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Great Firewall of The U.S.? AT&T May be censoring the internet.

internet-what.blogspot.com — Someone was redirected to go.com when trying to access The Pirate Bay. Running traceroute, it looks as if AT&T/Global Crossing may be intentionally causing it to be redirected to another website.

Who dugg this? Made popular Sep 15, 2006

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  • xose, on 10/12/2007, -1/+32Different ISPs will get you different traceroutes, going though different countries. That depends on the routing services they have contracted. For example, I have only 6 hops and most of them go though Paris, London and Amsterdam.

    Although if you're getting a different site then there's something going on. Maybe it's just spyware, maybe a modified Hosts file. But if more people from that ISP get to the same site I would start worrying.
  • Vary, on 10/12/2007, -4/+30Unbelievable, if it's true. I don't have the tech-fu to tell if this is legit or not. Anyone who understands the technical stuff from the article know of a less Big-Brother-ey explanation?

    This comes close to some of the concerns raised around net neutrality - if your isp doesn't have to treat all traffic the same, they get to decide what you can and can't see. I'll be interested to see what others who have the same isp as this guy have to say, too. If they really are intentionally redirecting traffic to The Pirate Bay, there might well be other sites affected, too.
  • Apage43, on 10/12/2007, -0/+20It's not a modified hosts file being that it's the same destination IP on both ISPs, blue tried typing the IP in his browser after I looked it up and still got "go.com", and doesn't seem to get it when trying to visit any other site.
  • osbjmg, on 10/12/2007, -7/+24Sniffer capture please.

    I put it to blue that he is full of *****, he's not even using AT&T - buried.

    Show more details. Is it still happening? Try asking blue to use another computer in the same location and see what he gets - I'll put money it's on blue's machine. Seriously, $100 bucks.
  • ElFredo, on 10/12/2007, -1/+16The last node name is hilarious:

    hey.mpaa.and.apb.bite.my.shiny.metal.ass.thepiratebay.org
  • osbjmg, on 10/12/2007, -3/+17The traceroute doesn't show tha the is an AT&T user!!!

    Calm down people... this is an inaccurate article.
  • SteelChicken, on 10/12/2007, -1/+13give him a break? is that before or after people are proclaiming THE INTERNET FIREWALL STOLE MY MEGAHURTZ!

    Its ok to be a noob and to not understand, its NOT ok to be a noob and not understand, and then run your mouth off all the time making these huge proclamations.

    Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity.

  • mzwaterski, on 10/12/2007, -0/+12I'm on SBC/AT&T DSL and I go straight to the correct page.
  • mason.parker, on 10/12/2007, -0/+12This article reminds me of myself back when I was a kid learning about the series of tubes that make up the internet. At least once a month something weird would happen and I would ping or tracert and exclaim something like 'oh my god, the root dns servers are down!!!' or something equally as stupid while I really had no idea what was happening.

    He's probably a kid and learning, give him break.
  • OmniMe, on 10/12/2007, -2/+14By the looks of that Go.com site, he probably has spyware.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+14The Pirate Bay does this on purpose. Bloggers piss me off.

    This article has been marked Inaccurate! (I suggest everyone else mark it the same)

    Try going to the Pirate Bay and actually reading what they have to say instead of thinking about stupid consPiracy theories.
  • lebel, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9The packets are just going thru AT&T, that's all. AT&T is a backbone provider and the traceroute that I'm seeing here is that his packets used AT&T as the shortest route to get to thepiratebay.org.

    However, I suspect a snafu in the BGP routes rather than some intentional redirection in the series of tubes that is the Internet. Or maybe this is the beginning of the infamous not-neutral Internet?
  • twowords, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9Most of US internet traffic is routed by AT&T. He doesn't have to be a AT&T customer to go thru AT&T routers.

    TW
  • Viat, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8Look in the taskbar at all those programs running in the background - I'd nearly guarantee it's one of those, instead of some AT&T conspiracy.
  • tekrat, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9This is my wacky conspiracy theory: Disney/Go.com recently had a blockbuster released called 'Pirates of the Caribbean'. You're trying to go to 'Pirates Bay'. I think that Disney, through some spyware company, is doing DNS redirects to a Go.com subdomain to advertise their movie. It may even be a hold over from a summer campaign. The spyware could be redirecting to a dead subdomain and then the domain wildcard for Go.com then redirects you to the default Go.com.

    Disney probably figures that most people won't complain about a 'hacker' site being redirected to a respectable kids/Disney website. Plus using redirection as a tie-in to a popular product adds a little creditability to what they are doing.
  • onepingonly, on 10/12/2007, -3/+10I have AT&T, no problems here.

    This would be incredibly stupid even for AT&T. They are in the middle of the Net Neutrality fight and certainly wouldn’t want to give even more ammunition to the opposition.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9I tried to go to http://www.thepiratbay.org, and it got redirected too! OMFG!
  • DoubtfulSalmon, on 10/12/2007, -8/+14I'm burying *you* as clueless. Learn the (kindergarten level) fundamentals of IP networking before you go off half clued. *All* that the traceroute proves is that (1) there is connectivity between the two points via all those other points, and (2) ping packets aren't being redirected. It proves *nothing* (for or against) the other claims made by TFA.

