6 ms·

But possession of child pornography is what's illegal. They very well may have reported the owner of the blog to the authorities but, in the mean time, google w

But possession of child pornography is what's illegal. They very well may have reported the owner of the blog to the authorities but, in the mean time, google was both possessing and distributing the material. It's not that it's violating their TOS, it's that Google thought they may have been violating the law. EDIT: At least if that's what the content was.

67726e 10y ago
Then suspend the blog, and allow for some process to deal with the situation. Don't just torch everything on some suspicion of something going wrong. This isn't a new issue for Google. They're notorious for fucking with people's accounts and providing no recourse or customer support. Something happens? Better hope your uncle works at Google or your shit out of luck. Hell, I've hosted most of my personal domains' email accounts via Google. A few months ago one of them was deleted. I never really used the email, but I certainly had things on their I would like to have for posterity. When Google deleted the account I was given no recourse or ability to appeal. It was just gone. It's not as if the account was even anything controversial, it was just my contact-me email for an old NES modding site I had.
- awesomepantsm 10y ago
  >Don't just torch everything on some suspicion of something going wrong. You can rest assured, if it was child porn, they'd be obligued to keep backups as proof for law enforcement. I doubt the material is actually deleted, just hidden until they sort it out with the feds.
- parent5446 10y ago
  I mean, who's to say that isn't the case. The blog might still exist on Google's side, and it's just been quarantined or otherwise looks like it's been deleted from the outside.
  - 67726e 10y ago
    The point is not the "soft delete" vs "hard delete" but their total lack of transparency or customer support. It doesn't matter to the end user the difference if all outward appearance is that the blog was deleted.
    - Sleaker 10y ago
      If there's any legal thing going on they wont be able to make any statements on it anyway...
      - Karunamon 10y ago
        "Due to ongoing litigation we are unable to comment" would still be valuable in that case. Radio silence on the other hand, is not acceptable.
        tener 10y ago
        In some jurisdictions it is illegal to let your client know they are being secretely investigated. Such statement may interfere with the investigation - they may destroy the evidence etc.
        Karunamon 10y ago
        If that's actually what's happening. Google's policy seems to be radio silence in all cases.
        lotharbot 10y ago
        > "Google's policy seems to be radio silence in all cases" This may be an intentional decision to cooperate with law enforcement. If they only go silent in the case of ongoing investigations, then "Google went silent" functions in the same way as "the warrant canary disappeared" does for other sites, which could in theory jeopardize an investigation.
- Grishnakh 10y ago
  >Hell, I've hosted most of my personal domains' email accounts via Google. A few months ago one of them was deleted. I never really used the email, but I certainly had things on their I would like to have for posterity. That's what you get for not making backups. This isn't rocket science. You're using someone else's free service, and they have zero obligation to continue to provide that service to you. Even if they didn't intentionally delete your account, mistakes do happen sometimes. Who actually thinks it's a good idea to keep only one copy of data that you value? Especially on a site with the name "Hacker News"? Do hackers these days not understand backups?
  - 67726e 10y ago
    Maybe I'm just a lazy fuck? I know backups, I get it, but you know what? I'm human.
