“The Great Firewall of China” stops overseas email traffic
During the weekend I got a phone call from a friend, frustrated not being able to access her email blaiming outlook express. I looked into it and could only confirm that there had to be something with the server or network. No new emails where delivered after Friday 13th. Then the day after I used my OS X Mail and realised I too hadn’t received any new emails since Friday 13th. I use Gmail for all my mail but sometimes use Mail for sending certain emails as Gmail insist showing the gmail address even if you use an alias.
Managed to solve her problem by using Google to fetch the mail via pop3 so everyone was happy.
Today I happend to see an article at CNN regarding this and then found a lot of other ones such as the China Media Blog confirming it is due to the Chinese firewall. At CNN a source said that it was because they installed a “new firewall system” to intensify their monitoring and control ahead of a big meeting in August, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, and after that the controls would be lifted.
