Arrested for Providing Web Access: Q&A With Ex-Cuban Prisoner Alan Gross

Forget classic automobiles, mojitos, and the Buena Vista Social Club. The Cuba I visited last month is fast transforming into a hotbed for fledgling tech start-ups. Despite a heavily regulated economy, widespread poverty, and notoriously poor broadband access, Cubans are starting businesses in calculator hardware repair, mobile app evolution, IT consultancy, and web blueprint. Merely how did we get here? In 2009, a U.Due south. contractor faced fifteen years in prison house for threatening the "integrity of the land" past creating three Internet networks. Today the very same state sells Internet access through dozens of Wi-Fi hotspots.

On the threshold of President Obama's celebrated visit to Havana, I spoke with Alan Gross, the U.S. contractor who helped bring the Net to Republic of cuba. Seven years agone, he traveled to Cuba under the auspices of the U.Due south. Bureau for International Evolution and created three satellite Cyberspace networks via Jewish synagogues in Havana, Santiago, and Camagüey. After his abort, he served more than than five years in prison house earlier he was ultimately released through a prisoner exchange. That appointment, December 17, 2022, wasn't just the twenty-four hours that Gross returned to the United States; it was also the day the Obama Administration appear information technology would brainstorm to normalize relations afterward more than than 50 years. Alan Gross was the linchpin in this and then-called "Cuban thaw."

Gross and I talked about the thaw, the embargo, and the particulars of his underground efforts to bring Internet admission to Cuba. Perhaps because of the technical nature of his piece of work, previous accounts suffer from numerous inaccuracies, which Gross corrected in what proved to be a lively, illuminating, and wide-ranging conversation. Read on for previously unavailable specificity nearly his work with Broadband Global Area Network (BGAN) applied science, his philosophy of open admission, and his assessment of Cuban politics.

Fateful Journey

PCMag: You went to Cuba under the auspices of the U.S. Agency for International Development [USAID] whose mission statement is to "partner to end extreme poverty and to promote resilient, democratic societies while advancing the security and prosperity of the United States…"

Alan Gross: I had nothing to do with the republic program. I was a subcontractor to Development Alternatives, Incorporated [DAI]. They came to me—I didn't go to them—and they asked me to develop a pilot project to bring broadband connectivity on a limited basis to Cuba. Bring the equipment in, set information technology up, train people how to use information technology and maintain information technology. That's it. They didn't tell me it was role of a larger projection. In fact, when I found out, I was non privy to any information about the project. I had no ideological reason for doing the project. I was blinded by my desire to piece of work with the technology I liked on a nice island with the Jewish community. I was naïve. But I was likewise deceived by DAI and USAID. That confession became the basis of our litigation.

Of course you're more interested in the technology. Take yous ever used a BGAN?

No. Do you desire to take a moment to explicate it for our readers?

The acronym stands for Broadband Global Area Network. It's like a mini VSAT [very small discontinuity terminal]. Information technology tin be the size of an iPad. The company that operates it, Inmarsat, offers global coverage, so y'all tin can be almost anywhere in the world and lock onto one of the satellites. Information technology's betoken and shoot. Depending upon your BGAN and service, the speeds are much ameliorate than punch-up, but information technology'south expensive because they base their prices on throughput, not bandwidth. Then to establish Net on a short-term basis, it's fine, but for annihilation long-term it's impractical.

So this was a short-term project to which y'all were contributing.

That's correct.

I read an AP piece that listed the following equipment for your fourth visit: eighteen wireless access points, 12 iPods, 11 BlackBerry Curve smartphones, half dozen 500GB external drives, iii MacBooks, iii BGAN Internet satellite phones…

Not Net satellite phones—I didn't have any satellite phones. The media, with all due respect to your colleagues, don't check their facts.

I'll besides tell yous that I didn't smuggle anything. Every piece of equipment and every slice of paper was inspected past security and customs, and I was permitted to bring all of it in. I read an article that said that I took some black record and covered identifying marks on the BGANs—that's a fabrication.

So I didn't have any satellite phones, but I did bring in Ruckus wireless equipment to boost my signal. That'south why I had these access points. I set up three sites with 18 access points—six access points per site.

According to the AP piece, y'all brought all this equipment—the eighteen wireless points, the BlackBerrys, the BGANS, the ruckus—on your fourth trip?

No—I brought a trivial each fourth dimension. I had five trips. The first was for Havana, the second was for Santiago, and the third Camagüey. I couldn't bring it all in one trip—that's a lot of stuff to schlep.

That's what I thought. And you didn't take any trouble getting this through security?

Absolutely not.

Is that only because they didn't know what you lot were bringing in?

That's not my trouble—that'southward their problem. They asked, "What'due south this for?" "Information technology'southward for a computer network." "Where?" "At the synagogue."

I didn't do ane affair of a covert nature. I've seen articles that said I ran a covert performance—that's another fabrication. Everything I did was out in the open up. The reservations for the hotel were made through the Cuba-owned tour company. The hotel was owned by the regime of Republic of cuba. The airline was owned past the government of Cuba. The car rental was owned by the government of Republic of cuba. Where I ate was owned by the government of Cuba. Where'due south the covert operation? They asked me questions. I gave them truthful answers.

