Wikileaks Calls For Global Boycott Against eNom

souls writes "The folks at Wikileaks are calling for a boycott against eNom, Inc., one of the top internet domain registrars, which WikiLeaks claims is involved in systematic domain censoring. On Feb 28th eNom shut down wikileaks.info, one of the many Wikileaks mirrors held by a volunteer as a side-effect of the court proceedings around wikileaks.org. In addition, eNom was the registrar that shut off access to a Spanish travel agent who showed up on a US Treasury watch list. Wikileaks calls for a 'global boycott of eNom and its parent Demand Media, its owners, executives and their affiliated companies, interests and holdings, to make clear such behavior can and will not be tolerated within the boundaries of the Internet and its global community.'"

Comments

How About GoDaddy?

[jellie]

GoDaddy is another bad registrar, and has been mentioned on Slashdot many times, including here and here. I'm assuming Dynadot should also be boycotted.

Re:How About GoDaddy?

[cp.tar]

What we need is a list of known good registrars and a set of instructions how to escape bad ones.

information versus action

[yakiimo]

Perhaps it doesn't fit with what the wikileaks people intended when they started it, but I wish that wikileaks would let/encourage others to fight using their facts (however much is fact) rather than wikileaks themselves doing it. Somehow their active stance makes me more wary of the information on the site.

Re:information versus action

[rucs_hack]

This kind of posturing is more likely to rebound badly on WiKileaks than anything else.

So long as they are simply providing access to the kinds of information they normally host, they're being just what they said they were, and remain a powerful influence. If they try to stir up a boycot, and it fails (which it almot certainly will), then they will only have succeeded in demonstrating that they don't have much in the way of ability to influence others.

Its a mistake to even go down this road. A simple document on a web page can be more powerful then any number of boycots and angry marches.

Re:information versus action

[zhrike]

I strongly disagree. Wikileaks is not attempting to act on information someone posted on their site; they are acting in response to something that was done to them directly.
This has absolutely nothing to do with the information they host, aside from the fact that the information that they host was a reason for the acts by eNom et al. It also does
not reflect on the veracity of their information, and interpreting it that way seems odd to me.

Re:information versus action

[siddesu]

Well, they were a victim of an unjustified shutdown, and it seems eNom was a part of this shutdown, so I suppose one could cut them some slack on that account only.

Given the recent systematic drive to regulate the internets that's coming from virtually all quarters, it is hard to call their initiative for exposing irregular censorship entirely out of place. On the contrary, I think it is timely, and seems to me quite limited in scope, being concerned mainly with domain registrars.

Besides, Wikileaks is an activist site by definition -- publishing as they are scandalous materials from anonymous sources. I don't quite understand why would you feel more or less uncomfortable just because they publish some more of the same.

other registrars?

[ionix5891]

i have dozens of websites registered thru enom

are there any other registrars that are not "evil"?

Any other course of action?

[Cryophallion]

I know the concept of the internet being non-centralized, and with no real authority to oversee it, which is one of its strengths.

However, it stinks at times like these, when you want an authority to go to to punish actions for a registrar (an d I know some registrars have been shut down, but for more egregious actions).

However, in a case like this, where the "people" of the internet have felt wronged because a company went against the philosophies of the internet, Is there any other course of action besides a boycott (which may or may not be effective due to the terms of registrations, and companies going with what they think is the best price, not necessarily the best price and the right philosophy).

If there is no other course of action, what is the best way to get this out there (besides Slashdot, etc)?

Howto change a registrar

[dattaway]

Anyone want to create a step by step guide, howto, or link how to "escape" from a registrar? Is it possible?

Re:Howto change a registrar

[JavaRob]

It's not all that complicated. The horror stories you see here and there are the exception, not the rule.

I don't have any domains registered with eNom, so I'm not sure of the specific procedures for them, but the gist of it is:
* Sign in to your current registrar
* Make sure your email address with them is valid (there will be confirmation steps using it!)
* Unlock your domains (many registrars have "locking" features to prevent others from stealing your domains, plus to make it a little trickier for you to leave
* You might as well disable automatic renewals as well (if they have them), just in case
* Go to your new registrar and click through to "transfer" your domain, and pay for it. Normally they'll honor your existing expiration date (even if it's a couple of years away) and add your new years to the end of that.
* Make sure you set up the domain at the new registrar with the correct nameservers for your host, and you won't have any downtime because of the switch.
* The next steps will often take a few days -- new registrar will submit request to old registrar, who will email you for confirmation (and you'll have to click through to provide that)... possibly multiple confirmations... and then the domain will be transferred, and you're done.

Anyone want to provide details for eNom, or add anything I forgot?

I can also mention that most of my domains are currently hosted with GoDaddy -- who I'm not particularly fond of, but they're cheap and haven't screwed me over personally. Suggestions for alternatives are welcome... it's something I haven't researched in a while.