    I'm not saying that the guy who wrote TFA is right, but I'm not about to ***** him either (not until a bit more evidence comes to light anyway!!!). Sure, it's a 99.99999% likelihood that his mate has cocked something up locally (never attribute to malice that which may be sufficiently explained by stupidity), but the fact remains: it's *absolutely* possible for his ISP, or any other party en-route, to do what he's claiming is happening.
  • JoeSlingo, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7The conclusion that AT&T is censoring the pirate bay seems rather silly to me. routing can do and go through anywhere and whoever it wants to as long as the destination is the same. From the two chat scripts, both traceroutes end at ...bite.my.shiny.metal.ass.... (I like that btw).

    It looks to me that two people with different service providers are comparing routes which *should* be different. One guy is going through AT&T, and the other is going through Sprint. The end result is thepiratebay.org as it should be.

    Cisco routers have something called Border Gateway Protocol that magically routes traffic through less congested routes when the need arises - not all network topologies use it though. This is just and instance where you can get two different traceroute readings.

    Also, did you notice the popup window to partypoker.com when you clicked Blue's screenshot? I think someone is doing some clever click-collecting by advertising outrageous articles on digg.
  • osbjmg, on 10/12/2007, -3/+9Lame, there is nothing conclusive in the article.
    Stop jumping to conclusions guys!

    The guy isn't even on AT&T, the next to last hop is AT&T - thepiratebay is using them as an ISP.
  • mrmagoo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6Blue's trace route ends in the same place mine does, and I can get to the site just fine. Its Blue's box.

    Here's my trace route, with the first few hops omitted for obvious reasons:

    5: 68.2.13.5 (68.2.13.5) asymm 6 12.452ms
    6: 68.2.13.1 (68.2.13.1) asymm 7 13.405ms
    7: chnddsrj01-ae1.rd.ph.cox.net (68.2.14.1) asymm 8 14.562ms
    8: chnddsrj01-so010.rd.ph.cox.net (68.2.15.1) 14.028ms
    9: ae-2-54.mp2.Phoenix1.Level3.net (4.68.98.97) asymm 10 15.025ms
    10: ae-2-54.mp2.Phoenix1.Level3.net (4.68.98.97) 13.264ms
    11: ae-0-0.bbr2.LosAngeles1.Level3.net (64.159.1.126) 27.621ms
    12: no reply
    13: port80.ge-2-0-0.407ar1.ARN1.gblx.net (207.138.144.102) asymm 16 191.949ms
    14: port80.ge-2-0-0.407ar1.ARN1.gblx.net (207.138.144.102) asymm 16 191.311ms
    15: hey.mpaa.and.apb.bite.my.shiny.metal.ass.thepiratebay.org (83.140.176.146) asymm 18 193.661ms reached


  • stuffhappens, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6Oh FFS. How the hell did this make it to the front page without any technical verification.

    All those who dugg it 'just to see if it's true' aren't helping - guys, if you cannot verify what you are Digging is accurate then leave it alone.

  • nogami, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5It sounds to me like he's got some spyware/adware in his computer, or that his ISP is caching HTTP requests and their caching server is screwed and serving the wrong pages.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7shhhh, no dude. It's a conspiracy.
  • Ribald_Jester, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6This is great news for us if it's true. Now we have precedence that we can take to our Congress people to show that AT&T *will* ***** with Internet traffic if allowed to. IE - they CANNOT be allowed to tier the Internet and disband Network Neutrality because of ***** like this. Regardless of whether the site the person is visiting is legal or not.

    We constantly hear about how China oppresses their people and limits their Internet usage via the "Great Firewall of China". Guess what America - it happens here to, thanks to AT&T.
  • bat-21, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5I don't have a problem either. It could be a bug with one of the servers. Disney (which owns Go.com) has their own pirate website.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4This actually happen to me before when visiting a serial number and crack site. It was like two years ago. I even used Google to get there after it didnt work by direct type-in. Very weird...
  • Ryosen, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Of course it could be possible, but then it wouldn't be nearly as sensational. The article is obviously inaccurate.
  • bigfatdonny, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4@doubtfulsalmon

    "and (2) ping packets aren't being redirected"

    BTW, they're ICMP packets, not ping packets. There is no such thing as a "ping" packet. Just thought I'd throw that out there since you berated the parent for not having "kindergarten level" knowledge of IP.
  • rzklkng, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5Dugg. And not for the original article, but for the comments and process...

    Next time some knucklehead tells you that social networking and news (or digg, del.icio.us, wikipedia, and the hive-mind) are useless as sources, and that the blogosphere is full of unsubstatiated rumors can point to this thread and show that there is way more fact checking and community enforcement of truthiness than any of the broadcast or cable news networks, news bureaus, or newspapers.

