On Thu, Jun 21, 2018 at 12:28:10PM +0200, Maria Xynou wrote:
As of last night (or last morning, Venezuela-time), we've been receiving reports from locals in Venezuela that Tor is being blocked.
State-owned CANTV is reportedly blocking access to Tor and obfs4.
They've been running OONI Probe tests that seem to confirm this, though it remains unclear if other ISPs in Venezuela are blocking access to Tor (and Tor bridges) as well.
This follows weeks of increased censorship, particularly targeting media websites (like lapatilla.com and elpitazo.com).
What strategies would be relevant here?
It's likely that the obfs4 blocking is being effected by IP address blocking of the default obfs4 bridges. My guess is that non-default bridges from bridges.torproject.org will work.
Idea: turn the situation into a teachable moment by making a Spanish-language tweet/blogpost that contains one or two non-default bridge lines and instructions on where to paste them, *plus* a link to https://blog.torproject.org/breaking-through-censorship-barriers-even-when-t... or similar that shows how to get more bridges when the tweeted ones get blocked.
My thinking is that while people normally have no incentive to use anything but a default bridge, they can learn the skills they need now that there is a reason.