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The commenters saying be reasonable, they were sanctioned, GitHub had to do this, should look into the last time code was made illegal or similar turmoil and wh

The commenters saying be reasonable, they were sanctioned, GitHub had to do this, should look into the last time code was made illegal or similar turmoil and what the developer community did in response…It was not accepting sanctions or govt failures to understand code as “well that’s that.” - Phil Zimmerman (PGP) was under criminal investigation for arms exports by releasing the code for consumer encryption. The case escalated and was eventually dropped, included POTUS attention. - Aaron Swartz passed away via suicide in 2013 under threat of 35 years in prison and a lot else for downloading from JSTOR programmatically - Clifford Stole spent several years being ignored by every govt agency under the Sun, except for CIA, for finding, attributing and then exposing a widespread KGB hack of govt systems in the 80s - L0pht testified in front of congress to expose significant internet security risks that were otherwise ignored. I’m not saying Tornado Cash and related devs were doing a purely moral action. But the automatic siding with the heavy hand of govt sanctions on code the govt doesn’t really understand is pretty shameful for a nuanced technical audience.

Bedon292 4y ago
I think its important to make a distinction between GitHub attempting to ensure they are in legal compliance with a sanction and approving of the sanction happening at all. You can disagree with the sanction while still being understanding of GitHub trying to cut ties with the sanctioned entity. Or be critical of them being heavy handed in their compliance but agree with the sanction in general.
- dogman144 4y ago
  You’d be on the “be reasonable” side of this I suppose. Plenty of organizations in the past have chosen what side of this conceptual line to stand on. One can end up looking like the EFF with a long term, very strong reputation of standing up for clear boundaries of what’s right in the legal<>code context and go to court over it, or you can end up looking like GitHub.
  - revscat 4y ago
    Honestly, I don’t care what happens to crypto bros. They put profit before environment. Fuck em.
    - TruthIsHeresy 4y ago
      It’s amazing how well the media is able to reprogram the minds of the masses into mindlessly regurgitating its talking points. “Crypto bad” seems to be a big one for 2022.
      - Taywee 4y ago
        There being next to nothing positive so far from cryptocurrencies for the past decade doesn't make it hard for the media to "reprogram" the minds of the masses. It's easy to convince somebody that something is bad when it's been overwhelmingly useless to negative on every single front except for speculative investment.
      - gaspard234 4y ago
        In what way has 'the media' pushed crypto is bad? Seems like every celebrity and talk show host was pushing NFT's, be it Kardasians, Kimmel, Fallon, even Bill Murray released a collection 1 month ago. Ultra stars like Tom Brady to Mark Cuban were investing and (still) talking about crypto companies they are heavily invested in. Half the superbowl ads this year were advocating for people to waste money on crypto.
    - dogman144 4y ago
      PoW uses less energy than global dishwasher usage. Do you feel similar sentiments against Home Depot and dishwasher users? Facebook data centers aren’t pretty either in this regard. Edit - additionally, tornado runs on eth, which is soon to be env-friendly PoS.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - 4y ago
- sneak 4y ago
  > still being understanding of GitHub trying to cut ties with the sanctioned entity What is the name of this sanctioned entity that GitHub supposedly cut ties with? You'll note that none of the developers who had their accounts suspended were themselves sanctioned.
  - Bedon292 4y ago
    Tornado Cash, which had an organization on GitHub and the developers were members of that organization. I don't know if I agree with the decision but I certainly understand why it would be made by a lawyer trying to ensure they are in compliance with a sanction as soon as possible.
    - sneak 4y ago
      GitHub organizations are not legal entities. As far as I know, Tornado Cash is not a legal entity either.
- ymolodtsov 4y ago
  I think shutting down the repo would be more than enough.
Nursie 4y ago
I don't find "facilitating mass money laundering" to be as compelling as the other cases, frankly. This doesn't mean that any/all measures taken against them are automatically justified, but it's large-scale crime, and it's not in the realm of "information wants to be free", it's actual money laundering, for actual criminal cartels and actual rogue states.
- sneed-oil 4y ago
  It's not comparable to money laundering. When you launder money by registering sales that did not happen you'll get taxed and you can then spend that money wherever you'd like. If you try to use funds coming from Tornado Cash most people won't accept them because they'll assume they were stolen or they come from some type of illicit activity.
moritonal 4y ago
Isn't it hypocritical to celebrate when platforms kick off the people we don't like, then mourn when they kick off the ones we do?
- clucas 4y ago
  No it isn't. Here's an analogy: Is it hypocritical to say "we shouldn't punish people who sell marijuana," but also say "we should punish people who sell heroin?" Maybe you disagree with the person's preference for what should be punished, but saying "we should punish this behavior but not that behavior" doesn't make a person a hypocrite.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - rwiggum 4y ago
