It's old news by now that the Egyptian government pulled the plug on that nation's Internet connection. But, there is a serious security question concerning the data that its national Telecom Egypt, and others, are screening.  Using Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology they can view the Internet postings of dissidents, as well as innocent citizens. The use of their network equipment is now being questioned as to whether it is for enhanced communication or increased repression.

Although the Egyptian government wanted to prevent their citizens from having contact with outside entities, they might have instead used DPI technology to get incriminating evidence and valuable intelligence.

The Internets role as a citizen journalist's tool to advance stories along with commentary and even live video is unprecedented. In fact many of the most well know and well respected international news organizations troll social media and blogs to find content for breaking news stories.

So what does all this have to do with Egypt and DPI technology?

Well, DPI is content-filtering technology that allows network managers to inspect, track and target content from Internet users and mobile phones as it passes through routers on the Web. In other words one by product of this amazing technology is that it allows ISP's (Internet Service Providers), and those in control of various LANs (Local Area Networks) and WANs (Wide Area Networks) to intercept, analyze and perhaps take action on certain screened communications that travel through their network equipment. What I mean by this is if a dissident wants to express an opinion or send vital or damaging info that has to pass through the network equipment of a service provider than that data can be captured and be used to suppress freedom of speech and put the sender (and possibly the intended receiver) in harms way.

Officials with Free Press, the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) and the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) all spoke in favor of online privacy legislation. "In our view, deep packet inspection is really no different than postal employees opening envelopes and reading letters inside," said Leslie Harris, president and CEO of CDT. "Consumers simply do not expect to be snooped on by their ISPs or other intermediaries in the middle of the network, so DPI really defies legitimate expectations of privacy that consumers have."

For years, many US, and international companies have been selling network equipment or operating system products that use or include DPI. So, when state run Telecom Egypt pulled the plug on Internet it was in part with help from Narus, of Sunnyvale, California. It seems Narus sold Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology to work on their network equipment to Telecom Egypt. Narus, btw, was originally founded in 1997 by Israeli security experts to create and sell surveillance systems for governments and significant sized corporate customers.

DPI technology allows everything that is transmitted through an internet protocol network to be recorded. By doing this network administrators, security authorities, etc., can reconstruct e-mails along with any attachments, view web pages a user clicked on, and can even reconstruct VoIP [voice over internet protocol] phone calls. The technology is very intrusive and currently is not sale restricted. With US tech companies being suppliers to governments in China, Iran, Burma and other countries that have been accused of human rights violations it become easy to imagine how a valuable technology can be used for sinister purposes.

Now before you (or I) completely malign DPI technology let's recognize that it has a host of positive uses including policy management and enforcement, prioritization to support quality of service, and as an enabling technology for tiered services and can use DPI technology to control Internet traffic based on protocol type or content. As an example, Comcast Corp., uses DPI technology to selectively throttle the upload and download speeds of its customers, especially those who engage in file sharing via  peer-to-peer (P2P) networks.

I guess with every advancement there is a peaceful and positive purpose that can also be used for purposes that are not so positive and innocent. In the case of Egypt, let's hope that the DPI technology that we know they possess will not be used as a tool for oppression.

Hal Stevens

CEO

http://www.NetworkEquipment.net

About the Author

Bennett Frazier