A Privacy Threat for Internet Users in Internet-censoring Countries

摘要

Online surveillance has been increasingly used by different governments to control the spread of information on the Internet. The magnitude of this activity differs widely and is based primarily on the areas that are deemed, by the state, to be critical. Aside from the use of keywords and the complete domain name filtering technologies, Internet censorship can sometimes even use the total blocking of IP addresses to censor content. Despite the advances, in terms of technology used for Internet censorship, there are also different types of circumvention tools that are available to the general public. In this paper, we report the results of our investigation on how migrants who previously had access to the open Internet behave toward Internet censorship when subjected to it. Four hundred and thirty-two (432) international students took part in the study that lasted two years. We identified the most common circumvention tools that are utilized by the foreign students in China. We investigated the usability of these tools and monitored the way in which they are used. We identified a behaviour-based privacy threat that puts the users of circumvention tools at risk while they live in an Internet-censoring country. We also recommend the use of a user-oriented filtering method, which should be considered as part of the censoring system, as it enhances the performance of the screening process and recognizes the real needs of its users.