Cyber Libre: Cubans
Log On Behind Castros Back
By John
Coté
Researchers: Cyrus Farivar and Osvaldo Gomez
The rooftop apartment in Central
Havana has black iron bars on the front window and door. Jagger, a German shepherd,
growls and charges the doorway, his lean head pressed against the iron as he
snaps at the visitors. Antonio Cuesta, a gangly 26-year-old Cuban with a crew
cut, takes Jagger by the collar and chains him to a yellow hallway door grooved
with claw marks.
"Guard dog," he says and
flashes a smile. "When my moms here alone, he wont let anyone
in."
Not quite comfortably out of Jaggers
reach in the front room sits Cuestas passion: a patchwork computer, the
parts borrowed from friends or bought on Cubas black market.
Before he sits down, Cuesta looks
at the visitors.
"If I get caught telling you
this, its 30 years," he says. "Theyll send me to a place
no one would ever want to go."
With a few mouse clicks he brings
up a list of pirated codes to access the Internet. He selects one, and the modem
dials.
No dice.
The codes legitimate owner
might be logged on, or maybe the system is experiencing a glitch.
"Sometimes different phone
lines in different areas go down," says Cuesta. He shrugs and clicks another
icon. "So I have 11 accounts."
Hackers must be resourceful to survive
in a Communist world, where fraying infrastructure, snarled bureaucracy and
draconian security services are the norm. But cyber criminals like Cuesta are
not simply survivors; theyre an indication that Fidel Castro is unable
to control the inherently democratic world of the Internet.
Ever since the government embraced
la revolucion digital to make state-run companies more competitive, it has tried
to control popular access. For the most part its been successful. Black-market
Internet accounts like Cuestas are rare simply because most Cubans dont
have phones and cant afford a computer. In 1999 there was one personal
computer for every 100 Cubans, far below the amount in other Latin American
countries such as Mexico, where, in the same year, one computer served every
23 citizens, according to the World Bank. When a plan to increase and digitize
Cubas phone lines is completed in 2004, only 1 in 10 Cubans will have
a phone, according to Cuban government figures and census estimates. With an
average monthly salary of $20, many of those who do have phones are not thinking
about buying a computer, let alone a black market Internet account.
The government also controls the
islands four Internet service providers, whose traffic is routed through
a single state-controlled Internet gateway. Home Internet accounts are restricted
to foreigners, company executives and state officials. Access codes are required
to log on to the countrys 3,600 legal Internet accounts. That suffices
for a population of 11 million. In addition, about 40,000 academics and government
workers have legal email accounts, half of them with access outside of Cuba,
said Luis Fernandez, a government spokesman.
Thats what the government
allows. But as Cuesta demonstrates, the Internet doesnt stop there. A
small but lively black market has emerged. Sometimes legitimate account holders
want to supplement their state wages by selling their access code. Other times,
people like Cuesta steal codes while repairing computers for company executives.
Pirated codes go for $30 to $50 a month for Internet access, $10 to $15 for
email-only accounts. Thats too steep for most Cubans, but affordable for
some earning dollars off Havanas pulsing tourism. This new class of Internet
users who circumvent government controls is a testament to Cuban ingenuity,
said a Western diplomat in Havana who asked to remain anonymous. It also seems
to indicate the Cuban government cant completely leash the teaming world
of online information.
Cuesta should know. On the third
try his modem hisses its familiar singsong, and this time a server elsewhere
on the island squawks back. He doesnt look up from the monitor, but a
sharp smile flashes across his face. Its the smile of child telling his
friends he just got away with cheating on a test.
"Look," he says, pointing
as his Netscape browser opens. "Where do you want to go?"
Soon Cuesta is on Hotmail checking
his email.
"This is the account we should
use its not Cuban," he says. "The government doesnt
look at it, and its faster."
Cuesta has reason to be concerned
about government surveillance. Black market Internet accounts, largely copied
or stolen from someone authorized to access a server at a company or government
institution, usually dont warrant jail time. But Cuestas case is
different. "In general people who have access are related to someone in
power. They get fired, they take away their Internet access, and they fine them,"
he said. "This is not similar to my situation. Ive done illegal work
for them." Cuesta clarified. "Them" is the government. He pauses
and looks down. When he raises his head, the smile is back. "The state
prepared me to steal secret data," he says.
