the most authoritarian measures to stifle free speech.

The plan also triggered concern that Internet speeds would plummet, which would almost certainly hurt online business and anger Internet users.

Full story: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/15/us-thailand-internet-idUSKCN0S916I20151015


-- Reuters 2015-10-16

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[Toknarok]

Lets hope that this puts an end to this matter, although this Government with its draconian self appointed powers can't be trusted. I would like Prayuth to come out himself and categorically state that the idea has been totally abandoned.

[pinkpanther99]

Yes, but the question is do we actually believe them when they say this?

Especially given that the whole 'great firewall' thing was planned in secret.

[Wilsonandson]

Logic wins and the people were heard, maybe this new government ain't so bad as it's portrayed. Good on yer Junta, lets have faster internet and fibre optic speed. Happiness is now returning, time to play cookie run, hooray!!!

[Thian]

haha and i just read about that new thing they bought from Italy, to spy on cellphones....

[NongKhaiKid]

I'm no computer expert so i would like to ask those who know the subject if it would be possible for the govt to go ahead with this idea, in some form or other, in secret without it being spotted ?

Edited October 16, 2015 by NongKhaiKid

[mrrizzla]

Logic wins and the people were heard, maybe this new government ain't so bad as it's portrayed. Good on yer Junta, lets have faster internet and fibre optic speed. Happiness is now returning, time to play cookie run, hooray!!!

Um they were planning it in secret and were caught out causing the outcry. If they weren't caught out god knows what would of happened.

You sycophants are a laugh sometimes.

[robblok]

I had hoped this would not go through and reason finally prevailed. Good to see that they do listen to the public.

[robblok]

I'm no computer expert so i would like to ask those who know the subject if it would be possible for the govt to go ahead with this idea, in some form or other, in secret without it being spotted ?

Of course not, they would need cooperation of all the major telecom providers just to test it. People would know and you can keep a secret with 10 people but not with thousands of people. Believe me the telecom providers are against this and would blow the whistle for sure.

They can try to develop but without more people in the know and tests it would never work and the implementation would take a lot of time from the moment on they informed the telecom providers. More then enough time to protest against this again.

[Somtamnication]

Not being paranoid, but, they say they will scrap it. Doesn't mean they won't do it.

[wxpwzrd]

Scrapped or just renamed... Even if it is "scrapped" the control freaks in government will look to another system. They can't help themselves.

[MaxLee]

"Thailand scraps unpopular Internet 'Great Firewall' plan"

Just kidding or just kidding...????

[mrrizzla]

Again with the "ahh good ol' happiness giving junta listening to the public" shtick. They were caught with their pants down and even through massive public outcry and cyber attacks tried to keep passing it off.

If this wasn't leaked they'd still be working on it now.

[AlphMichaels]

It was never going to be operationally feasible anyway. Costs would be too high.

[English 1]

They have a habit of throwing ideas into the circus ring to TEST reaction.

[MZurf]

I had hoped this would not go through and reason finally prevailed. Good to see that they do listen to the public.

If they cared about what the public thought they would hold an election.

[robblok]

I had hoped this would not go through and reason finally prevailed. Good to see that they do listen to the public.

If they cared about what the public thought they would hold an election.

Obviously they care else it would not have been scrapped, they were set on it but the outcry was too massive and the gains too little.

[MZurf]

I had hoped this would not go through and reason finally prevailed. Good to see that they do listen to the public.

If they cared about what the public thought they would hold an election.

Obviously they care else it would not have been scrapped, they were set on it but the outcry was too massive and the gains too little.

So they care, but obviously not enough to hold elections. Or they just realize that the outcry would have been massive and the gains minimal (for them) if they had held them.

[monty1412]

Yet another from the school of ready ,fire, aim by the political masters here.

Please oh please.... I am but a simple man but wouldn't it be better to research, review, seek counsel, explore all aspects, evaluate pro's cons and then announce intent rather than come out of the gate with a grand falutin announcement, get everyone up in arms and then say " Oh on reflection we aint going to do it now"....

Any public servant within the ministries could have told you that this announced plan was not going to be efficient or get support from numerous industry groups..... continual situations like this can be avoided and will prevent the government from looking like the most important Ministry is the Ministry of Backflips....

On the other hand to be balanced I did think the recent housing stimulus package announced made good sense and Im all in favour of seeing more policies and structure being added to help the wider populace.......

I like the governments call to increase " happiness".. now if the actions can match the words it would be great.....perhaps a good yardstick for any potential policy being evaluated is " to whom does this add happiness and why".... more submarines and an internet gateway arguably adds " happiness" to a precious few......more affordable housing, better education, clamp down on corruption and more transparent legal system will add buckets of happiness to many ......

[Denim]

The cheque is in the post.

We are not planning a coup.

I have no plan to become prime minister.

If we say we wont do it , we won't do it.

The credibility of the governments utterances is not getting any better as time passes.

[diehard60]

Only one thing to say"GOOD"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[klauskunkel]

"We will not talk about this any more. If we say we won't do it, we won't do it," Somkid said

I think he is pouting, what a sullen boy...next, there will be a tantrum which will lead to a national bureaucratic befuddlement combined with country image tarnishing...

(but what do I know? )

[Tatsujin]

I'm no computer expert so i would like to ask those who know the subject if it would be possible for the govt to go ahead with this idea, in some form or other, in secret without it being spotted ?

They already are (in a smaller way) intercepting and monitoring some internet traffic, and have been for some years now, they've admitted to it on a number of occasions.

[DrTuner]

The new way of making the government do what the people want seems to be cyberterrorism. Thainess, updated.

[cockatoowho]

Be prepared for some other little nasties, these oxygen theives do not like being told no.

[GinBoy2]

Honestly the snooping and censorship will not stop, and it probably will increase. However there are and always have been 'ways' to avoid that. The single gateway would have made it easier but more importantly for the majority of us it would have hobbled internet connectivity, taking Thailand back to the dialup era.

So, keeping the multiple gateways (so long of course that they don't do a U turn, as unheard of as that is <ahem>) is a good thing. Censorship, well that is going to be a continuing battle no matter what they say.

[gk10002000]

Some officials said they plan to scrap the plan. That hardly means that they have scrapped the plan. They almost certainly will step up their electronic monitoring of the internet. I also would not be surprised if they are not already monitoring a lot of cell phone texting. That traffic is east to intercept and decode. Many countries knowingly monitor voice traffic also, but that is a little more difficult to translate, transcribe etc.

[PaPiPuPePo]

For something to plummet it has to be high (up) to begin with. The article's sentence should read "The plan also triggered concern that Internet speeds would get even slower."

[robblok]

For something to plummet it has to be high (up) to begin with. The article's sentence should read "The plan also triggered concern that Internet speeds would get even slower."

Internet is not slow I got 50M / 10M connection and I can get international speeds of 50M when downloading form international sites. That is over 6M/b per second.

If you pay peanuts have a crappy computer sure then speeds are slow over here. But not everyone goes for the cheapest option available.

(Fiber optic 3bb greater BKK area)

Edited October 16, 2015 by robblok

[mancub]

I had hoped this would not go through and reason finally prevailed. Good to see that they do listen to the public.

If they cared about what the public thought they would hold an election.

Obviously they care else it would not have been scrapped, they were set on it but the outcry was too massive and the gains too little.

The only reason they appear to "care" being the fact that they were caught out trying to implement it covertly.