Indian ISPs Told To Block Access To Vimeo

from the massive-overreaction dept

A few months ago we wrote about Indian ISPs being told to block (entirely) access to Megaupload (when it still existed) and BTJunkie. It seemed like overkill to block entire sites, but it appears that such censorship is expanding. There are reports in India of ISP-level blocks, ordered by the government, of a ton of sites. Many of these are torrent search engines and cyberlockers... but they also include Vimeo, one of the most popular video sites for filmmakers. This seems like another case of massive overkill by a government that has no idea what it's doing. It's amazing just how many overkill censorship attempts we've seen lately all in the name of copyright holders.
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Filed Under: censorship, india, isp, torrents
Companies: btjunkie, megaupload, vimeo


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  • identicon
    Nigel, 10 May 2012 @ 8:45pm

    Are these countries trying to turn back time to avoid the future?

    Only Superman can do that.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Alana (profile), 10 May 2012 @ 8:50pm

    Squash them all! Puny little insects, who will just burrow underground where the mean nasty foot can't reach them... They'll build tunnels to have outside access, too! Ah yes, this analogy is perfect!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 10 May 2012 @ 9:13pm

    ah yes, because only mike knows what best for all countries in the world, and of course only Americas idea of "freedom" applies to all countries
    and it only for the rights holders, who are th evictims of crime, that they do this, but of course mike can overlook the crimes his fellow pirates do, all in the name of freedom mind you

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      IronM@sk, 10 May 2012 @ 9:26pm

      Re:

      /slow clap

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        abc gum, 11 May 2012 @ 4:52am

        Re: Re:

        IDK - maybe a 1 out of 5.

        The poster missed several key elements. For example this post correctly identifies the author, but does not call him "Mikey" and there is a blatant lack of key words here.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 11 May 2012 @ 12:01am

      Re:

      How is vimeo even remotely on the same level of notoriety and alleged criminality as The Pirate Bay is?

      Are you that dissatisfied with El-P that you've gone beyond trolling his thread and have now spread your shillwings to other topics, regardless of relevance?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Balwinder Singh, 10 May 2012 @ 9:16pm

    Well I am from India and can tell with certainity that this ban is NOT compulsary to be implemented by all the ISPs as i never had any problem accessing any of the blocked sites (and the ban is place for the past 5 months)!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 10 May 2012 @ 9:53pm

    Why Vimeo? Dailymotion is much worse for piles and piles of ripped shows. And youtube has the biggest collection of all.

    I guess now people in India have to use a proxy to see indie shorts, actors' self-filmed monologues, and fanvids, but they can still watch all the My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic episodes they want to.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Pixelation, 10 May 2012 @ 10:05pm

    I think the entertainment industry better beware. The ISP's are about to wrest control away.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Rabbit, 10 May 2012 @ 10:19pm

    You're not seeing the big picture (and those in India probably no pictures at all). But one day, by blocking off the entire internet we can finally get back to promoting the arts and sciences instead of being distracted by these interwebs.

    Here here to big content for looking after our progress by moving backwards!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Narbal, 10 May 2012 @ 11:04pm

    False Rumour

    These blocks are limited to one ISP (Reliance Broadband - ironic name!). Above mentioned websites worked fine on other ISPs in India

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      varagix, 11 May 2012 @ 12:01am

      Re: False Rumour

      If that's true, why just them? Are they government ran or something, and the government is afraid of international backlash or something? Lawsuit gone horribly wrong? It seems weird that only one ISP would be ordered.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Anonymous Coward, 11 May 2012 @ 12:46am

        Re: Re: False Rumour

        Their parent company also runs a movie production house.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      S Ban, 19 May 2012 @ 11:28am

      Re: False Rumour

      Not so any more. Airtel blocks vimeo.com and other similar websites in question as on Saturday May 19th 2012.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 May 2012 @ 12:56am

    that is the biggest problem with having someone in charge of something that they are clueless about themselves but are also easily lead to a particular action by another, all be it selfish, party

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 May 2012 @ 1:02am

    Our courts are run by retards

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 May 2012 @ 1:53am

    All I see is a group of kids, who are angry that they can't get free stuff anymore.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Beech, 11 May 2012 @ 2:16am

      Re:

      beautiful post! short, sweet, inflammatory, and i think about 100% wrong.

      1) What you see is a bunch of squiggles called "letters" on a webpage, unless you are actually in India watching kids, which is pretty creepy.

      2) "angry" isn't the word most would use, "disappointed" is probably a better choice of words for how i feel about it.