    If this was a story that the papers cared about, especially those news magazines (I'm looking at you ABCNEWS, with that internet's bad, m'kay, from last night), there would be breathless fear mongering and promos about people haxoring your interweb.
  • Apage43, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Could it also be possible that somewhere earlier in the list of hops is redirecting it? (anc.net (aka arkansas.net)) At the very least, from the point of view of the user making the request, the packets LOOK like they're coming from / going to thepiratebay.org, though go.com comes back.
  • DoubtfulSalmon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Agreed.
  • d7415, on 10/12/2007, -4/+7Dugg because I want to know if this is true or not. Traceroute doesnt say much to me because, as xose said they vary a lot. If other AT&T users are unable to access the Bay, however, then that's a problem.
  • LordFate, on 10/12/2007, -4/+7Buried as inaccurate. Learn how the heck traceroute/internet routing works and then try again.

    This article proves nothing. In fact, the fact that the traceroute terminates successfully at the right IP address means that the person proved that they are NOT blocking anything. Tell blue to get rid of crappy spyware.
  • hurfydurfur, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3We probably won't know for sure without more details from this blog. However, tools to keep the ISPs in check sure help. Take what doxpara.com or Dan Kaminsky is theorizing about. Everyone surfs around on different ISPs and we all agree on what we're seeing. Then we keep our ISPs honest.

    http://www.boingboing.net/2006/08/03/test_for_network_neu.html

    Now, someone just needs to implement this in a google toolbar or something (please don't submit my results for what my bank account looks like). :P
  • masamunecyrus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I have fourteen hops using SBC Yahoo! DSL (which is not AT&T Yahoo! DSL) in Indianapolis, Indiana:

    1. Indianapolis, Indiana
    2. Chicago, Illinois
    3-12. It flies around East Lansing, Michigan, to Los Angeles, California, to Bristol, Connecticut, back to LA
    12. London, England, UK
    13. Jonkoping, Sweden
    14. Stockholm, Sweden -- thepiratebay.org
  • theWaterboy, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4this story is bull -- I have no problems contacting piratebay... reporting the story as inaccurate, because it is.
  • dooms13, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3I'm not going to digg or bury this story...I'm a little concerned about the implications of this. How often does this occur? I mean I just tried going to TPB and it worked fine, and my school blocks a lot of content. Does this occur every time this person tries to go to the site and when did they try to go? To me this just seems like a fluke...
  • krazygluon, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3insightBB works fine with thepiratebay...

    have Blue load a new os (linux maybe?) and see what he/she gets. I'm betting spyware.
  • yaosio, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2My last few hops go through AT&T and I end up at The Pirate Bay.
  • ABadInAlbany, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3:uh: somebody forgot to run his spyware cleaners. marked as innaccurate, next.
  • osbjmg, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I can't believe how many idiots dugg this aticle. All the comments point to it being bogus and I am tired of looking at it. This is nothing more than some idiot with a stupid idea and a lack of understanding of big boy concepts.

    There is nothing going on here, move along. This dude has something wrong with his host... sheesh.
  • acousticiris, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Traceroute is probably accurate (I get the same results on compcast for the last several steps). The screenshot is probably faked with a hosts file.

    Even if it's legitimate, anyone willing to level a charge like this best provide better proof than a traceroute and a screenshot. And maybe it's just the geek in me, but I can think of about 20 other things I would have tried before going to the trouble of setting up a blog and posting it to digg.

    So that goes to another question... was the investigation more important or was getting exposure more important? It probably took twice as long to set the blog up as it did to run two traceroutes and a CTRL+PrtScn+Pbrush combination.

    Of course, knowing how a story like this would likely strike Digg (we Digg folk tend to pounce on anything that smells of injustice), an author has a great motivation to trump up a charge like this.

    I'm not saying I'm an AT&T fan (quite the contrary), but ... maligning a company using false charges only makes that company look like the good guys.

    Hoax. Period.
  • liber8ed, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2reported as innacurate.... clean your spyware before going off on conspiracy theories.
  • richbradshaw, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4Royale Theme, with Microsoft Virtual Desktop installed (deskman.exe - it's on the powertoys website)
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2keep in mind these are the same people that listen to your calls NSA style... so i really wouldnt put it past them at all. I think they arent doing it, so shhhhh dont give them any ideas
  • mrfreeziexp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2well, whatever it was, it's fixed now.
  • Apage43, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Sorry that it seems to be wrong, but I'm much more glad I was wrong anyway. Feel free to mark the story inaccurate. I'll keep trying to figure out why blue can't access TPB
  • Sakumi, on 07/20/2008, -0/+1I can confirm this is true - i cannot access 'thepiratebay.org' but i can access 'static.thepiratebay.org' It happened 2 days ago... Verified on 3 pcs.
  • LiterateWolf, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I have InsightBB and got to the Bay. The blog shows Sprint which is owned by ATT&T which could mean that an area had a problem with piracy. Of course, if this was done on a national scale, we'd all be forced to deal with conservative Web sites and their fantasies of a utopian world without gays, non-Christians, and scholars.
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