Dancing in the Dark with the Net Nanny
The Net Nanny confounds me some days. Like today.
For the past few months, something has been blocking iTunes from picking up my daily diet of podcasts, mostly public radio bits ranging from KCRW’s Top Tune to the latest world news. When I logged in today, the floodgates opened and I suddenly had several dozen downloads coming in. I have no idea what changed.
I usually have the most pesky, aggressive blocker on my ISP. It blocks things almost at random, from NPR to The Humanaught. In other parts of China, even on other servers in Dalian, these sites are available without a proxy.
When I use Tor, sometimes things show up in German, or occasionally in other languages. Today, everything is in Chinese with no proxy running.
Gracchi recently linked to Greatfirewallofchina.org, a site that boasts: “Test any website in real-time and see if it’s censored in China.” I toyed around with it a bit, trying out things I already knew were blocked, like WordPress and the BBC News. It maintains a test list, showing how often certain domains come up blocked.
Among those it lists as off-limits in China:
Google
New York Times
The Peking Duck
That was when I tested yesterday. Today they work. The problem with all this isn’t that some sites are down on some days in some places, while others slide through the cracks in the Great Firewall like glutinous rice balls through chopsticks. It’s the unpredictability, the utter randomness, the fickle nature of the invisible watchers who are strict today and slack tomorrow.
My friend Alex in Beijing calls it the Internet version of the panopticon. They’re watching us, somewhere, but we can’t tell when or from where or what’s really off-limits. And that, of course, is what is supposed to keep us all in line.
March 8th, 2007 at 10:30 am
Here’s something else. I am convinced that fewer sites are blocked from International hotels than from Chinese hotels, which leads me to conclude that blocking occurs at all sorts of levels. I am also convinced that blocking can be regional, which may explain you having issues in Dalian that others in, let’s say, Shanghai, may not be having.
March 9th, 2007 at 12:39 am
I think I spoke too soon. Today my podcasts are once again being stopped. It’s maddening.
I’m sure there are all levels of blocks, from the ones starting at at the big wires going through Taiwan down to individual ISPs. It wouldn’t surprise me at all that international hotels would have better access than Chinese hotels, since I suspect foreigners used to an open internet would be more likely to complain than Chinese travelers who’ve never known an unfiltered web.
March 12th, 2007 at 8:08 pm
I’m with ya on that “maddening” bit - particularly when it’s my aforementioned site.
I’ve had much fewer problems accessing my site since I moved down to Suzhou - which could indicate localized filtering is not as strict here… or could indicate that I’ve softened somewhat in my content
I’ve tried hard to figure out the system by which the blocking rules are set… but you’re absolutely right - it’s like dancing in the dark, and you ever been to a Chinese nightclub? Fuck me.
August 17th, 2007 at 4:19 pm
if anybody wants to know how to DISABLE NET NANNY for good. it’s quite simple. for version 4.0 up to 5.0 bring up the windows task manager and go to processes. delete OCRAWARE.exe..
it should end net nanny. if you have the gay later version(5.5) it’s a little harder. the thing that sucks is you can delete cwtray.exe in the processes and it will appear to have terminated net nanny but the second you try any other website on I.E or firefox net nanny will reactivate itself. therefore go to processes and end cwtray.exe.. go to the start menu and click my computer. than go to search and search all files and folders keyword cwtray.exe. you can delete it now because you ended the process in windows task manager so your computer doesn’t restrict the file if you tried to do it otherwise. now just go to recycle bin and delete it from there.
February 19th, 2008 at 2:02 am
I have net nany 5.6 and I have tried everything to get rid of it. The task manager thing doesn’t work. I tried ending the process, going to the start menu, and sending it to the recycle bin like “disable net nanny heh-james gutro” said…nada. I’ve tried opening up the c:/windows/system.ini and I see the following
; for 16-bit app support
[drivers]
wave=mmdrv.dll
timer=timer.drv
[mci]
[driver32]
[386enh]
woafont=dosapp.FON
EGA80WOA.FON=EGA80WOA.FON
EGA40WOA.FON=EGA40WOA.FON
CGA80WOA.FON=CGA80WOA.FON
CGA40WOA.FON=CGA40WOA.FON
NOT whatever I need to see to do this:
“Open the file c:\windows\system.ini. Under the section marked “[boot]“, there should be a line labeled “drivers=” with some stuff listed after it. Remove the word “wndrv16.dll” from the “drivers=” line. (If there are other words listed on the “drivers=” line, leave them there, just remove “wndrv16.dll”.) Save changes to the file and restart your computer, and Net Nanny is gone for good!”
I’m really desperate! I can’t watch my shows any more and it’s killing me!! Got any ideas?
July 1st, 2008 at 8:54 am
i managed to delete cwtray and the netnanny iconis gone but one of my emails wont open, it just keeps refreshing to my inbox. Im going to restart my comp and see what happens
July 21st, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Ugh, I’ve got 5.6 also. And It seems impossiable.
I’ve tried the whole ‘Peacefire’ thing too, and it doesn’t work for me.
I’d love to hear some ideas too. : )
July 26th, 2008 at 1:39 pm
yeah how the hell do we get 5.6 off our comp ive been tryin diff shit for 2 weeks, nuthin.
August 14th, 2008 at 12:25 pm
i have net nanny 5.6 at my house and i have been trying to bypass it, i can’t find a girlfriend or do anything it is pissing me off how do u disable it
November 15th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
I’ve bypassed NetNanny easily! Didn’t need to do anything much. Just opened up LimeWire, clicked on the New @ LimeWire tab and then stopped loading the page. Then, in the address box, I entered my blocked website and it worked! NetNanny is still running but I doesn’t block! But for this to work, first you have to open up Firefox or Internet Explorer and leave it open. NetNanny will just block Internet Explorer and Firefox when it’s running!