Re:Howto change a registrar

[The_DoubleU]

Try https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net/

I don't get it

[softwaredoug]

They complied with a lawful court order issued as a result of due process. You don't have to agree with it, but its legal. The US is a nation of laws, not a nation driven by the whims of precocious fan-boys. What would you have them do? Throw abandon to the wind and defy it? The company might get shut down which would threaten their employees and customers. I don't see any other plausible action here. I would only hope my employer would have as much sense in such a case.

Re:I don't get it

[Aluvus]

The court ordered that wikileaks.ORG be shut off. The Wikileaks people argue that eNom incorrectly interpreted the temporary restraining order to also apply to wikileaks.INFO. Additionally, eNom kept the domain out of commission even after the original temporary restraining order had been dissolved and the wikileaks.org domain had been restored.

Seems to me its a matter of establishing a .....

[3seas]

standard procedure for which to handle domain shut down requests.

a take down request should be specific and start with a request to remove the offending material, not the whole site.

It could be done with laws but would need to be done in any country hosting.

Perhaps I'm wrong, but this is a hosting site issue, not a domain registry issue (or it shouldn't be a domain registry issue).
Registry is like an ID, messing with an ID is like identity theft or other wrongful manipulation of a persons ID. There should already be laws for this.

Anyways, there is the possibility to organize a standards group on the issue just as there is the OSI, linuxs standard base ,
etc.. and openly rate and publish hosting policies compliance level and even registry policies if that is indeed an issue.

There should also be recourse against those who violate. Or at least a bad mark on the open rating report.

Use Registrars in a Neutral Country?

[Aero77]

Rather than cry about eNOM's vulnerability to the US Justice system, Wikileaks should be protecting their domain name with the same care as they do their content.

I ask this purely out of curiosity, of course...

[westlake]

But what is the difference between Geek-led boycott and a dead-end road?

The successful Geek boycott seems to belong in the same Fantasyland where "Microsoft is dying" and "This is the Year of Linux on the desktop."

Re:WikiLeaks, you are idiots

[Sique]

So ... you're boycotting a company which is following the laws of the country it is based in rather than registering your name with a registrar in a country that doesn't have these laws.

Are they really that stupid? No, Wikileaks is asking to boycott a registrar that overzealously interprets a court order, which orders the shutdown of one domain. Said domain wasn't even registered with the registrar, so the court order wasn't even affecting the registrar.

But instead of just ignoring a paper that didn't matter to them, they shut down a different domain, which wasn't mentioned in the court order at all.

How about working within the system?

[cellocgw]

Maybe it's easy to move your domains, maybe it isn't. But why not just work, politely (so to speak), with your domain manager to convince them to drop eNom as their source? For example, I'm quite happy with the service I get from domaindirect. They answer their phones, they have a "network status" page that's pretty accurate and up to date when something happens, and all the intarwebby things JustWork.
I'd rather join a mailing list to urge DomainDirect to switch than just apply a blanket boycott.

www.gandi.net

[kandresen]

I would clearly recommend www.gandi.net as well. I have been using them for years exactly due to them declaring I am the owner of my domain and in charge of my domain, not them unlike most other registrars. The prices have increased over the last couple of years - they have been charging 12 Euro, which when I started clearly was among the best prices in the marked, but with the current strong Euro, you will be aware of the difference. The are now allowing payment in USD which is only $15/year now (thought the strong Euro would have cased higher dollar price). That said - I have used many registrars and I for one will select Gandi over the rest also for other reasons: I feel they are providing a much better overall experience than the rest. I once tried Godaddy as it was a bit cheaper than Gandi, and it seemed like a good provider... Not that I have ever had a problem such as this with them, but the services of Gandi are worth the difference for me, and Gandi do not spam me, or keep sending as much "renew your information" type messages and so on.

Some of the benefits I am using:

You are the owner of the domain name! : See https://www.gandi.net/contracts Section 1
Gandi includes DNS in its default service so you can edit directions of domains and sub domains without also paying for hosting!
Gandi allows you without hosting to have 5 mail boxes with 1GB mailbox space - again without paying additional for hosting!
Gandi also allow you to add wildcard mailbox aliasing og 1000 e-mail addresses, and may relay the mail to external mailboxes.

You forgot one (maybe two) parts

[Tolvor]

1 - Get the transfer authorization code (EPP code). At most registrars it is available at the same place you unlock the domain, but it is critical to the transfer.

2 - Some registrars don't let you transfer for 60 days if you update your ownership info on that domain (account holder, email address, whois admin details, legal name change). This is SOP for Godaddy (and probably most others), and to be fair I do see how this can prevent serious abuse. Check before you update, and if you must, call the registrar.

Re:It's not mis-information.

[Kalriath]

I'll give you a more conclusive answer:

http://www.verisign.com/information-services/naming-services/com-net-registry/page_002166.html

This is the list of all companies which Verisign has on record as being allowed to add directly to the .com and .net registries. Gandi is listed (under the name Gandi SARL) as an accredited registrar.