Researchers unveil tool for dodging countries with Internet surveillance

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Currently, Internet users have little control over diverting their Web traffic to avoid countries they deem untrustworthy. But a team from University of Maryland, University of Pennsylvania, and NEC Labs recently announced a possible fix – an Internet traffic routing system designed to give users the ability to determine where information flows as it moves from network to network.

Their project, called "Alibi routing" is a promising development for activists, dissident groups, journalists, or anyone else who has a vested interest in protecting sensitive information from prying eyes. "Encryption and anonymous networks are still important, but they don’t solve the problem of how available the information is to a country that could tamper with it," said Dave Levin, an assistant research scientist in the Institute for Advanced Computer Studies at the University of Maryland. “I can try to trick a censoring country into thinking I'm communicate with someone else, but rather than sneak through a bad neighborhood, just avoid it," he said. "Just go around it altogether.”


Researchers unveil tool for dodging countries with Internet surveillance