    Free speech is free speech though. Either it's free or it's not free. You are arguing for "not free". I am not a fan of that ideology. This isn't shouting "fire" in a crowded theatre. This is restricting access to speech (code) simply because the gov doesn't approve of what the code does.
    - DoctorOW 4y ago
      > when platforms kick off the people we don't like Is not a comment on free speech or not. There are rumors of government sanctions for this specific case, but the typical deplatforming is more like getting kicked out by the bouncer.
    - clucas 4y ago
      Let's say we, as a nation, through our elected representatives, decide to pass a law against trojans. Then let's say there's a site hosting a trojan repo, open to the public, and they refuse law enforcement's demands to remove access to the code. So the FBI goes through the court and gets a warrant to seize the site and prevents access to the code. Would you stop the above chain of events at the very first link? Would you say: "We can't ban trojans because it's code, and code is speech, and speech is either free or its not?"
anonporridge 4y ago
Has it ever been the case that the majority of the developer community stand behind this kind of resistance to government power? It seems like it's always been a tiny minority of idealists who put their own lives on the line to do what they believe is right in the face of the beast bearing down on them. The majority has always been (and probably will always be) weak minded corporate yes men. What is distasteful is the so called "hacker" community being filled with corporate yes men.
- dogman144 4y ago
  Yes this is usually it, and then the whole ecosystem benefits from it down the line. Very distasteful.
- mikhael28 4y ago
  So, money laundering, fraud and enabling cyber criminal activity is 'idealism'? Also: GitHub is a private company. It's their real estate, they can do what they want with it. If they wanted to keep it up, they could have. They didn't want to.
jahewson 4y ago
Counterpoint: The automatic opposing of govt sanctions is pretty shameful for a nuanced technical audience.
- dogman144 4y ago
  Automatic, or nuanced view as a result of on understanding the tech pretty deeply?
roastedpeacock 4y ago
DMCA and similar nonsense got forced to the rest of the world :-(
parasense 4y ago
> - Phil Zimmerman (PGP) was under criminal investigation for arms exports by releasing the code for consumer encryption. The case escalated and was eventually dropped, included POTUS attention. A legitimate example of free speech. Zimmerman published his code in the appendix of scholarly book, in addition to posting online in source & binary form. > - Aaron Swartz passed away via suicide in 2013 under threat of 35 years in prison and a lot else for downloading from JSTOR programmatically A terrible example, and not comparable to your first example. Swartz gained physical access to a network room he was not supposed to be, inside a building he was not supposed to be, connected a laptop to a LAN he was not granted access.... When you say programmatically, you must mean the parts where he proceeded to download JSTOR using his laptop? Has was criminally trespassing, accessing a network he knew he wasn't allowed to access. The tragic outcome was due to... hate to say it, he had well known mental issues that amplified the stress he felt when being indicted for a crime he knew he was guilty. So I get what you're saying, but you might want to limit your examples to abjectly reasonable ones that withstand scrutiny. Otherwise it might look like a bandwagon, generalization, or even false dichotomy.
- akiselev 4y ago
  Actual prison time wasn't on the table until the federal prosecutors took over and tried to make an example of him [1]. Until then, everyone expected a slap on the wrist. I remember those events clearly and even JSTOR, the "victim" in the case, backpedaled on the prosecution before he committed suicide. He was driven to suicide by an overzealous federal prosecutor trying to make a career for themselves. [1] https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/swartz-didnt-face-prison-until-feds-took-over-case-report-says/ https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/swartz-didnt-face-pr...
  - tiahura 4y ago
    He made the choice. No one else. Or, if you blame the prosecutor for driving him, do you also blame his friends and family for not being supportive enough?
    - loktarogar 4y ago
tekknik 4y ago
> on code the govt doesn’t really understand But they do understand it, quite well. It launders money, there is no legal use for a money laundering machine.
- sneed-oil 4y ago
  Its use is offering a level of privacy that is at least as good as the one a credit card offers. On the Ethereum blockchain anybody you transact with can see your transaction history.
  - tekknik 4y ago
    because your average citizen needs anonymity when buying everyday items? So much so that we need to allow money laundering? No, this still isn’t a valid use.
    - sneed-oil 4y ago
      Yes, for example a teenager with religious parents might not want them to know that they're buying contraceptives, or a buyer of illegal drugs might not want the government to know it. As long as there are anonymous payment methods such as cash, money laundering remains a possibility. Besides, getting ETH from Tornado Cash is not comparable to money laundering because whoever will be paid with those funds will have a strong suspicion that they were stolen or came from some other type of illicit activity.
      - tekknik 4y ago
        They can use cash for these cases. So no, still not a valid use case to allow for blatant money laundering.
        sneed-oil 4y ago
        If they don't know a dealer for the drugs they want they might decide to buy them online with cryptocurrency, and that's where a service like Tornado Cash is useful. Cash can be laundered too.

