Libya begins cutting off access to Internet, starts with Facebook

Following anti-regime protests taking place in the nation, Libyan officials have begun cutting off access to Facebook, and the whole Internet intermittently, in the country's capital.

Hundreds of reports coming out of the country say Facebook is completely baned, while connections to other sites, especially social networking, were painfully slow.

It is unclear how citizens outside of the capital are faring.

80 people have died this week in Libya after anti-government demonstrations began on Tuesday.

Libyan authorities have also begun rejecting entrance visas, keeping foreign journalists out of the nation.

Ruler Muammar Gaddafi has been in power since 1969.

Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 19 Feb 2011 2:55

KillerBug

It seems like this is becoming the standard...let social unrest get to the point of riots in the street, send out the shock troops to make people REALLY mad, then cut off the internet to make sure that they get really extra super mad.

19.2.2011 05:53 #1

Jemborg

Every new method of communication, no matter how minor, sparks a revolution.

Its a lot easier being righteous than right.

19.2.2011 08:53 #2

blueboy09

To be frankly honest, we need to leave these countries alone instead instead of meddling in their affairs, history has shown us what happens to the integrity of its citizens/government when we get involved. I'm all for what's going on in these countries, but we can see results of what happens when we don't butt in and control everything in site. Egypt is a perfect example of this: little violence, mostly peaceful when we left them alone to deal with their affairs. Just my 2 cents.

Chance prepares the favored mind. Look up once in a while and you might learn something. - BLUEBOY

19.2.2011 12:19 #3

plazma247

20.2.2011 04:15 #4

jam_k

Libya? Crap... if they completely block, there goes all the bit.ly links...

I know the server itself is somewhere in Colorado, but isn't the first step to resolving bit.ly to query Libya's DNS servers? Sigh...

20.2.2011 09:30 #5

Joshewah

This is a good thing!

Now the Libyans have other things to focus on other than Dr. Emmit Brown and the plutonium he stole.

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20.2.2011 23:54 #6

xtago

Originally posted by blueboy09: To be frankly honest, we need to leave these countries alone instead instead of meddling in their affairs, history has shown us what happens to the integrity of its citizens/government when we get involved. I'm all for what's going on in these countries, but we can see results of what happens when we don't butt in and control everything in site. Egypt is a perfect example of this: little violence, mostly peaceful when we left them alone to deal with their affairs. Just my 2 cents. Um, it's the local popualtion who don't give a feck anymore.

When the government shots your whole family dead if you say something against them you don't really care much if you do a riot and might get shot.

These governments are tiny little things.

It's like 100 people trying to tell 10 million what to do if the 10 million say feck you get lost the 100 people can't do anything about it.

Egypt is different because the whole army just let the people do what ever they wanted, they didn't do what the government wanted, where as in Libya the army is shooting people dead, because they will be told to do that.

21.2.2011 00:50 #7

KillerBug

If all the people say f**k you, then yes, you are f**ked...but if only 75% of them say it, and the majority of your military forces don't, then things get real messy.

Egypt was a whole other situation; it started as a popular revolution, and ended with the old dictator handing rule over to the new dictator. For some reason, the people were appeased by this...and that is why I think that most of them deserve what they will get.

21.2.2011 05:03 #8

jam_k

Originally posted by jannypan: Sigh... Sigh as in I'm totally off base? Or sigh as in the potential loss of bit.ly? or sigh as in the outcome for bit.ly is meaningless when compared to the people of Libya...?

I know your local ISP will cache the DNS result of a .ly for some time, but somewhere along the line, doesn't a Libyan DNS server handle all requests for .ly domains? If Libya removes all Internet access does that not also mean they would block our incoming access?

During Egypt's shutdown, .eg's where only resolving from cache... that couldn't of went on for very long...

22.2.2011 08:36 #9

Jemborg

Originally posted by KillerBug: Egypt was a whole other situation; it started as a popular revolution, and ended with the old dictator handing rule over to the new dictator. For some reason, the people were appeased by this...and that is why I think that most of them deserve what they will get. The impression I've been getting.

I suppose for many people it's the person not the ideology or the entrenched crony-ism that they rebel against. Maybe it's folks natural inclination to scapegoat that causes this.

Its a lot easier being righteous than right.

24.2.2011 19:16 #10

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