Egypt’s Last-Standing ISP Goes Dark | Threat Level | Wired.com

Egypt’s Last-Standing ISP Goes Dark

• By David Kravets
• January 31, 2011  | 
• 6:55 pm  | 
• Categories: Censorship, Cyber Warfare

A small Egyptian ISP that continued sputtering along after the government ordered Egypt off the internet Friday is now offline.

Security researcher Renesys said Monday the Noor Group, believed to be the last Egyptian ISP in operation, had provided access to the aviation, banking and financial sectors — including the Egyptian stock market.

“They are completely unavailable at present,” Renesys wrote of the ISP.

Egypt’s major providers — Link Egypt, Vodafone/Raya, Telecom Egypt, Etisalat Misr — and all their customers and partners, went dark Friday. Renesys said the Egyptian government’s actions were “unprecedented in internet history.”

The Egyptian net began going out Friday as Facebook, Twitter and other online forums helped fuel large-scale protests against President Hosni Mubarak’s 30-year rule. Mobile-phone communications have also been shut down.

Egypt has also closed Al Jazeera’s office in Cairo, arrested a half-dozen of the news outlet’s reporters, and seized their equipment.

See Also:

• Internet Down in Egypt, Tens of Thousands Protest
• Egypt Shut Down Its Net With a Series of Phone Calls
• Amid Street Protests, Twitter Shuttered in Egypt
• Complete Wired.com coverage of Egypt

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via wired.com