Bedon292 4y ago

I think its important to make a distinction between GitHub attempting to ensure they are in legal compliance with a sanction and approving of the sanction happening at all. You can disagree with the sanction while still being understanding of GitHub trying to cut ties with the sanctioned entity. Or be critical of them being heavy handed in their compliance but agree with the sanction in general.

dogman144 4y ago
You’d be on the “be reasonable” side of this I suppose. Plenty of organizations in the past have chosen what side of this conceptual line to stand on. One can end up looking like the EFF with a long term, very strong reputation of standing up for clear boundaries of what’s right in the legal<>code context and go to court over it, or you can end up looking like GitHub.
- revscat 4y ago
  Honestly, I don’t care what happens to crypto bros. They put profit before environment. Fuck em.
  - TruthIsHeresy 4y ago
    It’s amazing how well the media is able to reprogram the minds of the masses into mindlessly regurgitating its talking points. “Crypto bad” seems to be a big one for 2022.
    - Taywee 4y ago
      There being next to nothing positive so far from cryptocurrencies for the past decade doesn't make it hard for the media to "reprogram" the minds of the masses. It's easy to convince somebody that something is bad when it's been overwhelmingly useless to negative on every single front except for speculative investment.
    - gaspard234 4y ago
      In what way has 'the media' pushed crypto is bad? Seems like every celebrity and talk show host was pushing NFT's, be it Kardasians, Kimmel, Fallon, even Bill Murray released a collection 1 month ago. Ultra stars like Tom Brady to Mark Cuban were investing and (still) talking about crypto companies they are heavily invested in. Half the superbowl ads this year were advocating for people to waste money on crypto.
  - dogman144 4y ago
    PoW uses less energy than global dishwasher usage. Do you feel similar sentiments against Home Depot and dishwasher users? Facebook data centers aren’t pretty either in this regard. Edit - additionally, tornado runs on eth, which is soon to be env-friendly PoS.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - 4y ago
sneak 4y ago
> still being understanding of GitHub trying to cut ties with the sanctioned entity What is the name of this sanctioned entity that GitHub supposedly cut ties with? You'll note that none of the developers who had their accounts suspended were themselves sanctioned.
- Bedon292 4y ago
  Tornado Cash, which had an organization on GitHub and the developers were members of that organization. I don't know if I agree with the decision but I certainly understand why it would be made by a lawyer trying to ensure they are in compliance with a sanction as soon as possible.
  - sneak 4y ago
    GitHub organizations are not legal entities. As far as I know, Tornado Cash is not a legal entity either.
ymolodtsov 4y ago
I think shutting down the repo would be more than enough.

Nursie 4y ago

I don't find "facilitating mass money laundering" to be as compelling as the other cases, frankly. This doesn't mean that any/all measures taken against them are automatically justified, but it's large-scale crime, and it's not in the realm of "information wants to be free", it's actual money laundering, for actual criminal cartels and actual rogue states.

sneed-oil 4y ago
It's not comparable to money laundering. When you launder money by registering sales that did not happen you'll get taxed and you can then spend that money wherever you'd like. If you try to use funds coming from Tornado Cash most people won't accept them because they'll assume they were stolen or they come from some type of illicit activity.

moritonal 4y ago

Isn't it hypocritical to celebrate when platforms kick off the people we don't like, then mourn when they kick off the ones we do?

clucas 4y ago
No it isn't. Here's an analogy: Is it hypocritical to say "we shouldn't punish people who sell marijuana," but also say "we should punish people who sell heroin?" Maybe you disagree with the person's preference for what should be punished, but saying "we should punish this behavior but not that behavior" doesn't make a person a hypocrite.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- rwiggum 4y ago
  Free speech is free speech though. Either it's free or it's not free. You are arguing for "not free". I am not a fan of that ideology. This isn't shouting "fire" in a crowded theatre. This is restricting access to speech (code) simply because the gov doesn't approve of what the code does.
  - DoctorOW 4y ago
    > when platforms kick off the people we don't like Is not a comment on free speech or not. There are rumors of government sanctions for this specific case, but the typical deplatforming is more like getting kicked out by the bouncer.
  - clucas 4y ago
    Let's say we, as a nation, through our elected representatives, decide to pass a law against trojans. Then let's say there's a site hosting a trojan repo, open to the public, and they refuse law enforcement's demands to remove access to the code. So the FBI goes through the court and gets a warrant to seize the site and prevents access to the code. Would you stop the above chain of events at the very first link? Would you say: "We can't ban trojans because it's code, and code is speech, and speech is either free or its not?"