      3) "that they can't get free stuff anymore" no, the problem is that some people in India can't get free stuff anymore. Everyone here is saddened for THEIR loss. Those who have posted from India apparently have no problem accessing the affected sites

      4) "can't get free stuff" if by "stuff" you mean access to completely legitimate websites. the kind that you can access from almost any other country, because there's nothing wrong with them. There's nothing inherently wrong with free. If someone walks up to you on the street and offers you $20 to go get professional psychiatric help, are you going to tell him no because it's FREE!?!?!?! (oh noes!). Of course, it may be different if the $20 is stolen, but on vimeo that is the exception rather than the rule

      5) "Can't" as with any form of "blocking" there's already tons of ways around this. so this will stop grandpa from accidentally watching a legal video. The kind of people who are technically proficient enough to pirate in the first place have probably already found another way to "get their free stuff."

      So, in conclusion, you comment should be something more like:

      "The majority of what I'm reading about here is a bunch of age-diverse webizens empathizing with those in a foreign land who have a slightly more difficult time accessing legal websites, while hardcore piracy continues unabated."

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 11 May 2012 @ 4:12am

      Re:

      Way to miss the point. Unless you can point to somewhere else where filmmakers are also freely hosting their videos, which they own the copyright to.

      Oh, and this time there's no Kim Dotcom or Peter Sunde for you to blame notoriety on. Vimeo has been wrongly and irresponsibly blocked.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Chuck Norris' Enemy (deceased) (profile), 11 May 2012 @ 6:53am

      Re:

      can't get free stuff anymore

      Only a delusional troll would believe that there are not a multitude of workarounds, let alone other sites, where 'free stuff' can still be found...and these workarounds were probably available as soon as the first 'freetardist' got a website block splash page.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    The WTO Blogger (profile), 11 May 2012 @ 3:17am

    Vimeo

    Vimeo sucks anyway. Nothing of value was lost.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 May 2012 @ 5:04am

    The RIAA is a terrorist organization , there members ad financial supporters must be arrested and charged with terrorism. The are using threats to get governments around the world to do there bidding, they use there power to destroy peoples lives as an example to others who do not bow down to there wishes , they are a terrorist organization and we must destroy them, ban them from our countries and attack them where we can.
    If the RIAA threatens you, you have the right to retaliate as you would to any terrorist.

    Tell everyone they are supporting terrorism when they buy a dvd or bluray or pay for any entertainment from Hollywood or from any studio/organization financing the RIAA.

    Tell everyone that when they share movies/tv shows /music over the Internet they are defeating the terrorists.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Samuel BG, 11 May 2012 @ 6:29am

    This is really disturbing!

    Ok on first note. This ban to me has nothing to do with copywright infrigment whatsoever. However copywright infrigment is an excuse being used here to justify the ban.

    What i see is a terible precedent being set in front of everyone eyes. If we allows them to shutdown any website for false pretexs, then they might as well shutdown any website for no reason at all.

    This to me is the coup of an investor that got very deep pockets and attempted to use govt. to shutdown their competition. General Electric is the undisputed champion in this departement.

    Anybody that say this ban is no big deal cause the site in question is not a big loss, those people failed to see what is at stake here.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Gerald Robinson (profile), 11 May 2012 @ 6:56am

    Really stupid censorship

    Bollywood is a huge source of income for India. It was built on sharing sites and many of the producers depend on Vimeo. This looks like the Indian government is penalizing their local industries to suit the US.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Jeremy Butcher, 24 May 2012 @ 10:35pm

    The solution is to download the Tor Browser Bundle from :

    https://www.torproject.org/dist/torbrowser/tor-browser-2.2.35-12_en-US.exe

    Close your browser.
    Unzip this portable file to a suitable location like non System partition ( Drive other than the C:\ Partition) or pendrive.
    Run the “Start TOR Browser.exe” file from the “TOR Browser” Folder to launch a secure version of Firefox Portable.
    It takes time to open since it directs your request through a Tor network of IP Addresses and exits in another country as a different IP address from your own.
    Hence you can access any of your “forbidden” sites to which access has been blocked on the basis of the High Court order.
    Other option is UltraSurf but it is slightly suspicious based on net reports.

    Legal Disclaimer :
    Distributed in public interest for educational purposes only.
    Users requested to exercise caution and use it for legitimate purposes only.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Prashant, 9 Jul 2012 @ 7:49am

    VPN

    I`m using this when I need to to access blocked sites: http://www.sunvpn.com/
    It`s a VPN service, works similar with a proxy, only faster..

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Bellmani, 31 Dec 2013 @ 1:25am

    VPN service to open blocked website

    "If you want to be able to leave your network devices on vpn permanently you will need a vpn client router.

    I got mine from http://www.primovpn.net , they are really easy to setup. I don't know if they will work with Himachi though.

    Primovpn routers also let you do dual gateway on one router so you can be local and on vpn at the same time."

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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