Cuesta, who asked that his name
be changed, says he was trained as a teenager to be a government hacker. Sitting
in worn jeans and a knock-off Calvin Klein T-shirt, he hardly looks like a covert
state operative. His story could not be verified beyond his stash of illegal
access codes, but the respect he commanded from other informaticos, or "computer
geeks," was unassailable. His computer knowledge was likewise extensive,
and, given the shortage of computers on the island until recent years, it seemed
unlikely he could reach that skill level without formal training.
With palpable caution, Cuesta describes
excelling at science at an early age. When he was 14 he was selected to attend
a specialized science boarding school. There he was introduced to computers,
and soon after he arrived, Cuesta says he started working on computer viruses
for fun. While at school he studied Trojan horses programs that appear
to be useful but then launch a virus or an unintended function and had
written a virus by the end of his first year. "I demonstrated it to the
professors," he says and laughs. "They were a little bit jealous."
Even at 14 Cuesta says he had to
look beyond his teachers for inspiration. He found it in his 21-year-old girlfriend,
who was studying cybernetics, the theoretical study of communication and control
in machines and animals. "I would study with her," he says and pauses
for a moment. The smile is back. "We would exchange ideas."
After graduating from the science
high school he sharpened his computer skills at the Eduardo Garcia Delgado Electronics
Institute in Havana. At 21 Cuesta says he went to work for a state-run construction
company that specialized in large projects like airports and hotels. His job:
hacker. "The state trained me to circumvent passwords and access databases,"
he says. Most of this training came on the job at the construction company.
"They would buy software and then Id be paid to break the dynamic
code so we could load one copy on all the machines."
Cuesta says his company, which was
in competition with other state-run companies, would get one copy of the cheapest
and most basic version of a program. It would be designed to be loaded on only
one computer. His job was to crack the software security and install unlicensed
programs on however many computers the company needed. He says he would also
hack into other companies computer systems either the software
designer or a company that had a better version of the program to steal
information or computer code to upgrade his companys version of the software.
Trade-specific software for designing a large hotel, for example, could then
incorporate more variables and make more complex calculations.
An agent in the FBIs computer
intrusion center and an executive for a U.K.-based computer and Internet security
firm both say the situations Cuesta describes are plausible, but neither had
any first-hand information about hacker attacks by Cuban companies.
Cuesta says at his job he targeted
both foreign and Cuban companies whatever it took to make his company
more effective. "The state owns every company and business, but each must
finance itself. They are in competition," said Cuesta. "But no one
important can really go out of business. Its a false economy."
Disillusioned with the poor treatment
and meager salaries at state-run companies, Cuesta quit his job at the construction
firm in January and decided to try the world of freelance programming. With
two partners he does contract work designing software and Web sites. The work
is not sponsored by the state, and therefore illegal. To minimize the danger
for both the contractors and the programmers, the business relationship is deliberately
murky. Cuesta says he and his two associates are currently designing software
for an Italian company. When asked, he says he doesnt know the name of
the company, just the names of contact people he talks to weekly. And the Italian
contacts dont know Cuestas partners. "Its not convenient
for them to know who we are," Cuesta says. When asked if he wanted to know
more about his employers, he shakes his head. "Its better to know
less."
The nature of the work promotes
secrecy. Cuesta says the Italian company would be expelled from Cuba for contracting
a group without government oversight. He also said because the work is illegal,
he and his colleagues write software using whatever means necessary. He says
they copy sections of code from patented software and hack other useful information
from databases. When speed and file size are a factor, he turns to a friend
at ETECSA, the Cuban phone company. The friend sneaks Cuesta into ETECSA after
hours to use its contemporary machines and high-speed connection, a considerable
improvement over Cuestas 28.8 kbps modem and 133 megahertz Pentium I desktop.
But hes coaxed that computer into performing beyond its capacity. Most
computer towers have multiple bays inside for hard drives, allowing for an additional
drive to easily be added. But Cuesta has jerry rigged two 1-gigabyte hard drives
to operate simultaneously in one bay taping a white plastic bag between
them to keep their electrostatic charges from shorting each other out. He also
doubled the capacity of one drive by using an application called Double Spacing.
All this gave him three times the original 1 gigabyte of hard disk space.
But these details are of little
consequence to his Italian employers, who, according to Cuesta, want software
they can sell as their own on the world market.
"They want cheap software,"
Cuesta says. "And we want dollars."
