Not trying to steal Jake or Nadiem's talking points, but why did he roll his own when there are pretty well vetted standards out there? On Mar 15, 2013 10:27 AM, "Yosem Companys" <[email protected]> wrote:
> This story appeared on Network World at > > https://www.networkworld.com/news/2013/031313-users-flock-to-japan-student39s-267650.html > > Users flock to Japan student's firewall-busting thesis project > 'VPN Gate,' designed by Ph.D. student Daiyuu Nobori to circumvent > government firewalls, has drawn 77,000 users in less than a week > > By Jay Alabaster, IDG News Service > March 13, 2013 07:05 AM ET > > IDG News Service - If you're not sure about the purpose behind Daiyuu > Nobori's online thesis project, perhaps the large picture of the > collapse of the Berlin Wall will help. > > Nobori created VPN Gate to help individuals in countries that restrict > Internet use to beat government firewalls. The service encourages > members of the public to set up VPN (virtual private network) servers > and offer free connections to individual users, aiming to make the > technology more accessible. > > "Today's VPN software is very complex. They are not easy to use. Some > VPN services around the world are expensive for people in other parts > of the world," Nobori said in an interview with IDG News Service. > > His service maintains a public, real-time list of freely available VPN > servers for users to choose from. It also offers downloadable server > software to run the VPN, and a client that greatly simplifies the > process of finding and connecting to one of the free servers, for the > less technically inclined. > > The 28 year-old doctoral student at Tsukuba University, about 30 miles > northeast of Tokyo, wasn't sure what the reaction would be when he > launched last Friday. He did little to advertise it outside of the > home page and a few mentions on tech forums. > > Five days later, the service has drawn 77,000 users and served nearly > 4 terabytes of data. > > "There are a lot of users from around the world, so I'm very happy," > he said, but "the large amount of data transfer charges are a problem. > This is coming from my credit card." > > Nobori had originally planned to host the service on his university's > servers, but they have been down recently so he switched it to the > Windows Azure cloud platform. He has spent about US$9,000 keeping it > up so far, and will move it back to the university as soon as he can. > He also operates his own VPN company, income from which has helped > with expenses. > > The service is based on "SoftEther," open-source VPN software he > built. He says most of it will be released as open source in the next > few months. He said he plans to keep certain small portions related to > custom protocols private, for security reasons. > > He was motivated to create VPN Gate when he learned about the > firewalls imposed on people living in Middle East countries such as > Egypt and Libya. The Web page is currently offered in English, Chinese > and his native Japanese, but he says that is more based on the number > of language speakers worldwide than any political feelings about a > particular country. > > "I'm an engineer, I don't have any interest in politics," he said. "If > people somewhere want to study and can't use services like Wikipedia > or Google, this is a big problem. Wikipedia has political articles, > but also articles about science and other topics." > > The service's public access logs show that the vast majority of > connections are coming from China. He had friends at his university > help him translate his materials into Chinese, but they asked that he > not credit them by name for fear of repercussions. > > Nobori said that while few people in countries like Japan feel > threatened by government firewalls, he remains concerned. In Japan, > police have publicized a plan to block access to a genre of sites that > give advice on how to kill yourself, to cut down on the country's high > suicide rate. > > "It is probably acceptable to block the suicide sites, but you don't > know what happens next. There is always a chance it will expand." > > The IDG News Service is a Network World affiliate. > > All contents copyright 1995-2013 Network World, Inc. > http://www.networkworld.com > -- > Too many emails? Unsubscribe, change to digest, or change password by > emailing moderator at [email protected] or changing your settings at > https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech >
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