anonporridge 4y ago

Has it ever been the case that the majority of the developer community stand behind this kind of resistance to government power? It seems like it's always been a tiny minority of idealists who put their own lives on the line to do what they believe is right in the face of the beast bearing down on them. The majority has always been (and probably will always be) weak minded corporate yes men. What is distasteful is the so called "hacker" community being filled with corporate yes men.

dogman144 4y ago
Yes this is usually it, and then the whole ecosystem benefits from it down the line. Very distasteful.
mikhael28 4y ago
So, money laundering, fraud and enabling cyber criminal activity is 'idealism'? Also: GitHub is a private company. It's their real estate, they can do what they want with it. If they wanted to keep it up, they could have. They didn't want to.

jahewson 4y ago

Counterpoint: The automatic opposing of govt sanctions is pretty shameful for a nuanced technical audience.

dogman144 4y ago
Automatic, or nuanced view as a result of on understanding the tech pretty deeply?

roastedpeacock 4y ago

DMCA and similar nonsense got forced to the rest of the world :-(

parasense 4y ago

> - Phil Zimmerman (PGP) was under criminal investigation for arms exports by releasing the code for consumer encryption. The case escalated and was eventually dropped, included POTUS attention. A legitimate example of free speech. Zimmerman published his code in the appendix of scholarly book, in addition to posting online in source & binary form. > - Aaron Swartz passed away via suicide in 2013 under threat of 35 years in prison and a lot else for downloading from JSTOR programmatically A terrible example, and not comparable to your first example. Swartz gained physical access to a network room he was not supposed to be, inside a building he was not supposed to be, connected a laptop to a LAN he was not granted access.... When you say programmatically, you must mean the parts where he proceeded to download JSTOR using his laptop? Has was criminally trespassing, accessing a network he knew he wasn't allowed to access. The tragic outcome was due to... hate to say it, he had well known mental issues that amplified the stress he felt when being indicted for a crime he knew he was guilty. So I get what you're saying, but you might want to limit your examples to abjectly reasonable ones that withstand scrutiny. Otherwise it might look like a bandwagon, generalization, or even false dichotomy.

akiselev 4y ago
Actual prison time wasn't on the table until the federal prosecutors took over and tried to make an example of him [1]. Until then, everyone expected a slap on the wrist. I remember those events clearly and even JSTOR, the "victim" in the case, backpedaled on the prosecution before he committed suicide. He was driven to suicide by an overzealous federal prosecutor trying to make a career for themselves. [1] https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/swartz-didnt-face-prison-until-feds-took-over-case-report-says/ https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/swartz-didnt-face-pr...
- tiahura 4y ago
  He made the choice. No one else. Or, if you blame the prosecutor for driving him, do you also blame his friends and family for not being supportive enough?
  - loktarogar 4y ago

tekknik 4y ago

> on code the govt doesn’t really understand But they do understand it, quite well. It launders money, there is no legal use for a money laundering machine.

sneed-oil 4y ago
Its use is offering a level of privacy that is at least as good as the one a credit card offers. On the Ethereum blockchain anybody you transact with can see your transaction history.
- tekknik 4y ago
  because your average citizen needs anonymity when buying everyday items? So much so that we need to allow money laundering? No, this still isn’t a valid use.
  - sneed-oil 4y ago
    Yes, for example a teenager with religious parents might not want them to know that they're buying contraceptives, or a buyer of illegal drugs might not want the government to know it. As long as there are anonymous payment methods such as cash, money laundering remains a possibility. Besides, getting ETH from Tornado Cash is not comparable to money laundering because whoever will be paid with those funds will have a strong suspicion that they were stolen or came from some other type of illicit activity.
    - tekknik 4y ago
      They can use cash for these cases. So no, still not a valid use case to allow for blatant money laundering.
      - sneed-oil 4y ago
        If they don't know a dealer for the drugs they want they might decide to buy them online with cryptocurrency, and that's where a service like Tornado Cash is useful. Cash can be laundered too.