Psiphon Usage Surges as Brazil Blocks WhatsApp

At 9PM ET on December 16th WhatsApp was blocked in Brazil. The ban came after a judge ordered that the messenger app be blocked for 48 hours when the company refused to hand over private user information related to a criminal case. For months, Brazilian telecommunications companies have been attempting to shut down WhatsApp because it provides free messaging and voice services. WhatsApp is the most popular messenger service in Brazil and telecoms blame it for luring millions away from paid cell phone use.

Internet users in Brazil reacted strongly to the ban, criticizing the decision to block WhatsApp widely on social media. Millions turned to alternate messenger services and shared circumvention techniques over social media. Psiphon was praised by people in Brazil for being free, open source, and able to keep them connected throughout the blocking event. Psiphon’s surge capacity was able to cope with the increased demand, with peak data use of more than 8x that of a normal day. Psiphon’s unique users in Brazil went from 54,000 on December 16 to 946,000 on December 17.

Less than a day after the block was put in place, a second judge overturned the lower court’s decision and WhatsApp was unblocked. He stated that “it does not seem reasonable that millions of users be affected” because WhatsApp refused to disclose user information. While the surge use of Psiphon settled quickly, more than twice the expected amount of data was being served hours after the block was lifted.

Update: In May 2016 Brazil blocked WhatsApp again, and again users turned to Psiphon.

Android Browser Same Origin Policy Bypass Security Vulnerability (CVE-2014-6041)

A severe security vulnerability in the Android AOSP browser has been disclosed: http://www.rafayhackingarticles.net/2014/08/android-browser-same-origin-policy.html

The Psiphon team has determined that the built-in browser ("browser-only mode") in our Psiphon app is affected, on Android versions 3.0 to 4.3, through its use of Android AOSP browser via the WebView component. There is no known mitigation for this security vulnerability other than to disable JavaScript in our built-in browser WebView components.

We are releasing Psiphon for Android version 62 which will disable JavaScript in the built-in browser on these versions of Android. We plan to leave this restriction in place until a less disruptive, effective mitigation becomes available; or the Android AOSP browser becomes widely patched.

2015-09-17

https://blog.psiphon.ca/2015/09/17/android-browser-same-origin-policy-bypass-security-vulnerability-cve-2014-6041/ Psiphon Inc.

Psiphon Gives Global Boost to BFI Flare Film Festival 2015

From March 25 - 31, Psiphon partnered with British Council to deploy the BFI Flare #FiveFilms4Freedom campaign, a global digital human rights initiative and history’s first global, digital LGBT cinematic event. A leader in contemporary LGBT cinema for 29 years, BFI Flare 2015 sought to encourage the world to watch a film together, and show that love is a basic human right.

Psiphon helped maximize the global impact of the campaign, connecting the festival’s LGBT filmmakers and their stories to audiences in 135 countries around the world, in some of the most heavily censored societies — places where freedom of expression is not a given, in particular for members of the LGBT community. According to #FiveFilms4Freedom Director Alan Gemmell, the initiative “was a truly ground-breaking way to support freedom and equality all over the world and showcase some of our finest short filmmakers… we’re incredibly proud that our campaign reached tens of millions of people and that we were able to show solidarity with people around the world who risk their lives everyday just to live and love.”

Through the Psiphon platform, more than 5 million viewers were made aware of the festival, and viewed the landing page 13 million times.

The partnership was a litmus test of Psiphon’s capabilities as a publishing platform, and demonstrated its power to connect diverse international audiences to culturally-relevant content, to each other, and to a global conversation on a massive scale.

Psiphon CEO Karl Kathuria was pleased with the outcome. “We are really excited to have helped raise awareness of this film festival,” he said. “Many people using our software are in countries where it can be difficult to access LGBT content, so this is a unique opportunity to connect them with #FiveFilms4Freedom and help them to join in with the conversation over social media.”

Kathuria confirmed that Psiphon will continue to pursue future initiatives in art, cinema, and other cultural activities. “As a content delivery tool, our technology holds substantial and untapped potential to engage a global audience, regardless of information controls that might be imposed on them. Psiphon will be pursuing several more opportunities to promote and distribute content for cinematic events over the remainder of 2015.”

#FiveFilms4Freedom will return in 2016 with an expanded international programme. Psiphon’s free and open source software continues to be available for Windows desktops and Android mobile devices, helping people all over the world connect with each other over the open internet.

To learn more about the #FiveFilms4Freedom project, visit: http://film.britishcouncil.org/our-projects/2015/fivefilms4freedom

To learn more about BFI Flare, visit: http://www.bfi.org.uk/flare

To learn more about the British Council, visit: http://www.britishcouncil.org/

You can also stay in touch with Psiphon via Twitter and Facebook.

2015-04-26

https://blog.psiphon.ca/2015/04/26/psiphon-gives-global-boost-to-bfi-flare-film-festival-2015/ Psiphon Inc.