4 ms·

EU Adopts Resolution Against US Domain Seizures

175 points by Tsiolkovsky 15y ago

darklajid 15y ago
Finally, some sense. The internet is no place that any single country should have control over, whatever the reasons might be.
WiseWeasel 15y ago
For some reason, my browser didn't trust the https certificate for this site. Rather than continuing anyway, I simply removed the 's' in the 'https' portion of the url, and it resolved. Not sure why the https version was linked in any case.
- fl3tch 15y ago
  I use HTTPS Everywhere and it converts a lot of domains to the HTTPS version, including TorrentFreak. Maybe the OP uses this extension, too. I didn't get a certificate error, though.
- blackRust 15y ago
  Are you using Google Chrome? See this: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2662694 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2662694
  - WiseWeasel 15y ago
    I was using Safari on OS X when I got the error. Sorry for being dense, but could you elaborate on what I should learn from that thread you linked? Is there some kind of solution there, maybe if I was using Chrome, that I might have missed?
    - 286c8cb04bda 15y ago
      To summarize the linked thread: Some browsers, when you load an "https" page will complain if any of the elements on that page load over "http". For example, the story above loads some Twitter-y stuff from http://platform.twitter.com http://platform.twitter.com. The technically correct fix is for the site owner to modify the page to load all these resources over https when the page is accessed over https. Until they do that, as a workaround, you could install an extension like the one mentioned by fl3tch[1] to do it in your browser. N.B. That only works if the resource is available over https, many are not. In that case there is no fix. [1] https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
      - sp332 15y ago
        The technically correct fix is for the site owner to modify the page to load all these resources over https when the page is accessed over https. The easiest way to do that is with protocol-relative URLs. You're probably familiar with relative paths in URLs, e.g. if example.com/test/test.html loads an image at pics/pic1.png, it will really look in https://example.com/test/pics/pic1.png https://example.com/test/pics/pic1.png if you loaded it over https, or http: if you loaded over http. Simple, right? Well, you can use the same idea for absolute paths and even resources from other sites! So if a different site links to the URL //example.com/test/pics/pic1.png (note the lack of protocol before the double-slash), then it will use https: if you loaded the page over https and http: if you loaded it using http.
        JoshTriplett 15y ago
        Better yet, redirect all http URIs to the corresponding https URIs, and serve everything over https.
        WickyNilliams 15y ago
        That is not a better approach, there are issues with client-side caching if all resources are served over HTTPS. See http://encosia.com/cripple-the-google-cdns-caching-with-a-single-character/ http://encosia.com/cripple-the-google-cdns-caching-with-a-si...
        JoshTriplett 15y ago
        Easily fixed by serving up a Cache-Control header, as documented in the page you linked to.
  - blahedo 15y ago
    I'm using Firefox and got the same problem. (And the same fix: http works just fine.)
felipemnoa 15y ago
A very interesting comment on the page: >>Counter measures please, just like we neutered the Helms Burton act at the time. It's simple: Any person/company in Europe that suffers losses due to a unilateral domain seizure in the US, can sue for damage any US company (and all their holdings in Europe) for damages + costs, and maybe even plus punitive damages. Board members of such companies would be denied entry in the EU/EEA. It worked for Helms Burton it will work for SOPA / PROTECT-IP / E-PARASITES or whatever bullshit name they give that act. << Link to Helms-Burton: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helms–Burton_Act#Reactions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helms–Burton_Act#Reactions
- tedunangst 15y ago
  I realize that's not your comment, but the listed reactions to Helms-Burton do not appear to be anything like the proposed counter measures.
  - felipemnoa 15y ago
    From the provided link: >EU law also applied sanctions against US companies and their executives for making Title III complaints. >The United Kingdom had previously introduced provisions by statutory instrument[8] extending its Protection of Trading Interests Act 1980 (originally passed in the wake of extraterritorial claims by the U.S. in the 1970s) to United States rules on trade with Cuba. United Kingdom law was later extended to counter-act the Helms–Burton Act as well. >Mexico passed a law in October 1996 aimed at neutralizing the Helms–Burton Act. The law provides for a fine of 2.2 million pesos, or $280,254, against anyone who while in Mexican territory obeys another country's laws aimed at reducing Mexican trade or foreign investment in a third country. >Similarly, Canada passed a law to counteract the effect of Helms-Burton Not the same counter measures as the ones proposed by the original user but it seems to have the same effect of "neutering" a foreign law.
    - tedunangst 15y ago
      I think there's a pretty big difference between "US companies that make Title III complaints" and "any US company".
rickmb 15y ago
This is an EU parliament resolution, and the EU parliament has very little real power. That doesn't make it politically meaningless, but it in no way compels the European Commission or the joint EU governments to actually do anything about it.
- tarkin2 15y ago
  That's not been true since the 1970/80s really. The Parliament must approve the EU's budget (and has rejected it for political reasons before), approve the Commission's staff, the Parliament has even taken the Council to court about its failure to propose a budget on-time, 80% of all laws must be passed by the Parliament to come into force, has made plenty of amendments to directives, and it most famously had its forthcoming vote of no confidence force the Commission to quit in the 1980s. [1] In this case, it can use its influence over the Commission to get it to propose legislature. Has done very similar things in the past. And don't forget, these MEPs can influence the direction of Council, especially via countries like Italy who are really keen for the European Parliament to have more power and influence. This obviously doesn't mean a directive will appear tomorrow, but such resolutions are an essential and powerful step towards change in European Politics. [1] http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=EOSDFfmFJZYC&pg=PA68&lpg=PA68&dq=european+parliament+rejected+budget+reason&source=bl&ots=VKjcAQ5VmQ&sig=8tMBFrIg5xoRAH1u4tglv6zYz74&hl=en&ei=fJXFTrvVNYjRhAfvvODbDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8&ved=0CEcQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q&f=false http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=EOSDFfmFJZYC&pg=PA68&...
  - rmc 15y ago
    The Parliament must approve the EU's budget The EU doesn't really have a budget in the same way the US federal government has a budget (right?), so it's not really a big power.
    - tarkin2 15y ago
      €120.7 billion for the year 2007. From wiki. It's not so much it just has budgetary powers, but it must also approve most of the EU directives: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament#Legislative_procedure http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament#Legislative...
rmc 15y ago
This is really just a vague complaint more than anything. It would be interesting if this resulted in .com/.org/.net becoming de jure international (they are de facto international domain names now), and removing them from US control.

