Domain Tools (not blocked) is an online tool for webmasters. Their WHOIS service (formally known as whois.sc) is now blocked. The blocked URL is:
WHOIS is a harmless protocol used to look-up domain names, etc. There is no reason what so ever for having it blocked. Read more about WHOIS on Wikipedia.
To help getting it unblocked as soon as possible fill the form at internet.gov.sa, write an email to unblock@internet.gov.sa or send a fax to +966(1)2639290.
Google’s very own “Google Groups Guide” Google group is blocked for no known reason. This is a Google Groups help and support forum. Here’s more info about it:
The Google Groups Help Forum is the primary channel for getting your Groups questions answered. You’ll find that this community is always buzzing with activity. Get ready to meet some expert users of Google Groups who’ll provide friendly advice about the product (if you’re nice to them). The Google Groups Guide and Groups Guide Ray, Google employees, regularly monitor this unmoderated Help Forum. The Guides will only respond to questions if there is valuable information to share with our users that has not already been provided by the Forum’s resident experts! Messages from Google employees will appear with a blue “G” badge.
From the description I see no reason to have it blocked. Here is the blocked URL:
http://groups.google.com/group/google-groups-guide/
To help getting it unblocked as soon as possible fill the form at internet.gov.sa, write an email to unblock@internet.gov.sa or send a fax to +966(1)2639290.
Here are the STC Afaq DSL Shamil modem passwords. Thanks to Aly in the comments of this post for posting these.
This will hopefully help frustrated users who can’t change the settings:
Sagem - F@st 1201 (Sagem Firmware) admin admin
Sagem - F@st 2404 (Sagem Firmware) admin admin
Sagem - F@st 2504 (Sky Firmware) admin sky
Sagem - F@st 2604 (JaWeb French Firmware) admin admin
Sagem - F@st 3102 (Sagem Firmware) user user
Sagem - FST 3202 (Livebox English Firmware) admin admin
Sagem - FST 3202 (Livebox French Firmware) admin admin
Check the comments provided kindly by Aly for more info.
Update: a friend forwarded this to me “We would like to inform you that the Internet service has been restored. According to the ISP, the problem was in the IGW which caused slowness in internet browsing”. IGW is managed by STC apparently.
Everyone (at least in Riyadh) is complaining about extremely slow Internet connection (twitter links: 1, 2, 3, 4).
I noticed it as well, here is my speedtest.net results with STC’s server:
Of course it takes full advantage of my DSL bandwidth. It’s like running a speed test on a local Intranet.
However try a US based speedtest server and you get:
Very slow, it’s taking me an hour to upload 1MB via FTP! Do you have similar problems? Please share below.
Megaupload (www.megaupload.com) is a file hosting service similar to RapidShare. You can use it to send large files if you can’t email them. The Wikipedia article about it is inaccurate as it claims that KACST is responsible for blocking and we all know that CITC is handling it now.
I should add that RapidShare was blocked but now it has been unblocked for a while. Megaupload can be unblocked too!
We should get it unblocked as soon as possible and to do so fill the form at internet.gov.sa, write an email to unblock@internet.gov.sa or send a fax to +966(1)2639290.
The Google Wireless Transcoder is a simple tool that rearranges websites for mobile phone web browsers. This service is enabled by default on Google searches made on Nokia phones without an easy method to disable them.
The service is completely blocked in Saudi Arabia and most mobile phone users are annoyed by this block. It is easy to have a smart filter on google.com/gwt/n instead of blocking the whole service.
Let’s get it unlocked as soon as possible and to do so fill the form at internet.gov.sa, write an email to unblock@internet.gov.sa or send a fax to +966(1)2639290.
Metacafe is a well known internet video website just like Youtube. While the original site www.metacafe.com is not blocked one of the static servers “s2.mcstatic.com” is blocked in Saudi Arabia. That server holds many of the JavaScript needed to run the site correctly so basically Metacafe is crippled now.
Let’s get it unlocked as soon as possible and to do so fill the form at internet.gov.sa, write an email to unblock@internet.gov.sa or send a fax to +966(1)2639290.
Update: While s2.mcstatic.com is still blocked, Metacafe has changed the URL to bypass the block! Thanks Metacafe!
Update: this is a record time for CITC to unblock something. They will be blocking some individual accounts who are posting questionable content of p*rnographic nature.
Vox.com is a blogging service owned by Six Apart. It is a very popular social network platform.
Unfortunately I just found out that Vox is not blocked in Saudi Arabia! The random block hammer continues at CITC. What’s next? WordPress.com?
Let’s get it unlocked as soon as possible and to do so fill the form at internet.gov.sa, write an email to unblock@internet.gov.sa or send a fax to +966(1)2639290.
Something odd is appearing to Internet users in Saudi Arabia, random sites for no reason give the following error:
ERROR. Access Denied. Access Denied by security policy.
The security policy for your network prevents your request from being allowed at this time.
Other people on twitter reported they have the same issue and all of them are subscribers to Saudi Telecom (STC).
Strategy Analytics released their list of global penetration of broadband households. Surprise surprise, Saudi Arabia is ranked 49th on this list with only %7!
So when we look at the percentage of total households in any given country in which broadband is available (ie paid for and used), we find, not surprisingly, that Asia-Pacific countries lead the way, with Korea out in front, as it has been for many years. At the end of last year 95% of Korean households took broadband service, compared to 88% in Singapore and 81% in Hong Kong. But one or two European countries are edging towards the top of the list, led by the Netherlands (85%) and Denmark (82%).
Saudi Arabia is way behind the United Arab Emirates at 15th with 65%. This is disgraceful.