The quest for dollars doesnt stop at Cuestas front door. From there
one can look across stained rooftops sprouting TV antennas and makeshift satellite
dishes to the Capitolio, the domed Cuban capitol modeled after its counterpart
in Washington D.C. From the broad granite stairs radiating heat to the air-conditioned
Internet café tucked off the main hall, the push for dollars is evident.
Hawkers on the steps charge $1 for a bill with a picture of Che Guevara on it
worth 14 cents. A box of suspect Montecristo cigars goes for $40. But neither
these Cubans, nor someone like Cuesta, are allowed in Cybercafé Capitolio,
where another type of business goes on.
The Internet café the first in Cuba when it opened in April 2000 provides Internet access on seven computers for $5 hour. Pesos are not accepted, and the cafés commercial license only allows foreigners and Cuban nationals married to foreigners to use the computers, says Rolando Garcia, the café manager. Customers passport numbers are written down before they can get online.
Garcia says the restrictions were
simply a business decision, not a move to control access to information. He
dismisses the notion that Internet access could facilitate social change in
Cuba. "The revolution isnt afraid of this," says Garcia. "The
revolution is already committed to educating the population." He says he
wants to apply to the Ministry of Science, Technology and the Environment, which
controls the café, for a license allowing Cubans to get online, but he
hasnt started the process yet.
Most Cubans simply cant afford
to pay $5 for an hour of surfing. If they can, Garcia says they would still
be turned away. But one of the cafe clerks, who asked to remain anonymous, says
Cubans who can pay could get online.
"Today is a slow day,"
says Garcia, glancing around the narrow room where four café tables are
squeezed between floor-length windows and a counter. While they wait for a computer,
tourists drink bottled water and beer at the tables or mill around a rack of
Castro and Guevara postcards. "There are more or less always 20 to 25 people
waiting," Garcia says.
While that may be an exaggeration
on several trips to the café before 10:00 a.m. only two to three
people were waiting business is undoubtedly good. Garcia wouldnt
give specifics on how much revenue the café was bringing in, but he says
he wanted to get permission from the ministry to reinvest some or all of the
operational income. "Right now wed like to finance ourselves,"
says Garcia. "Were working on changing to a much bigger and more
comfortable location."
The ministry may be wary though
about the short-term loss of hard-currency. Besides the initial investment in
the computers and the cost of Internet service, the café has little overhead.
Garcia says his salary is about $12 a month. The six other employees make less
than Garcia. The café looks to be a cash cow, and Garcia says similar
operations have been opened in the cities of Santiago and Santa Clara.
The government is also not the only
one getting dollars from Cybercafé Capitolio. The workers are too. "Its
called inventa," says James Philips, a foreign national who has frequented
the Internet café regularly during his four years in Cuba. "Its
a creative way of stealing.
Say youre online for two hours. You
pay for that two hours, but they ring it up as one hour and pocket the rest."
According to Philips, who asked that his real name not be used, the practice
of shorting the register is common anywhere dollars are paid. "Its
the same thing at the grocery store," he says. "Everything works on
the dollar and informal client relationships. After Id been going to the
Capitolio for a while, one day they just said I was next. There was a list of
names in front of me."
Philips said he was online for about a half hour. His bill was $3. He gave the
clerk a five-dollar bill and told her to keep the change.
"The next time there was a
line and it was simply Well fix it," says Philips. "Theyre
not supposed to accept tips, but I know theyre keeping that money."
After that Philips says he no longer had to wait in hour-long lines to check
his email, and he always tipped when he paid. Soon after he says an employee
at the café offered him a black market Internet account for $50 a month.
When approached months later by a foreign national posing as a student living
in Cuba, the same employee said he could arrange a black market account. A meeting
was scheduled with the employees "friend" who supplied access
codes.
Philips, however, got a black market
account for $50 through a different source. "I dont even know his
name," Philips says. "I just call him Jorges friend. He shows
up every month for his money. He calls occasionally to make sure everything
is OK."
Depending on the type of black market
account, service can be spotty. According to multiple sources, black market
accounts are usually created in one of three ways: the access code is stolen,
the access code is sold by the legitimate owner, or an illicit account is created
by a network administrator who oversees a server.
"Lets say you work at
CITMATEL [one of four government-run Internet service providers] and you work
for pesos," says Nelson Valdes, director of the Cuban Academic Research
Program at the University of New Mexico. "During the day you create a program
to set up a proxy server on the commercial server. Now you have two servers
effectively working on one. Youre the only one who knows its there,
and you can sell accounts for dollars.
