Originally Posted by
Emma Royds
Emirates 24/7 VPN use punishable under law
The above article stated that:
While suo moto action may not be initiated against anyone using a VPN service, additional charges can be filed against a person caught in an illegal act and when he or she is found to have used VPN as well.
While the law is rather opaque in this part of the world, the above does seem to indicate that they are perhaps more interested in VPN use being linked to other crime rather than focusing on VPN use alone?
If the UAE was serious on tackling VPN use then why have they not gone down the same road as the Chinese and the Iranians and try to restrict VPN use altogether?
Yeah Emma, that was from 2015 when VPN was only considered illegal if used in connection with internet crime. The new law states that even preventing discovery of a crime, even if no crime is being committed, is a crime.
Back to the geek-fest, well no, they can probably not decode the content of your "secure" connection, but the can, 100%, see what type of traffic is being tunnled through the VPN. Even if you use port 443 for the VPN they can differentiate between a normal SSL connection from your browser and a VPN connection and also see if you are using the VPN for i.e. VoIP. Packet size and timings are giving it away.