    - bigB 10y ago
      A very very lazy human if you cant backup for 14 years....i hate mowing my lawn or doing my shopping but i have to do it. Going to work each day is a chore but somehow it happens...being lazy and human is the poorest excuse ive heard for not backing up over such a long period of time, and I deal with data loss whiners every day. If you dont want to lose it, make a copy, end of story.
      - 67726e 10y ago
        Oh go fuck yourself you judgmental asshole.
        sctb 10y ago
        Personal attacks are not OK on Hacker News.
true_religion 10y ago
From the OP who said: > "I've read a few of Cooper's books and the short answer is yes, pedophilia is a common theme in his writing (as is incest and necrophilia)." Because of the words 'book' and 'writing', I have the impression that everything there is written text and no certainly no pictures. This puts it in a nebulous position, at least in the USA. Dunlop v. U.S., 165 U.S. 486 (1897), ended up ruling that text-only content can be deemed obscene and being text-only is not a reason to get total 1st amendment protection. However later cases, decided there was a division between erotica and obscene material, which is essentially decided on a case-by-case basis subjectively. When it comes to things such as obscenity, its not really enough to go by our 'feelings' and intuition on the matter. For instance, would you believe the US is a fully functioning, 1st world democracy, where sex toys are illegal (Alabama, upheld by State Supreme court and enforced as recently as 2009)? To me, personally, anything that comes entirely from someones fanciful imagination, no matter how distasteful, should not be considered illegal unless it directly results in the harm of another individual.
- djsumdog 10y ago
  So in the US (and Japan and only a handful of other countries), fictional depictions of under age or incestual content isn't illegal (per the court case you referenced above), so long as you're not using real people to act it out. This doesn't hold true for ... most of the rest of the planet. In the UK a man was put in jail for Simpsons porn, something that's legal in the US (although potentially a trademark violation; unless you can argue it's satire). In Cooper's home country of France, fictional depictions are actually illegal (books like Lolita are banned). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laws_regarding_child_pornography https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laws_regarding_child_pornograp... But as already stated, even if legality wasn't the issue, yes they are still a private company and can do what they want. The article mentions this and there really needs to be an effort to educate people that they need multiple backups, not just on-line, but on their own media.
  - true_religion 10y ago
    > So in the US (and Japan and only a handful of other countries), fictional depictions of under age or incestual content isn't illegal (per the court case you referenced above), so long as you're not using real people to act it out. Actually, visual incest pornography exists in the US. I am not sure why (I am within the industry, but I don't actually keep tabs on legalities that I'm not involved in), but it seems that 2 years ago VISA decided it was okay for it to take credit card payments for incest-fantasy sites, and since then there's been an explosion of mainstream studios supporting said material. Cynically speaking, it seems to me that the adult industry is more scared of how their merchant banks will react to their content, than any chance of being taken down by the US government.
AWildDHHAppears 10y ago
It is astounding to contemplate that it's possible to type a series of English words which would be illegal to _possess_! Even if I was the only one to know about these words and, for example, kept them in a safe.