It happens all the time."
Free software to set up a proxy server is readily available through online chat
channels like Internet Relay Chat, or IRC. Valdes says that while doing research
in Cuba he paid $15 a month for an email-only account set up illicitly on a
proxy server.
Stolen access codes can be the most
problematic for Web surfers. If the code is for a single-user account, the legitimate
owner may try to log onto a server, only to be denied because someone else has
taken his or her place. Often the account owner will request a new code, canceling
the original one. The cut-off black market user then tells his supplier, who
gives him or her a code from a different source. "Sometimes it works for
weeks, sometimes for a month or so," says Philips.
"I have a multiple-user account,"
says Cuesta, the hacker. The account, which he says he stole from a company
executive, allows a set number of people an executive management group,
for example to dial in remotely at the same time. Since there are multiple
login slots available, there is less chance an authorized user will be denied
and realize the code has been compromised. "Generally people who have Internet
access are directors; they dont know anything about computers," says
Cuesta. "We steal the accounts and just sell the codes.
Also, I
have a lot of friends who give me connections anyway."
Some individuals with legal accounts
sell their code to make cash on the side, they then set up specific time periods
for use.
"My friend has an account that
he can only use between 8 at night and 8 in the morning when the owner isnt
using it," says Marelys Herrera, a 21-year-old writer who shares a black
market Internet account with her mother. Her friend pays $30 a month for the
limited service. Herrera and her mother do a little better. "My mom works
for a foreign firm," she says. "The firm hooks her up and pays the
$10 for the account, but of course its illegal."
The unregulated nature of the black market makes it impossible to tell how many Cubans are sneaking online or buying used computer parts to circumvent costly and restrictive government stores. Even more widespread is unofficial email use. There are about 40,000 registered email accounts in Cuba, but many account owners share their addresses with neighbors, friends and colleagues. They print incoming messages for these other users and type in outgoing emails.
Cuban students linger around the
stairs to the central library at Havana University, where foreign students can
open an account for $5 and send email on text-only computers running a Linux
operating system. Cuban students are rigorously questioned and often denied
an account, so they pass hand-written messages with an email address scrawled
on the top to any foreign exchange student willing to send it.
"How many people have email
connectivity? We dont know," says Valdes. "One account can have
eight people using it." Valdes says there are "easily 20,000"
free Yahoo! email accounts registered to Cubans. Many of these people dont
have regular computer access, so they set their accounts up to forward email
to a friend who has regular access, he says.
Though more rare than surreptitious
email use, everyone from painters to diplomats say they know about the black
market in computers and Internet accounts. "Its rare, yes,"
says Herrera, who asked that her name be changed. "But in my world, pretty
much everybody has black market access. We also share computer parts and things
like that. In my world were all informaticos."
Informaticos say they dodge the
system for two main reasons: money and anonymity. If one can get government
approval, an Internet account is prohibitively expensive unless a state agency
subsidizes it. The National Center for Automated Data Exchange, known by its
Spanish acronym CENIAI, oversees Cubas four Internet service providers.
CENIAI charges $260 a month more than the average annual salary of $240
cited in United Nations figures for 2000 to Cubans and foreigners alike
to register an Internet account.
"You can go the official way
through CENIAI, but that way they know everything," says Herrera. "They
know exactly when you get on, exactly where you go, what numbers you call. The
service is better, but we dont use it because of that and its
expensive. So you just go through the black market. You find someone who has
it and ask them how they got it. Its really easy to get Internet access."
The black market is
also a primary source for computer hardware. "You pretty much have to use
the black market to build a computer; its a fortune to buy one in the
store," said Herrera. Pedro Mendoza, a 35-year-old painter, turned to the
black market to get a used desktop with a Pentium III processor for $900. "Theres
a black market for everything, but you need money," says Mendoza. "You
find it. Its that easy. Thats where you go if you want to get something
done."
***
But not all Cubans
have the money to shop the black market, or have Cuestas ability to get
online themselves. These people have to go the official route, which is cumbersome
and restrictive. At the National Library of Science and Technology, downstairs
from the Cybercafé Capitolio, average Cubans can get online information,
but they cant get online. Instead, they submit requests to professional
researchers who search the Web on one of seven computers. The fee is 15 pesos
per hour about 70 cents.
