#Update January 2nd, 2014 There has been a recent uptick in interest about Soapy, so I feel the need to clarify a few things. The project is not under active development. Feel free to fork and make something awesome! :D All deployed extensions were disabled/deactivated at the end of 2012. My current main projects are Commotion and Cupcake.
###While SOPA did not pass, similar legislation could pass!
####See the EFF or Do You Have a Secret? for more info
Soapy is a small, free Fire Fox plugin that allows users to go to web sites banned under SOPA -- making SOPA, if it is passed, moot. It focuses on the DNS-blocking technique favored by oppressive regimes and middle management. Because this is designed to go around a complete block, HTTPS is disabled for sites covered by this plugin.
There's a bit of a lag time between coding and releasing source on git, just so you know. Every site that this circumvents for has a set of XML rules that are tailored to the quirks of that specific site. These are found in rules and src/chrome/content/rules. Much of the code has been borrowed from HTTPS-Everywhere and NoScript.
To compile this into a plugin, compress everything in /src into a zip file soapy.zip, then change the extension to .xpi. So once packed, the plugin should be called soapy.xpi.
Let me know what you think, either by email at griffinboyce@gmail.com, or on Twitter at @abditum. ~Griffin Boyce
Soapy works by automatically redirecting users to the website's server directly. It replaces the DNS system entirely for these blocked websites.
Domain Name Servers match domains like Google.com to their server's IP address (in this case http://74.125.224.72/ ). This process is usually invisible to the user, but you can access Google's site by using their IP address as well.
Computers use Domain Name Servers to make the connection to websites. These large servers act as online address books for websites, telling computers where the site they want to visit is located. Soapy acts as an alternative address book for sites that are at risk of being blocked.
Soapy is a plugin for FireFox written in JavaScript and XML that is designed to bypass DNS blocks by automatically redirecting the user to the site's IP address (if available). This is based on pre-defined rules for websites which may be at risk of being blocked. So while this means that sites must be included in the plugin package, it also means that they've been tested and aren't simply assumed to work.
Version: 0.05; MD5: b2ec7aaae1cc7b4810355fd0374868e1
Step one: Download it here, and save it to your hard drive.
Step two: Drag and drop the file onto your FireFox window.
Step three: Restart Firefox.
Since SOPA isn't in effect, you should disable the plugin or uninstall completely. Soapy updates its definitions automatically.
To remove, go to Tools > Addons, click Soapy, then click Uninstall. Firefox will ask you to restart your browser.
All code is open source under GPL v2. Though if you're charging for this, I could use a job (just saying).
Like crispy bacon, I crave censorship circumvention.