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Two times in the past we decided to terminate content from our security services because we found it reprehensible. In 2017, we terminated the neo-Nazi troll si
by jefftk 4y ago
Two times in the past we decided to terminate content from our security services because we found it reprehensible. In 2017, we terminated the neo-Nazi troll site The Daily Stormer. And in 2019, we terminated the conspiracy theory forum 8chan.
In a deeply troubling response, after both terminations we saw a dramatic increase in authoritarian regimes attempting to have us terminate security services for human rights organizations — often citing the language from our own justification back to us.
Since those decisions, we have had significant discussions with policy makers worldwide. From those discussions we concluded that the power to terminate security services for the sites was not a power Cloudflare should hold. Not because the content of those sites wasn't abhorrent — it was — but because security services most closely resemble Internet utilities.
Just as the telephone company doesn't terminate your line if you say awful, racist, bigoted things, we have concluded in consultation with politicians, policy makers, and experts that turning off security services because we think what you publish is despicable is the wrong policy. To be clear, just because we did it in a limited set of cases before doesn’t mean we were right when we did. Or that we will ever do it again.
I take this to mean they now think they shouldn't have terminated the Daily Stormer or 8chan, and won't be terminating Kiwi Farms.
- hammyhavoc 4y agoUpon a third reading, I'm not interpreting it to be that too. What the fuck?
- hammyhavoc 4y agonow*
- freedomben 4y ago> I take this to mean they now think they shouldn't have terminated the Daily Stormer or 8chan, and won't be terminating Kiwi Farms. That's certainly a possible interpretation, but I think it's more a call out of a fallacy, stating explicitly that "precedent doesn't make right." i.e. just because something was done before, doesn't mean it was correct. In other words, people will argue "you should take down KF because you took down <x> and KF is worse" and they are saying, "yes we did take down <x>, but just because we did doesn't mean it was the right decision. It might have been right, it might not. We just don't want to make a decision now regarding KF simply because we did something in the past." An extreme response to help illustrate the fallacy might be, "just because <x> committed genocide against <y> doesn't mean genocide against <y> was correct and should be used in support of genocide against <z>"
- empathy_m 4y agoYes that's how I read it, too - they regret having taken those sites down and wouldn't do it again. This feels like it's going in the opposite direction of Yishan's "Every Man Is Responsible For His Own Soul" ( https://web.archive.org/web/20140913105157/http://www.redditblog.com/2014/09/every-man-is-responsible-for-his-own.html https://web.archive.org/web/20140913105157/http://www.reddit... ) and reddit's subsequent evolution. In retrospect I was a little naive in the 90s. I read The Hacker Manifesto, I read "The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it", I didn't stop to think what would happen when weev was in charge.
- thegeekbin 4y agoWhat this really says that they opened a hole which got them into a questionable legal area by removing them, and they regret not just remaining neutral.
- colechristensen 4y agoExactly their position and they are right. Cloudflare also protects good things which are illegal in less good places. Every action they take to take content down weakens their position that they are neutral which allows them to keep up the argument that they aren’t there to enforce laws in places where the laws are quite a bit more disagreeable. Do you want them to be forced to deplatform planned parenthood in states where abortion is now illegal? There are certainly a lot of people in this country who think PP is far worse than 8chan. When you involve yourself in the politics of censorship you can’t claw yourself out.