"We dont
have sufficient technology to serve every Cuban," says Anierta Pereira,
a 37-year-old researcher at the library. "There are limitations."
One of the limitations is that foreigners are given priority, says Pereira. "The only thing is they have to pay in dollars," she says. Foreigners are charged $5 an hour for research, or they can get online themselves in the next room, where there are six computers with Internet connections for the same $5-per-hour rate.
According to Pereira,
most of the information requests come from academics or students. Pereira says
no Web sites are blocked at the library, but superiors can monitor researchers
movements.
To demonstrate, Pereira
opens the Web site for the Cuban American National Foundation, the largest U.S.-based
Cuban exile group, which is known for its militant anti-Castro stance. "You
see?" she says. "We can access anything, but its the time. We
have to be productive.
The cost to use the Internet is very high, and
we dont want to put the institution in a position where they have to pay
more money."
The Internet is more
expensive in Cuba than elsewhere. Pummeled by economic hardship as the West
leapt into the information age, Cuba is struggling to modernize an antiquated
telecommunications system that wasnt built to handle electronic data traffic.
There are no fiber optic links off the island, and all digital data is relayed
through two costly satellite links. In a bid to catch up, the government is
overhauling its phone network in a joint venture with Italy's Telecom Italia
and Mexicos Grupo Domos, digitizing analog lines and laying new cables.
When the project is completed slated for 2004 there will be 1.1
million phone lines. That is less than one phone per 10 Cubans. Now there are
about 623,000 phone lines, or one for every 18 Cubans. More than half of these
lines are analog and effectively useless for sending digital information.
The government frequently
cites the lack of infrastructure and current Internet costs as the main hindrance
to Cubans getting online. To address this, communications officials announced
a plan to set up email and "Internet" terminals in 2,000 post offices
across the country, allowing even rural Cubans to get online. In March three
post offices were wired, and another 30 were brought online in April. "We
had to find a way to use the Internet for the public," said Juan Fernandez,
head of Cubas e-commerce commission. "Here really the only restriction
for getting on the Internet is technology. Cuba is not afraid of the challenge
of the Internet."
Fernandezs assurances
seem hollow, however, considering the post offices that are wired dont
offer Internet access. Rather, they provide access to a national Intranet, a
closed network that only contains sites endorsed by the government. Cubans have
to pay in dollars $4.50 for three hours to surf the domestic Intranet
or to send email internationally. Web-hosted email accounts like Yahoo! Mail
or Hotmail are not accessible. Ostensibly Cubans are allowed to send domestic
emails for 5 pesos per hour, but at the main cyber post office inside the new
Ministry of Information and Communication the clerk said even domestic email
had to be paid for in dollars. Later, a second clerk at the same post office
said domestic emails could be paid for in pesos, but she didnt know what
the rate was. "Almost no one uses pesos," she said.
"We have to be
realists," Sergio Perez, head of the Cuban computer firm Teledatos, told
the government-controlled newspaper Granma in April. "Cuba, a poor country
which is economically blocked by the biggest imperialist powerhouse in the world,
has food rations and a shortage of medical supplies. How is it that we also
wouldnt have Internet access limitations?"
While Cuban officials
frequently blame the U.S. trade embargo for the countrys economic problems,
the U.S. Treasury Department, which oversees U.S. financial dealings with Cuba,
authorized U.S. companies in 1997 to negotiate with Cuban officials on opening
a fiber optic link between Florida and Cuba. The move came after the State Department
issued a policy statement earlier that year indicating it supported a fiber
optic link to increase the flow of information and cut high phone rates between
the two countries. The only condition was that no new technology could be given
to Cuba.
"Our end goal
is that there would be a fiber optic cable so that we could encourage a greater
development of Internet between the United States and Cuba," says James
Wolf, economic coordinator for Cuban affairs at the State Department. "To
our knowledge there has not actually been an agreement between the Cuban phone
company and any of the U.S. companies that have been looking into this."
A fiber optic ring
being laid around the Caribbean should be completed by the end of 2001, but
in its current form it bypasses Cuba. Some observers have speculated the network,
know as Americas Region Caribbean Ring System, or ARCOS-1, could be linked to
Cuba if the political and business factors fall into place. When completed,
the ring will pass within 50 miles of Havana, at which point an ARCOS-1 network
map indicates a "branching unit" will be laid down. The international
consortium funding the project includes 25 telecoms from 14 countries, including
AT&T, MCI and Genuity (formely GTE).