I've worked in 54 countries. Nowhere in the world did I have any problem in the police—except for in Cuba.

Did you travel with anyone else on those five trips?

I e'er traveled by myself. There were some groups from the Jewish customs that were coming around the same time, and I asked them if they would behave some of the phones or the iPods, and to give them to me at the airport, simply I took possession at the airport.

So they didn't go through security and evangelize it to you at your hotel?

No. I brought the computers in. I brought in BGANs. The most expensive equipment was on my person. I had a backpack.

Getting Down to Concern

In one case you lot got to Republic of cuba, yous worked through synagogues. My understanding is that, compared to a lot of other minority groups, Jewish Cubans are comparatively well off.

They're well off. Comparatively.

Given that Jewish Cubans can emigrate to State of israel, proceed Birthright trips, and even import kosher food, I'm curious to know, why use this project to serve the Jewish customs, rather than dissidents or some other disadvantaged group?

I'm Jewish. It was a personal decision. I consulted with the institutional Jewish community in the United States to find out if they wanted to do it and if they were willing to help me with the logistics. I received confirmation earlier I went down.

Then yous become to the synagogue in Havana, and you had contacts on the ground?

That's correct.

Were they nervous about the project?

Not at all, well not until in that location was something to exist nervous about. If they had any reservations, they would have told me, or they would accept told me through their contacts in the institutional Jewish community.

At what point did y'all become enlightened of the project's risks?

In Camagüey, about 5 hours from Havana, almost halfway to Santiago. I'm walking to the synagogue, I'm next to the street of the synagogue, and this tan unmarked van is rolling downwardly the street, very slowly. In that location's this guy walking next to the van with an antenna and a volt meter, or an amp meter—a makeshift device that detects radio transmissions.

Was it [authorities-owned telecom] ETECSA?

I have no idea. They didn't stop in front of the synagogue. They were rolling up and down all of the streets looking for radio signals. That was their job.

I read that there'south a special flake that can mask the transmissions of these satellite phones within a couple of hundred miles...

You can't hide radio transmissions. All radio transmissions are detectable.

That's true of BGANs?

Yes.

Begin at the BGANs

Let's talk nearly BGANs. Can you lot walk me through the process of setting up one of these devices?

The software asks you to enter the nearest city, in this case Havana. The BGAN is mostly facing south considering the satellite is up in that location, 22,300 miles above the Earth. Y'all turn it on and you tweak information technology until the signal is stiff.

So information technology connects to the satellite, which is basically a mirror. You're sending a bespeak up to the satellite, which goes down to a teleport. Incidentally, Havana has one teleport for all of their communications.

When you lock onto the satellite y'all've lit a candle. It's a feeling of elation. After I did it the first time, that's all I wanted to do. Go effectually the globe lighting candles.

What kind of speeds practice you get?

Information technology depends upon your specific BGAN. I recall I was getting 296 [Kbps] or something like that.

Faster than punch-upwardly.

Yes, in fact, I would be surprised if they could get 14.4 [Kbps] on their lines, they're so former.

Y'all've lit the candle. Does it stay lit?

Sure, but information technology's expensive.

How did the synagogues use your BGAN networks?

They used information technology to download the latest antivirus updates, to read the world news, to get the weekly Torah portion in Spanish. They used it to access information.

The irony is that Cuba has a much college literacy charge per unit than the United states. That's a direct consequence of the revolution. That'southward a good thing. Simply they tin only read what they're allowed to read. Data is a human right. I didn't accept an ideological purpose to go downwardly there, but I certain practice at present.

Open Internet, Open Club?

I'd like to think through conceptual questions, and I'one thousand hoping you'll indulge me. Many of my colleagues presuppose that Internet access empowers the disempowered. I'k thinking in detail about the celebratory coverage of Twitter's role in the Arab Spring, much of which proved premature. The Apple-Justice Department debate seems to suggest that just as spider web applied science tin give voice to the voiceless, it tin can also enable states to survey, regulate, and discipline populations. Has your work configuring network infrastructure under disciplinarian regimes changed the way yous think near access to web tech?

You tin can practice the same things with books or magazines! There are bad guys using technology. The good guys can apply technology to fight them.

Though that presupposes a clear segmentation between practiced guys and bad guys. I don't think anyone in the Justice Department aspires to be a bad guy.

Yeah, information technology'south not that blackness and white. It's a double-edged sword.

I doubtable that I know where you fall on this, but I'll ask nevertheless. Ane of the reasons that I find your story and then compelling is that you developed the infrastructure that many technologists take for granted. In the States, we often assume that if you requite a kid a laptop, the tool volition automatically improve their civic and economical prospects, an assumption that is predicated upon inexpensive and reliable broadband access—

Software today is meaningless without admission. Antivirus updates are non-existent if yous can't download them. VoIP is useless without a connexion. The betoken is that if y'all give a kid a laptop, he or she can acquire all kinds of things, but they would be limited without access. If they have access, information technology opens up the whole globe. That's why they call it world wide web. If you don't take access to the world wide web, you can't take telemedicine. You tin can't have rural cyberbanking.

