Saudia Arabia will lift a 2013 ban on Internet calling services:
Saudi Arabia will lift a ban on internet phone calls, a government spokesman said, part of efforts to attract more business to the country. All online voice and video call services such as Microsoft's Skype and Facebook's WhatsApp that satisfy regulatory requirements will become accessible at midnight (2100 GMT), Adel Abu Hameed, spokesman for the telecoms regulator CITC said on Twitter on Wednesday.
The policy reversal represents part of the Saudi government's broad reforms to diversify the economy partly in response to low oil prices, which have hit the country's finances. "Digital transformation is one of the key kick-starters for the Saudi economy, as it will incentivise the growth of internet-based businesses, especially in the media and entertainment industries," a statement from the information ministry said. "Access to VoIP (voice over internet protocol) will reduce operational costs and spur digital entrepreneurship – that's why it is such an important step in the Kingdom's internet regulation," it said.
Perhaps they found the backdoors.
Also at TechCrunch.
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Saudi Arabia will lift its ban on women drivers in June 2018, in a move the interior minister said would "transform traffic safety":
Saudi Arabia's lifting of a much criticized ban on women drivers will reduce the number of car crashes in a country with one of the world's worst traffic-related death rates, its interior minister said on Thursday.
King Salman announced the historic change on Tuesday, ending a conservative tradition which limited women's mobility and was seen by rights activists as an emblem of their suppression in the kingdom where Islam originated.
Saudi Arabia was the only remaining country in the world to bar women from driving, a policy that will officially end in June 2018 after a ministerial committee reports on measures needed for implementation.
Prince Abdulaziz bin Saud bin Nayef, the interior minister who took over from his uncle in June, said security forces were ready to apply traffic laws to men and women, though he did not mention if women would be recruited as traffic police.
"Women driving cars will transform traffic safety into a pedagogical practice which will reduce human and economic losses caused by accidents," he was quoted as saying on the ministry's official Twitter feed. He did not elaborate.
The current King of Saudi Arabia was crowned on January 23, 2015.
Also at the Washington Post. NYT has teaching activities for your students.
Related: Saudi Arabia, UAE to Donate to Women Entrepreneurs Fund
Saudi Arabia to Lift Ban on Online VoIP and Video Calling Services
Something is definitely going on in Saudi Arabia:
Saudi authorities arrested at least 11 princes, several current ministers and dozens of former ministers in a sweeping move reportedly designed to consolidate power for the son of King Salman bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud. According to media reports citing Saudi-owned television network Al Arabiya, an anti-corruption committee ordered the arrests hours after King Salman directed the creation of the committee, headed by his favorite son and adviser, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
The committee was established by the royal decree, The Associated Press reports, "due to the propensity of some people for abuse, putting their personal interest above public interest, and stealing public funds." Billionaire investor Prince Alwaleed bin Talal is among those detained, The Wall Street Journal reports. Alwaleed holds stakes in some of the world's major companies, including Apple and Twitter.
Remember Prince Alwaleed? Bitcoin could outlive him.
It's unclear what those arrested are accused of doing, but Al-Arabiya reported that new investigations into the 2009 Jeddah floods and 2012 MERS virus outbreak have been launched.
Separately, the heads of the Saudi National Guard and Saudi Royal Navy have also been replaced.
BBC notes that the reform faction is in control here:
BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner says Prince Mohammed is moving to consolidate his growing power while spearheading a reform programme. [...] Prince Mohammed recently said the return of "moderate Islam" was key to his plans to modernise Saudi Arabia. Addressing an economic conference in Riyadh, he vowed to "eradicate the remnants of extremism very soon". Last year, Prince Mohammed unveiled a wide-ranging plan to bring social and economic change to the oil-dependent kingdom.
Some Soylentils have been skeptical of Saudi Arabia's recent moves towards liberalization (some listed below). Has this apparent purge of internal political opposition changed your mind about the viability of these reforms?
Saudi Aramco and Alphabet/Google may cooperate on a "technology hub" within Saudi Arabia, or at least build some data centers:
Saudi Aramco, the world's largest energy company, and Google parent Alphabet have entered discussions to create a technology hub in Saudi Arabia, the Wall Street Journal reports.
The kingdom is embarking upon an ambitious plan, led by the 32-year-old Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, to diversify the nation's oil-dependent economy. The foundation of the effort is a plan to create a huge sovereign wealth fund, underwritten by selling shares in the state-owned Aramco.