Wolf would not comment
on whether the consortium was negotiating with the Cuban side, but noted, "at
this point there has not been a single application by any company to actually
install such a cable." Valdes, director of the Cuban Academic Research
Program, framed the question facing the Cuban government in economic terms:
"Do we bring in optical lines, or do we bring in pipes so we dont
have to truck in water to Havana?"
The Western diplomat
in Cuba, however, viewed it differently. According to him, the Cuban government
is making substantial revenue off high phone charges between the U.S. and Cuba.
Operating an efficient fiber optic network with a U.S. business partner would
cut into its revenue stream. For U.S. government approval, the network would
also have to allow for the free flow of information, undercutting the Cuban
governments ability to filter or monitor where its citizens venture in
cyberspace.
It is unclear how extensive
government control over cyberspace is. In March it blocked access to web phone
sites like dialpad.com and online conferencing services like Net Meeting. But
both government-run computer centers and home computers had access to sites
from anti-Castro groups and U.S. media outlets.
"It is absolutely
false that the government is controlling specific sites," Perez was quoted
in Granma as saying. "It is the companies or institutions connected to
the Internet that decide where its workers and students browse. In what country
in the world is a doctor allowed to use a hospital computer to visit porn sites
or chat with a friend?"
In Cuba though, all
companies are owned by the state, and many computer users say they are certain
the government monitors Internet activity. "Everyone knows it," says
Santiago Ferrer, and a 25-year-old technician at CUPET, the state petroleum
company, and a friend of Cuestas. "Its in the technology. Servers
have the capacity to look and check where you were." Chat rooms are dangerous
places because the government watches them for subversive talk, says Ferrer.
"We know the government monitors chat rooms," he says. "If you
say something out of the ordinary they kick you out of the chat room. They have
spies who are moderators." According to Cuesta, all chat rooms in Cuba
are controlled. The government can even monitor individually set up a channels
that host invitation-only chat rooms.
But just the threat
of monitoring may be an effective deterrent. "You dont have to check
someones urine everyday to see if theyre taking drugs," said
the Western diplomat. "I would be astounded if they werent monitoring
my every key stroke."
Even someone like Armando
Estévez, a well-placed state employee, isnt entrusted with Internet
access. Relaxing in the afternoon sun on the front steps of the Capitolio, he
checks his IBM personal organizer and his cell phone, conveniences someone like
Cuesta only reads about. The information services manager at CUPET, Estévez
even has a laptop to work from home, where he can dial into a closed company
Intranet but not the Internet.
Still, he plays down
the idea that the government was worried online information could stir political
change. "Undoubtedly there is an influence, but the political change is
not very big," he says. "That information is coming into the country
all the time it has been for 40 years. We cant blockade that kind
of information. You hear it over the radio or by word of mouth. People know
whats in the Miami Herald and compare it with Granma."
Estévez suggests
Cubans view the U.S. newspaper and the Cuban state-run daily with equal suspicion.
"The problem is the lies are very big on both sides," he says. "You
can spot them immediately. Thats what politics is."
With almost 2 million
Cuban immigrants in the United States, nearly all of the estimated 11 million
people in Cuba have a relative living somewhere across the Florida Strait. Travel
restrictions relaxed in 1999 under the Clinton administration have allowed many
Cuban émigrés to visit the island, bringing news and goods from
the United States. Thousands of tourists visit annually, many of them from Western
Europe. Miami-based Radio Marti, funded by the U.S. government and operated
by the Cuban American National Foundation, broadcasts programs heard across
Cuba. According to Estévez, the Internet is "changing the minds
of the people," but in a personal way rather than a political one.
"People use the
Internet for communication, mainly personal communication," he says.
Ferrer, both a colleague
of Estévezs and an informatico friend of Cuestas, typifies
a new generation of Cubans who get online to communicate. "Its very
Cuban to cooperate through chatting," says Ferrer, who goes by "macdaddy"
in chat rooms. "Usually when were chatting we get phone numbers.
We meet at the beach and stuff. Its really weird and kinda funny. No one
uses their real names when we meet. They say, Hey Mac Daddy, and
you dont know whether to use their real name or not."
Despite the lack of
home Internet access, Ferrer says chatting is "very common in Cuba now."
He chats on the job. Monitoring the flow of petroleum during a 24-hour shift
has its down times, but Ferrer is friends with the network administrator in
his division. Even though he is not authorized to have Internet access on his
computer, Ferrer said the administrator lets him get online whenever he wants.