175 points by Tsiolkovsky 15y ago

Finally, some sense. The internet is no place that any single country should have control over, whatever the reasons might be.

WiseWeasel 15y ago

For some reason, my browser didn't trust the https certificate for this site. Rather than continuing anyway, I simply removed the 's' in the 'https' portion of the url, and it resolved. Not sure why the https version was linked in any case.

fl3tch 15y ago
I use HTTPS Everywhere and it converts a lot of domains to the HTTPS version, including TorrentFreak. Maybe the OP uses this extension, too. I didn't get a certificate error, though.
blackRust 15y ago
Are you using Google Chrome? See this: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2662694 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2662694
- WiseWeasel 15y ago
  I was using Safari on OS X when I got the error. Sorry for being dense, but could you elaborate on what I should learn from that thread you linked? Is there some kind of solution there, maybe if I was using Chrome, that I might have missed?
  - 286c8cb04bda 15y ago
    To summarize the linked thread: Some browsers, when you load an "https" page will complain if any of the elements on that page load over "http". For example, the story above loads some Twitter-y stuff from http://platform.twitter.com http://platform.twitter.com. The technically correct fix is for the site owner to modify the page to load all these resources over https when the page is accessed over https. Until they do that, as a workaround, you could install an extension like the one mentioned by fl3tch[1] to do it in your browser. N.B. That only works if the resource is available over https, many are not. In that case there is no fix. [1] https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
    - sp332 15y ago
      The technically correct fix is for the site owner to modify the page to load all these resources over https when the page is accessed over https. The easiest way to do that is with protocol-relative URLs. You're probably familiar with relative paths in URLs, e.g. if example.com/test/test.html loads an image at pics/pic1.png, it will really look in https://example.com/test/pics/pic1.png https://example.com/test/pics/pic1.png if you loaded it over https, or http: if you loaded over http. Simple, right? Well, you can use the same idea for absolute paths and even resources from other sites! So if a different site links to the URL //example.com/test/pics/pic1.png (note the lack of protocol before the double-slash), then it will use https: if you loaded the page over https and http: if you loaded it using http.
      - JoshTriplett 15y ago
        Better yet, redirect all http URIs to the corresponding https URIs, and serve everything over https.
        WickyNilliams 15y ago
        That is not a better approach, there are issues with client-side caching if all resources are served over HTTPS. See http://encosia.com/cripple-the-google-cdns-caching-with-a-single-character/ http://encosia.com/cripple-the-google-cdns-caching-with-a-si...
        JoshTriplett 15y ago
        Easily fixed by serving up a Cache-Control header, as documented in the page you linked to.
- blahedo 15y ago
  I'm using Firefox and got the same problem. (And the same fix: http works just fine.)