The initial public offering, which could happen this year, is expected to be the world's biggest-ever share sale. Aramco President and CEO Amin Nasser recently told CNBC his company is ready for the IPO this year, but is waiting on the government to choose an international list venue.
Alphabet and Aramco have discussed forming a joint venture that would build data centers around the kingdom, sources familiar with the matter tell the Journal. It remains to be seen which customers the data centers would serve and how large the joint venture would be, but it could be listed in the Saudi stock exchange, the sources said.
Data centers are just a "tangible" area of cooperation, not necessarily the entire purpose of the joint venture. Saudi Arabia has talked about building a $500+ billion "megacity" that would be technology-focused.
Meanwhile, slightly-less-of-a-billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal has been put back to work:
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Thexalon on Thursday September 21 2017, @02:33PM (3 children)
They're working with their good friends at the US NSA to monitor all the calls. Or at least, all the calls that could potentially interest the thoroughly repressive government.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by DannyB on Thursday September 21 2017, @03:51PM
That is similar to my first thought about this.
Obviously, they have obtained some way to monitor these calls. With or without the NSA.
Saying it is to help business people is the window dressing to look welcoming.
They may have also realized that there is inherent value in letting people communicate things that the government doesn't like. That allows you to monitor these communications and identify and track the individuals involved for later punishment. Hey, US government! Maybe it is useful to not restrict internet communications if your goal is to become a fascist regime.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday September 21 2017, @04:05PM (1 child)
Well there's the rub right there.
I'm betting any layer of encryption users might want to wrap the voice call in is not going to meed requirements.
I wonder if mankind will ever shake off this idea that government must be a party to every conversation.
I also wonder when or if people will realize that having the Judiciary as part of the Government means there is never going to be any protection of civil liberties.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 22 2017, @12:57PM
Would you rather have judiciary as part of the clergy?
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @03:44PM (4 children)
Now people might talk to each other about how the Koran is just the rantings of an insane pedophile.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @03:57PM (3 children)
Or that the Bible is just a set of old wives tales passed down from an unbreakable lineage of grandmas
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday September 21 2017, @04:06PM (2 children)
I'll take Grandmas for 1000 Alex.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @04:22PM (1 child)
The Internet: Proof positive that hateful self-righteous bigotry is not exclusive to the religious nutters.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @05:18PM
since when is merely stating the truth "hateful"? you can try to change the meanings of words all you want and while you may get white yippies to follow along, the rest of us just grow to truly hate you. you will find out what true hate is, when we've heard enough from your kind.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by requerdanos on Thursday September 21 2017, @05:51PM (1 child)
Read for wisdom, ye Saudis, and encrypt:
TFS:
Thexalon:
DannyB:
frojack:
Many of us have personally shaken that notion, but I am saddened to find that it certainly doesn't seem to be most.
For example, I use only jitsi* and utox/qtox** for the voip/video calling discussed in TFA, and my contacts that I usually talk with are the ones who've agreed to use them also. The end-to-end encryption is the killer feature. Those who continue to insist on skype*** (skype! when MSNSA is just as much a thing as MSNBC!) aren't contacts I usually talk with anymore. It's a much smaller circle, but of people who value privacy. Also, we don't start off each conversation anymore with "Hey, good to hear from you. President Allah Bomb Terror Cell, hi to those monitoring this call." or some variation, because that no longer flags our calls for later intensive review, occupying some of the oppressive forces' time in a similar way to how scambaiters occupy the 419-mugus' time. I almost miss that.
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* Jitsi works but sucks. Bad. Because I rent a server and run resiprocate STUN/TURN on it, *every* call attempt doesn't fail now; merely many of them. It's buggy buggy buggy ("yeah, we'll fix that in the rewrite") but the sound and video quality are great and it's quite usable. Migration step one is "Lower your expectations."
** (q|u)tox works but sucks. Bad. Calls complete very reliably into a barely discernable garble of really, really bad audio quality that combines with my mild hearing loss to build a frustrating, almost unusable end result that shows great, great promise. Migration step one is "Lower your expectations."
*** Skype is simply a tool of oppression with which people place their own selves under the thumb of governments. It's like a russian roulette kit, but without the empty chambers. Audio and video quality are very, very good, the platform is very stable, and call completion is near-100%. I do not recommend using this platform for communication, though use to sandbag and waste the time of surveillance operatives is probably okay. Have a nice Bomb Allah President [rogerebert.com] day.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 22 2017, @02:56AM
Have you tried GNU Ring?