"If you chat at
lunch my boss wont do anything," he says. "Its not a problem.
We shouldnt chat it in front of him when were supposed to be working,
but we can surf the Web." Ferrer says surfing is actually part of his job
responsibilities. "My boss knows. Everybody knows," he says. "My
boss tells me to find stuff on the Internet."
As he talks, Ferrer
leans against a glass display case in the electronics store at Havanas
Plaza Carlos III shopping center. He is among a group of twenty-something males
looking wistfully at a new shipment of modems, motherboards and other computer
gear, most without price tags. According to the store manager, the parts arrived
three days ago, and the store headquarters hadnt decided how much to charge.
The few items that had prices were two to three times more expensive than in
the United States. A Multi-Tech Systems 56K modem was $230. The same modem is
listed on buy.com for $115. Similar markups are found in the few other computer
stores sprinkled around Havana.
Ferrer is building
his computer piecemeal, cobbling together parts bought on the black market or
loaned to him by friends like Cuesta. He still needs a monitor, a CD-ROM drive
and a modem to complete it. "Its very expensive," he says, casting
a sidelong glance at modem. "Most of the parts I have I got from friends."
Cost is not the only
factor when purchasing a computer. Prospective buyers must have written permission
from a company or government institution, like the professional writers union,
to buy a complete system. They then have to purchase the computer with a check,
usually drawn from a company or government account, since few Cubans have personal
bank accounts. Computer parts can be bought without authorization, but in all
cases the transactions are in dollars.
According to Ernesto
Reyna, manager for the Plaza Carlos III store, anyone can come in and buy all
the parts to build a complete computer system at one time. Although no hard
drives, CR-ROM drives or tower cases were on display, Reyna said the store had
everything to put together a full system. Once the pieces are bought, Reyna
says staff will assemble the machine if the customer requests. A Pentium III
system with a CD-ROM, modem and speakers would cost just over $2,000
more than double the price in the U.S.
In the Cuban cyber
realm whether its assembling computers bought in pieces or selling
Internet codes it comes down to ingenuity, connections and money. Cuesta
operates at one extreme, but the rules are the same even at the shiny state-run
computer clubs he describes as "bullshit."
The government started
opening the clubs in the 1990s to help Cubans succeed in a technology-driven
world. Affiliated with the Union of Communist Youths, a government student organization,
the clubs teach classes in Windows, Excel and Word, as well as more advanced
skills like web design and multimedia presentations. They focus on youths, but
offer classes for adults as well. There are currently 174 of these clubs throughout
the country, said Damian Barcaz, technical assistant director at the Central
Palace of Computing, the flagship club. He said the government plans to have
between 200 and 300 throughout Cubas 15 provinces in the next two years.
"Theres
really nowhere you dont need a computer," says Barcaz. "Its
the way to the world." But many of these youth computer clubs, like the
one is the Havana neighborhood of Vedado, lack Internet access. At the Central
Palace of Computing in Old Havana, five of the 10 computers available for students
to do work outside of their classes have Internet access. Barcaz says no sites
are blocked or filtered out, bringing up CNNs Web site when asked. "Staff
walk around and can look where the students are going, but we dont block
anything," says Barcaz.
Upstairs from the main
hall, past a framed placard on which Castro wrote "Siento envidia!"
(How would you translate that?) when he christened the center in 1991, a group
of six- and seven-year-olds sit two to a computer in a modern classroom. They
practice their spelling as brightly colored graphics of leopards and buses appeared
on their screens. One boy uses the mouse and keyboard to color in a graphic
of Peter Pan and then write a few words about the scene. Barcaz says the exercises
teach young children basics like how to use a mouse and turn on a computer while
also developing on language skills.
In the next classroom
the mood is more serious. Groups of three or four adults huddle around each
of the nine computers as they practice using Windows 2000 and Microsoft Excel.
Many say they needed computer skills for their job. "At my bank theres
one computer and I have to know how to use it," says Leticia Betancourt,
23. "This is the only way we can learn how. Society demands that you know
how to use a computer now, so we come here."
Marta Baros, a 50-year-old
accountant, is in a similar position. "I want to be able to use this,"
she says, gesturing at an Excel spreadsheet open on her screen. "If I can,
my work will be much better."