67726e 10y ago

Then suspend the blog, and allow for some process to deal with the situation. Don't just torch everything on some suspicion of something going wrong. This isn't a new issue for Google. They're notorious for fucking with people's accounts and providing no recourse or customer support. Something happens? Better hope your uncle works at Google or your shit out of luck. Hell, I've hosted most of my personal domains' email accounts via Google. A few months ago one of them was deleted. I never really used the email, but I certainly had things on their I would like to have for posterity. When Google deleted the account I was given no recourse or ability to appeal. It was just gone. It's not as if the account was even anything controversial, it was just my contact-me email for an old NES modding site I had.

awesomepantsm 10y ago
>Don't just torch everything on some suspicion of something going wrong. You can rest assured, if it was child porn, they'd be obligued to keep backups as proof for law enforcement. I doubt the material is actually deleted, just hidden until they sort it out with the feds.
parent5446 10y ago
I mean, who's to say that isn't the case. The blog might still exist on Google's side, and it's just been quarantined or otherwise looks like it's been deleted from the outside.
- 67726e 10y ago
  The point is not the "soft delete" vs "hard delete" but their total lack of transparency or customer support. It doesn't matter to the end user the difference if all outward appearance is that the blog was deleted.
  - Sleaker 10y ago
    If there's any legal thing going on they wont be able to make any statements on it anyway...
    - Karunamon 10y ago
      "Due to ongoing litigation we are unable to comment" would still be valuable in that case. Radio silence on the other hand, is not acceptable.
      - tener 10y ago
        In some jurisdictions it is illegal to let your client know they are being secretely investigated. Such statement may interfere with the investigation - they may destroy the evidence etc.
        Karunamon 10y ago
        If that's actually what's happening. Google's policy seems to be radio silence in all cases.
        lotharbot 10y ago
        > "Google's policy seems to be radio silence in all cases" This may be an intentional decision to cooperate with law enforcement. If they only go silent in the case of ongoing investigations, then "Google went silent" functions in the same way as "the warrant canary disappeared" does for other sites, which could in theory jeopardize an investigation.
Grishnakh 10y ago
>Hell, I've hosted most of my personal domains' email accounts via Google. A few months ago one of them was deleted. I never really used the email, but I certainly had things on their I would like to have for posterity. That's what you get for not making backups. This isn't rocket science. You're using someone else's free service, and they have zero obligation to continue to provide that service to you. Even if they didn't intentionally delete your account, mistakes do happen sometimes. Who actually thinks it's a good idea to keep only one copy of data that you value? Especially on a site with the name "Hacker News"? Do hackers these days not understand backups?
- 67726e 10y ago
  Maybe I'm just a lazy fuck? I know backups, I get it, but you know what? I'm human.
  - bigB 10y ago
    A very very lazy human if you cant backup for 14 years....i hate mowing my lawn or doing my shopping but i have to do it. Going to work each day is a chore but somehow it happens...being lazy and human is the poorest excuse ive heard for not backing up over such a long period of time, and I deal with data loss whiners every day. If you dont want to lose it, make a copy, end of story.
    - 67726e 10y ago
      Oh go fuck yourself you judgmental asshole.
      - sctb 10y ago
        Personal attacks are not OK on Hacker News.

true_religion 10y ago

From the OP who said: > "I've read a few of Cooper's books and the short answer is yes, pedophilia is a common theme in his writing (as is incest and necrophilia)." Because of the words 'book' and 'writing', I have the impression that everything there is written text and no certainly no pictures. This puts it in a nebulous position, at least in the USA. Dunlop v. U.S., 165 U.S. 486 (1897), ended up ruling that text-only content can be deemed obscene and being text-only is not a reason to get total 1st amendment protection. However later cases, decided there was a division between erotica and obscene material, which is essentially decided on a case-by-case basis subjectively. When it comes to things such as obscenity, its not really enough to go by our 'feelings' and intuition on the matter. For instance, would you believe the US is a fully functioning, 1st world democracy, where sex toys are illegal (Alabama, upheld by State Supreme court and enforced as recently as 2009)? To me, personally, anything that comes entirely from someones fanciful imagination, no matter how distasteful, should not be considered illegal unless it directly results in the harm of another individual.

djsumdog 10y ago
So in the US (and Japan and only a handful of other countries), fictional depictions of under age or incestual content isn't illegal (per the court case you referenced above), so long as you're not using real people to act it out. This doesn't hold true for ... most of the rest of the planet. In the UK a man was put in jail for Simpsons porn, something that's legal in the US (although potentially a trademark violation; unless you can argue it's satire). In Cooper's home country of France, fictional depictions are actually illegal (books like Lolita are banned). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laws_regarding_child_pornography https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laws_regarding_child_pornograp... But as already stated, even if legality wasn't the issue, yes they are still a private company and can do what they want. The article mentions this and there really needs to be an effort to educate people that they need multiple backups, not just on-line, but on their own media.
- true_religion 10y ago
  > So in the US (and Japan and only a handful of other countries), fictional depictions of under age or incestual content isn't illegal (per the court case you referenced above), so long as you're not using real people to act it out. Actually, visual incest pornography exists in the US. I am not sure why (I am within the industry, but I don't actually keep tabs on legalities that I'm not involved in), but it seems that 2 years ago VISA decided it was okay for it to take credit card payments for incest-fantasy sites, and since then there's been an explosion of mainstream studios supporting said material. Cynically speaking, it seems to me that the adult industry is more scared of how their merchant banks will react to their content, than any chance of being taken down by the US government.

AWildDHHAppears 10y ago

It is astounding to contemplate that it's possible to type a series of English words which would be illegal to _possess_! Even if I was the only one to know about these words and, for example, kept them in a safe.