Game of Thrones hype and SNET tech turned Cuban kids into spies

In Cuba for many years, to get online and watch shows or download games meant using methods and tools reminiscent of espionage and spycraft. In Cuba, for many years, getting online to watch a show or download the latest game meant using tools and methods reminiscent of spycraft and espionage. The PC behind him vibrates, letting him know that the 1TB paquete data file has been downloaded. He pops a thumb drive into the PC’s USB slot and begins copying over the paquete’s contents. In a desk drawer, dozens of dozens more hard drives sit, waiting to be formatted, filled with the paquete’s data and doled out.

Just as the copy completes, the office door opens and a middle-aged woman walks in, a shopping bag full of the day’s groceries slung over one shoulder. As he grabs and passes the thumb drive, the paquetero barely notices. The woman exchanges for the bundle of notes. It is a wordless exchange. Before turning to walk out in the blinding sun and street sounds, the woman raises her bag higher. After dinner she may upload the paquete onto her central network node, which is her pillar. The paquete is unrolled from a WiFi transponder attached to the pole of the local network administrator 15 feet up, releasing the list of content into the surrounding neighborhood. Its terabytes of data are floating out invisibly, waiting to be grabbed.

In that invisible web, maybe in an adjacent apartment, the teenager leaves his dinner and heads to his bedroom. The teenager then hops up in front his computer and joins a TeamSpeak Chatroom that’s buzzing. It is the most recent paquete at the very top. The user opens it and scrolls through the first few pages, until they find something interesting.

The process is reminiscent of an illicit internet where men with dark suits, slick hairstyles, and sharp haircuts trade valuable secrets that have been stolen by corporations and the government. The paquete is nothing more than a snapshot of the Internet. It’s news websites, photo journals, games, movies, and the latest TV series from around the world. A young man who browses its content has the same chance of picking up an episode as a woman. Game of Thrones as downloading the latest Taylor Swift album or that year’s FIFA. Though the mode of accessing the information may exist through a framework of murky legality, hacked-together hardware, and mysterious actors, this isn’t a spy story, or not the typical one. Rather, it’s a story about access, by whatever inventive means necessary.

SNET, short for “Street Network,” was a phenomenon in Cuba that lasted from the early 2000s to 2019, when the Cuban government outlawed and replaced most of the infrastructure in favor of its own. SNET originated in Havana, and soon more Cuban cities including Matanzas and Pinar del Río had their own massive mesh networks, modeled on Havana’s original SNET.

In the early years of this millennium, Cubans were unable to access the internet. It was a difficult and inconclusive venture. Searches on the web would return more 404s than useful results. It was impossible to play online games and it was even more difficult to stream the shows and films that the rest of world takes for granted.

People still use computers to play video games and other things. In an unreleased interview for the 2020 documentary “The Street Network,” one SNET user, Ander, noted: “Even though this country has been kind of cut off from general population, from general culture, it’s got a very, very — I would say, huge gaming community. Everybody, I mean everyone, waits until the E3 conference and then they download or buy them online. [paquete] because they want to see what’s coming, you know? They always want to keep updated.”

[Ed. note: Emile Bokaer, one of the co-authors of this story, directed The Street Network.]

The friends would bring their computer to the house together and play games. These LAN-parties would sometimes extend beyond the confines of an apartment, via ethernet cable strung through windows or air shafts. But these parties, for the most part, were forced to remain local, shut off from the outside world thanks to the United States’ blockade and Cuba’s resultant limited access.

Photo: Tijana Petrovic/Dogpatch Films

SNET grew out of the desire to connect and gain access to what was previously denied. SNET bypassed restrictions not to obtain secrets or to have access to forbidden information. It was to achieve the type of access they could not get through normal channels. “I’m proud of SNET because it’s a true Cuban innovation,” Cuban economist Ricardo Torres proclaimed in The Street Network. “Our system is very much top-down, and this is essentially the opposite: This is a bottom-up way of doing something that is of interest to the people.”