With 1,040 students
enrolled at the center, and thousands of applications received before new courses
start every four months, it appears many Cubans think computers are the key
to their future. Deciding who gets in, and who does not, is the "most difficult
task," according to Barcaz. He says he is one of four people who determine
what percentage of workers, students and housewives the club accepts. Individuals
from those categories are then enrolled on a first-come first-served basis.
Once they are selected, "everything is completely free," says Barcaz.
Raul Varella, a former
student whose name has been changed, says the process is really based on who
you know or how much you pay. Varella, who runs in the same informatico circle
as Cuesta and Ferrer, said he was denied admittance on his first attempt, but
his father was friends with a teacher at the club, who used his influence to
get Varella in. After he completed his first course, Varella again tried to
enroll aboveboard and was denied. "Through friendship its much easier,"
he says. He also says business employees are given priority because their companies
pay in dollars to have them trained. According to Varella, it costs companies
$180 to enroll their employees in one four-month course.
"They prioritize
the admittance list according to business people like me who work in an office,"
he says. "The company gives you money and you take the classes. For individuals
its free, but businesses have to pay because you are getting skills."
The youth computer
clubs are not the governments only efforts to get certain citizens computer
skills. The official journalists union handed out 150 computers and home Internet
accounts to distinguished members in 1999, including installing phone lines
if the reporters lacked them, says Aixa Hevia, vice president of the union.
The state-sponsored
artist and writers union, known by the Spanish initials UNEAC, opened up an
Internet café for its members in October 2000. Tucked in the back of
a colonial palace off the Plaza de Armas, the café gives writers access
to the outside world, even if the connection is slow. The five computers share
one modem linked to a proxy server at the Book Institute, the countrys
largest publishing house. But the café was bustling on a Saturday, with
two people seated at each computer, staring intently at emails or tapping furiously
in Microsoft Word as Simon and Garfunkels "Sound of Silence"
downloaded off Napster slipped around the room.
"Many writers
dont have computers at home," says Joanna Ramirez, 20, one of the
café administrators. "Writers can work on their books here and then
send them to other countries for interaction and discourse." The 180 writers
authorized to use the café pay about 50 cents a month for membership.
They have to book computer time in advance in two- to three-hour blocks. For
some the time isnt spent seeking critiques of their work, but rather emailing
friends, getting new versions of songs, or downloading software like PhotoShop.
A few members have computers and black market Internet accounts at home, and
one writer brings in his hard-drive, complete with songs downloaded overnight
from Napster the embattled music sharing program so others in
the café can hear and copy the songs. Another artist uses the time to
get world news not presented in the Cuban media, including Castros nomination
for the Nobel Peace Prize, which was submitted in March 2001 by leftist Norwegian
politician Hallgeir Langeland.
"We found out
Fidel was nominated for the Nobel Prize on the Univision Web site," says
the writer, who asked not to be named, referring to the Spanish-language broadcast
group. "It was never announced here. That only goes around by word of mouth."
"Its not
like is used to be," says Ferrer in the musty Central Havana apartment
he shares with his mother. "Then we were in a bubble. We used to see the
world through tinted lenses. It was very difficult." He is lounging against
a Russian TV with a Marlboro in his hand, sunglasses on his head, and gold bracelets
on his dark wrists. The shutters are closed and his mother is gone. It seems
like a hackers room. Tacked to the shelf above him is a sign that reads
"no smoking." Overhead, an inflatable silver alien dangles from a
fluorescent light bulb. The shelves are piled with bootleg CDs and grainy pictures
of Maria Carey and Pamela Anderson that had been downloaded and printed out.
Varella and Cuesta recline nearby. Ferrers "Frankenstein" computer
is on the desk. Its a lonesome gray case no keyboard, no mouse,
no monitor. A piece of white cardboard carefully cropped to fit around the disk
drive and start button covers the front of Ferrers unfinished gateway
to the world.
"We dont
have to see what they want us to see," he says. "The world is getting
to know each other through the Internet. Everyone in the world is the same as
in Cuba."
Cuesta, however, is
more cautious in his assessment. "The state thinks the Internet can change
society," he says. "Tourism is more abundant and is creating more
of an effect though. People compare their lives to the lives of outside people.
That makes them think."
He leans back in his
chair against the closet door. Ferrer takes a drag of his cigarette, fiddling
with a bootleg Mariah Carey CD. He rests his eyes on Frankenstein for more than
a few seconds.
"You cant predict whats going to happen," he says.