felipemnoa 15y ago

A very interesting comment on the page: >>Counter measures please, just like we neutered the Helms Burton act at the time. It's simple: Any person/company in Europe that suffers losses due to a unilateral domain seizure in the US, can sue for damage any US company (and all their holdings in Europe) for damages + costs, and maybe even plus punitive damages. Board members of such companies would be denied entry in the EU/EEA. It worked for Helms Burton it will work for SOPA / PROTECT-IP / E-PARASITES or whatever bullshit name they give that act. << Link to Helms-Burton: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helms–Burton_Act#Reactions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helms–Burton_Act#Reactions

tedunangst 15y ago
I realize that's not your comment, but the listed reactions to Helms-Burton do not appear to be anything like the proposed counter measures.
- felipemnoa 15y ago
  From the provided link: >EU law also applied sanctions against US companies and their executives for making Title III complaints. >The United Kingdom had previously introduced provisions by statutory instrument[8] extending its Protection of Trading Interests Act 1980 (originally passed in the wake of extraterritorial claims by the U.S. in the 1970s) to United States rules on trade with Cuba. United Kingdom law was later extended to counter-act the Helms–Burton Act as well. >Mexico passed a law in October 1996 aimed at neutralizing the Helms–Burton Act. The law provides for a fine of 2.2 million pesos, or $280,254, against anyone who while in Mexican territory obeys another country's laws aimed at reducing Mexican trade or foreign investment in a third country. >Similarly, Canada passed a law to counteract the effect of Helms-Burton Not the same counter measures as the ones proposed by the original user but it seems to have the same effect of "neutering" a foreign law.
  - tedunangst 15y ago
    I think there's a pretty big difference between "US companies that make Title III complaints" and "any US company".

rickmb 15y ago

This is an EU parliament resolution, and the EU parliament has very little real power. That doesn't make it politically meaningless, but it in no way compels the European Commission or the joint EU governments to actually do anything about it.

tarkin2 15y ago
That's not been true since the 1970/80s really. The Parliament must approve the EU's budget (and has rejected it for political reasons before), approve the Commission's staff, the Parliament has even taken the Council to court about its failure to propose a budget on-time, 80% of all laws must be passed by the Parliament to come into force, has made plenty of amendments to directives, and it most famously had its forthcoming vote of no confidence force the Commission to quit in the 1980s. [1] In this case, it can use its influence over the Commission to get it to propose legislature. Has done very similar things in the past. And don't forget, these MEPs can influence the direction of Council, especially via countries like Italy who are really keen for the European Parliament to have more power and influence. This obviously doesn't mean a directive will appear tomorrow, but such resolutions are an essential and powerful step towards change in European Politics. [1] http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=EOSDFfmFJZYC&pg=PA68&lpg=PA68&dq=european+parliament+rejected+budget+reason&source=bl&ots=VKjcAQ5VmQ&sig=8tMBFrIg5xoRAH1u4tglv6zYz74&hl=en&ei=fJXFTrvVNYjRhAfvvODbDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8&ved=0CEcQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q&f=false http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=EOSDFfmFJZYC&pg=PA68&...
- rmc 15y ago
  The Parliament must approve the EU's budget The EU doesn't really have a budget in the same way the US federal government has a budget (right?), so it's not really a big power.
  - tarkin2 15y ago
    €120.7 billion for the year 2007. From wiki. It's not so much it just has budgetary powers, but it must also approve most of the EU directives: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament#Legislative_procedure http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament#Legislative...

rmc 15y ago

This is really just a vague complaint more than anything. It would be interesting if this resulted in .com/.org/.net becoming de jure international (they are de facto international domain names now), and removing them from US control.