Haystack Developers Announce Successful Test; Plants Program in Handful of Iranians Abroad

July 17, 2009

After confirming Haystack allows access to restricted websites, the project’s developers are distributing the software to a handful of trusted contacts prior to a larger scale release.

San Francisco, CA (PRnine – July 17, 2009) - Haystack’s developers, Austin Heap and Daniel Colascione, announced today the successful test of their program with an anonymous Iranian contact earlier last week, and have since “seeded” a preliminary version of the program with a handful of Iranian contacts in anticipation of the 40th day martyr mourning rallies. Haystack provides Iranians with safe, unfiltered Internet access, a key tool in the Iranian peoples’ efforts to dispute the results of their country’s recent elections.

Since posting proof last week from an Iranian contact that Haystack does indeed provide access to restricted sites, several other Iranian contacts came forward requesting a copy of the program, indicating their need for the Internet was “urgent,” according to Heap.

“Our contacts understand the software is not in its final form,” states Heap. Nonetheless, many of these agreed to use a beta version of Haystack, according to Heap, not only because they need Internet access, but because their experience and feedback provide Haystack’s developers with invaluable data to refine the program for its final release.

These issues are mostly related to user-friendliness and compatibility with other programs - “things that apply to any software package,” in the words of Colascione.

More importantly, by seeding the program with a select group of volunteers, Colascione and Heap are improving their knowledge of the filtering mechanisms within Iran, thereby allowing them to develop countermeasures quickly.

In addition to resolving issues of user-friendliness, Heap and Colascione are in need a larger server of network to support more users prior to Haystack’s official launch. While in the process of securing funding for these additional servers, the pair is operating a flagship network with a capacity of 500 concurrent users, made possible by donations received online.

In spite of the generousity of the donors to date, “funding is our largest limitation,” says Heap, as “everything you’ve seen to date is the result of volunteers who have donated both their time and money.” In order to make Haystack a success, he adds, additional funding is needed – primarily to build the server network needed to support the program and its users in Iran.

RELEVANT WEB LINKS

New York Times, “Social Networks Spread Defiance Online”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/16/world/middleeast/16media.html

Associated Press, “’Hacktivists’ take up Iran fight as streets quiet”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090627/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_iran_hack_backlash_1

FARSI LANGUAGE VERSION

A copy of this release in Farsi (Persian) may be found by clicking here.

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Media Contact Information:
Austin Heap
me@austinheap.com
http://blog.austinheap.com