Earlier this year Egypt cut internet access during widespread protests. In this picture, a woman loots a computer during the chaos. Source: AFP
THE US Government is reportedly financing the development of "shadow" internet systems to enable dissidents abroad to get around government censors.
The New York Times said today the covert effort also includes attempts to create independent cellphone networks inside foreign countries.
The operation involves a fifth-floor shop on L Street in Washington, where a group of young entrepreneurs are fitting deceptively innocent-looking hardware into a prototype "internet in a suitcase", the report said.
Financed with a $US2 million ($1.9 million) State Department grant, the suitcase could be secreted across a border and quickly set up to allow wireless communications over a wide area with a link to the global internet.
The Times said some projects involve technology being developed in the US while others pull together tools that have already been created by hackers from the so-called liberation technology movement.
The State Department is financing the creation of stealth wireless networks that would enable activists to communicate outside the reach of governments in countries like Iran, Syria and Libya.
The US Government has also spent at least $US50 million ($47.2 million) to create an independent mobile phone network in Afghanistan using towers on protected military bases inside the country, according to the newspaper.
It is intended to offset the Taliban's ability to shut down the official Afghan services, the report said.
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