Egypt Said to Have Cut off Facebook and Twitter
A website that monitors internet traffic was receiving reports on Wednesday that Facebook was inaccessible in Egypt, a day after Twitter was blocked amid anti-government unrest.
Asked about the social network's status in Egypt, a Facebook spokesperson referred AFP to Herdict.org, a project of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University.
The Herdict.org website listed two reports o fwww.facebook.com being inaccessible in Egypt.
There was no immediate reply from Herdict.org to a request for further information about the status of Facebook in Egypt, where tens of thousands of demonstrators have staged protests against President Hosni Mubarak and his 30-year rule.
Twitter said its service remained blocked in Egypt as of 10pm GMT on Wednesday but that some people were using third-party applications or proxy servers to successfully send "tweets" at the microblogging service.
The Twitter website had been cut off in Egypt on Tuesday in an apparent move to thwart protesters using the social network in the anti-Mubarak campaign.
"We believe that the open exchange of information and views benefits societies and helps governments connect with their people," Twitter said in a message at @twitterglobalPR.
Twitter and Facebook were among internet social networking services protesters reportedly used to share information and coordinate activities.
More on that from PCMag, adding Blackberry services to the list of possibly-not-working-in-Egypt tech tools.
I don't even know how that is done technogically, but….Wired.com on how to follow this week's Middle Eastern political unrest online.
Jesse Walker on Wiki and Twitter revolutions.
UPDATE: AP reporting lightly on Internet being cut off in general. A source I confess I never heard of but which is at top of Google News on "egypt internet cut off" search called Global Post with much heavier reporting.
UPDATE II: In the comment thread, various folk are keeping up on latest links re: Egypt and Internet censorship better than I'll be able to as the night wears on. Thank you for doing so, and readers please consult the comments thread.
UPDATE III: Also see higher up on Hit and Run a fresh post from Jesse Walker with fresh links on the 'Net crisis in Egypt.