As you lot know better than nigh, broadband infrastructure isn't wished into existence. What responsibility does the authorities have to build that infrastructure, and if not the regime, with whom does that responsibleness rest?

The capacity of the Cuban government is limited because there's no incentive to perform. Information technology depends upon who can provide a better service. If you're in a country without a individual sector, then it has to be the public sector. An intra-measure would exist to franchise the infrastructure to the individual sector. Allow them provide a better service.

Land of the Nation

I am eager to hear your thoughts about Republic of cuba in 2022. I visited Havana a week ago. While the Wi-Fi hotspots are expensive, tiresome, and overcrowded, they are ubiquitous. The government recently appear a pilot program for residential broadband. Subsequently speaking to a number of Cuban entrepreneurs, I got the sense that the ground was moving under my feet. Am I being naïve? What changes do you think are superficial, and what changes practice you think are meaningful?

That'south a tough question to answer because you lot never really know what the government of Cuba is thinking. One matter that you can be assured of is that yous tin't presume anything. But I accept a question for you: When you lot were using any kind of access, did you lot ever fourth dimension out?

I didn't, but I was but on for thirty to 60 minutes at a time.

If y'all didn't time out, I would say that the service has improved. Hither's my take on things: I think there'due south a leak in the bucket that's going to get bigger and bigger, and they're never going to be able to fix it like they did in the past because Cubanos are getting a taste of something they've just had a whiff of previously. They got a whiff of something that smelled appetizing, just they got into trouble if they tried to sense of taste information technology.

I was arrested in the terminate of 2009. At that point it was illegal for Cubanos to access the Net unless they had special circumstances, then the average person on the island couldn't admission the Internet. If they went into a hotel that offered Internet service, they could be arrested. It wasn't until June 2022 that using the Internet became legal.

All the same, a written report from that October stated that ETECSA had 473 computers placed in diverse ETECSA-run Internet centers or Cyberspace cafes. That amounts to approximately one computer for every 24,800 Cubanos. At one bespeak ETECSA had about eight Internet centers in Havana maintaining approximately 80 computers for Havana'southward ii million people, or ane figurer for every 25,000 Habaneros. So you have to put things in the proper context. This is why they had to become to a Wi-Fi organization. It made sense. It was applied. Cubanos were starting to demand access and the regime didn't have the capacity to satisfy that demand. They still don't for that matter.

A New Day

Given that you were something of a linchpin to the December 2022 diplomatic breakthrough, how practice you feel about the current state of Cuban-U.S. relations?

I very much back up the administration'south new policy initiatives. I absolutely support re-establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba. If nosotros had diplomatic relations, I might non have had to forfeit five years of my life. We have constructive date for a reason.

Consider Iran. Whether you agree with the bargain or not, a relationship was established between the government of Islamic republic of iran and the authorities of the Usa then that when those sailors drifted off course and were arrested by the regime of Islamic republic of iran, they were only detained for 23 hours, and not 23 years. Why? Because nosotros immediately and constructively engaged with Iran.

I remember it volition take years before nosotros have normalized relations because Republic of cuba does non be in a normalized land. Their economy is on the verge of full collapse. They accept nothing. The reason they have aught is because they have low productivity. The reason they have a low-productivity problem is because they don't pay their workers annihilation. So the attitude of workers in Cuba is very similar to what it was in the onetime Soviet Union. They pretend to pay u.s., and we pretend to work.

Do you have any predictions for Obama'southward upcoming visit to Cuba?

I think he's probably going to desire to interact with Miguel Díaz-Canel a little bit more considering he'south the kickoff vice president and the designated successor to Raúl. He'south a young guy, in his 50s. He'due south a technocrat. I phone call him a dissident because he listened to Beatles music when it was banned.

[Obama] is probably going to tell Raúl that they're falling short on their end of the deal, that they demand to take some steps to ameliorate the man rights situation, and, that if they don't, information technology's going to create problems for them. We have people in the [U.Due south.] Senate, and particularly the House, who will never repeal the embargo if at that place are whatever human being rights abuses.

No one is going to invest in Cuba until the embargo is lifted.

Do you advocate for catastrophe the embargo?

Of course!

Your experience in Cuba didn't alter your perspective?

Non at all. It's in our own best interest to end the embargo. The government in Republic of cuba calls the embargo "el bloqueo," the blockade. They've successfully sold our embargo to the globe every bit a occludent. Republic of cuba trades with 80 countries around the world every year. The United States is currently one of the top 5 trading partners of Cuba. "Que bloqeo?"

One hundred percent of the craven consumed in Cuba is imported. Much of it, if not most of it, comes from Georgia and Arkansas. Agriculture and medicine are exempted from the embargo. So yes, the embargo has hurt Cuba, only information technology hasn't prevented Cuba from trading with the residual of the world, including the Us.

Interview edited for clarity and length. Equipment photos courtesy of Gross.

Source: https://sea.pcmag.com/networking/11256/arrested-for-providing-web-access-qa-with-ex-cuban-prisoner-alan-gross

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