Categories
Business

Suez Canal Blocked After Container Ship Will get Caught

CAIRO – A giant container ship got stuck crossing the Suez Canal late Tuesday, blocking traffic through one of the world’s major shipping lanes as tugs struggled to free it.

It was unclear what impact the blockade could have on global shipping through the canal, which connects the Red Sea to the Mediterranean and carries around 10 percent of global shipping.

Lt. Gen. Osama Rabie, the head of the agency overseeing the Suez Canal, said the agency is reopening an older section of the canal to allow ships to navigate the waterway again.

“The Suez Canal will spare no effort to restore shipping and serve the movement of world trade,” he said in a statement, adding that rescue units and eight tugs continued to try to get the stuck ship afloat on Wednesday morning.

The ship, which was sailing from China to the Dutch port of Rotterdam, ran aground in poor visibility and strong winds from a sandstorm that hit much of northern Egypt this week, according to George Safwat, a spokesman for the canal authority.

The storm caused an “inability to steer the ship,” he said in a statement.

Pictures from the canal showed the container-laden ship – the Ever Given, which is nearly a quarter mile long – sitting sideways across the canal at such an angle that the name of the company that owns it, Evergreen, is clearly legible on the ship behind. Its bow seemed to be stuck on the rocky east bank of the canal.

“The ship in front of us ran aground when we drove through the canal and is now stuck on the side,” wrote an Instagram user named @fallenhearts17 on Tuesday evening. “Looks like we might be here a little …”

A living navigator showed a group of other ships blocking the canal behind the Ever Given while they waited for them to move. When, according to the pursuer, the ship suddenly turned sideways, several tugs rushed to rescue him, without success.

Categories
Business

Hong Kong Web site Doxxing Police Will get Blocked, Elevating Censorship Fears

With an Internet provider, China Mobile Hong Kong, the separation – a kind of drop action – indicates a direct involvement of the telecommunications company. “A drop action is a specially configured element of a DNS firewall environment,” April said. “This is not something that the owner could have intentionally or accidentally configured.”

China Mobile Hong Kong, a branch of China Mobile, the state-owned Chinese company, declined to comment. Two other companies tested by The Times, SmarTone and Hutchison Telecommunications, which are controlled by local conglomerates, did not respond to requests for comment sent via email.

Users from PCCW, another local operator, told The Times that their access to the site was also blocked. A spokesman declined to comment.

While site blocking may at first glance be similar to mainland China censorship, the methods are very different from China’s sophisticated system.

At China Mobile, SmarTone and Hutchison, the process of associating a website address with the series of numbers a computer uses to look up has been interrupted. The practice would be like listing an incorrect number under someone’s name in a phone book. If you know the correct number for that person, you can still call them.

On the Chinese mainland, on the other hand, the hardware of the Great Firewall – as Beijing’s system of filters and blocks is known – actively separates connections. In the phonebook comparison, the call would not be forwarded even if you had the correct phone number.

The blockades in Hong Kong are “very easy to bypass and clumsy,” said Professor Tsui. Still, he said, authorities may not want to control the internet as tightly as Beijing for fear of deterring the global banks and international corporations that have made the city their Asian headquarters.

Categories
Business

Hong Kong Web site Doxxing Police Will get Blocked, Elevating Censorship Fears

With an Internet provider, China Mobile Hong Kong, the separation – a kind of drop action – indicates a direct involvement of the telecommunications company. “A drop action is a specially configured element of a DNS firewall environment,” April said. “This is not something that the owner could have intentionally or accidentally configured.”

China Mobile Hong Kong, a branch of China Mobile, the state-owned Chinese company, declined to comment. Two other companies tested by the Times, SmarTone and Hutchison Telecommunications, which are controlled by local conglomerates, did not respond to requests for comment sent via email.

Users from PCCW, another local operator, told The Times that their access to the site was also blocked. A spokesman declined to comment.

While site blocking may at first glance be similar to mainland China censorship, the methods are very different from China’s sophisticated system.

At China Mobile, SmarTone and Hutchison, the process of associating a website address with the series of numbers a computer uses to look up has been interrupted. The practice would be like listing an incorrect number under someone’s name in a phone book. If you know the correct number for that person, you can still call them.

On the Chinese mainland, on the other hand, the hardware of the Great Firewall – as Beijing’s system of filters and blocks is known – actively separates connections. In the phonebook comparison, the call would not be forwarded even if you had the correct phone number.

The blockades in Hong Kong are “very easy to bypass and clumsy,” said Professor Tsui. Still, he said, authorities may not want to control the internet as tightly as Beijing for fear of deterring the global banks and international corporations that have made the city their Asian headquarters.