Having access to SNET was legal, but anyone using the network had to use caution to avoid violating local laws or upsetting the authorities. SNET was invisible to the majority unless they knew exactly which threads and people to look for. The key to getting access to SNET was in finding your local administrator, an SNET user who looked over a local chunk of the network, someone who handed out login privileges — and revoked them for users who broke one of the network’s rules. They might also have helped you determine what type of hardware was needed, or even set up a pool for others to contribute money to help you get online. The administrator was responsible for the SNET rules, which were well-enforced and robust.

SNET was advertised as a system that would allow users to access information for free, but it actually had a strict set of rules and a long list of offenses. In order to prevent overcrowding and congestion, the system was regulated with some simple measures. You could only download files between certain hours in the morning and at night. According to Ander: “You can play from morning to 2 a.m., but from 2 a.m. till morning it’s downloading time. And you’re not allowed to download during playing time, or you’ll get banned. We’ve gotten banned a few times because we were downloading a movie or show that we loved, and we forgot to pause the copy. At first it’s not much, maybe 45 minutes or so — just so you don’t do it again.”

Violating the download schedule was only considered a “minor offense.” The network’s most stringent rules were reserved not for its practical side, but its political one. SNET did not allow any political discussion. You were not allowed openly to express racist, homophobic or sexist views, nor any other kind of prejudice. Transgressing any of these rules was quickly and severely punished: banishment from SNET’s walled garden, with the only recourse being to beg the admin to be let back in.

All this self-policing was there due to the network’s liminal legal state. There was an unspoken understanding that SNET was allowed to run largely at the government’s discretion. SNET’s directories and chat rooms, as well as the timelines on the ersatz social network, were all known to the government. SNET users knew they were under constant surveillance. All users acted with a constant and obvious tail. In order to avoid being seen, all users had to behave like model citizens, be always on their best behaviour, and not rebellious in the slightest. This was an uncomfortable arrangement. It was freedom, but not true freedom. It was an opportunity to see what access looked like from under the powerful and ever-watchful eyes of SNET. SNET’s users were technically secretive, undercover and underground, yet their behavior was very visible, sanctioned, and regulated by the administrators.

Photo: Tijana Petrovic/Dogpatch Films

Cuban authorities passed a law in 2019 that declared illegal the use of long-range transmitters that were used to connect the various SNET clusters located on the Island. The network became crippled and reduced to localized clusters without the ability to communicate over distances. The government claimed that SNET’s antennas would interfere with its own newly built infrastructure, meant to improve digital connectivity to the island. And, in the past few years, getting online through the government’s public service provider has become far easier and more reliable.

But for many of SNET’s original users, the network meant something more than that basic need to be online. SNET was a way for users to connect and gain more access than they were originally given. Describing the experience of playing multiplayer games for the first time, Ander said: “It was something that was completely new, that was mind-blowing, sharing that experience, not just playing a game where you’re the hero and you’re just doing it on your own. It’s like you actually need people to help you win and that is really interesting and helps you connect with people in a different way.”

The internet is a basic service that has been available to most of the world outside Cuba for years. The internet is not a treasure that must be protected, or a right to which one has to fight for. It can easily be downloaded illegally, and then snatched up in pieces like the crumbs from a table overloaded. The internet today is often viewed with skepticism, as a place that’s more bad than good. It can be a cacophony, full of propaganda and misinformation. There are also battles between hyperprivileged, loud-mouthed power brokers. The internet, especially for those fortunate enough to have the privilege of working remotely during COVID-19, began to feel like an imprisoning cage.

SNET showed that this doesn’t have to be the only way. SNET is a great example of the power of collective action. The need to have access was so strong that the people decided to act on their own. The people pooled funds and installed antennas on their rooftops. They persevered online despite being vulnerable and under surveillance. It was a sacrifice to get access to their favorite soccer teams’ scores, latest episodes of shows and games. World of Warcraft, called “El WOW” by its devoted Cuban players. All this to be able to partake in the artistic and creative output of the rest of the world — and to partake in what was happening within Cuba’s borders as well.

SNET, with its clusters of interconnected data transmission pillars and connected clusters, served as a way for Cubans connect. As Idania del Río, founder of the Cuban fashion brand Clandestina, put it in The Street Network, “With increased internet access — beyond rum, tobacco, ‘la mulatta,’ son and salsa music, baseball, all of which is great… We’re getting to know more what Cuba really is, through its people.”