Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

US Gov't Orders 73,000 Private Websites Offline

Posted by Soulskill on from the one-fell-swoop dept.

joeszilagyi sends this excerpt from TorrentFreak: "... according to the owner of a free WordPress platform which hosts more than 73,000 blogs, his network of sites has been completely shut down on the orders of the authorities. Blogetery.com has been with host BurstNet for 7 months, but on Friday July 9th the site disappeared. ... Due to the fact that the authorities aren't sharing information and BurstNet are sworn to secrecy, it is proving almost impossible to confirm the exact reason why Blogetery has been completely taken down. The owner does, however, admit to handling many copyright-related cease and desists in the past, albeit in a timely manner as the DMCA requires."

26 of 536 comments (clear)

  1. The fact is, US is just as bad as China by SquarePixel · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Who said US doesn't pull stunts like China? I think I've heard so many times on slashdot.

    US is just as bad. It's just for different interests (protecting the money and cash flow of huge corporations versus ensuring that the people in the country don't start bloody revolts).

    Twist it how you want to, but the fact remains that both countries act like assholes and US is in the same level.

    1. Re:The fact is, US is just as bad as China by linzeal · · Score: 2, Interesting

      No, they get sent to labor camps ( *cough* re-education camps ), which they have been thinking about shutting down. China is rapidly modernizing its justice system, so while they are attempting to practice a bit more parsimony when it comes to crimes the US in all but a few states has seen its prison population double or triple in the past few decades.

      --
      An Education is the Font of All Liberty
    2. Re:The fact is, US is just as bad as China by Burz · · Score: 2, Interesting

      How about the "nuance" of demanding "full-spectrum dominance" (full control) over the planet?

      Maybe some of us are *reacting* to the "over-stark black-and-white" world view espoused by the Pentagon.

    3. Re:The fact is, US is just as bad as China by PaladinAlpha · · Score: 5, Interesting

      We're deep enough into this thread where this may not be read, but allow me to offer my view.

      Marriage has been for years a way to ensure an equal distribution of males to females. Attraction develops from ancient rites of selection which favored those that were stronger, faster, and more likely to survive. However, as a requirement for society to develop, we suddenly need "experts" in various fields not directly connected to survival -- i.e. the person good at farming may not be "attractive", the person who knows how to predict the weather may not be "attractive", and so forth. We'll call these "beta mates", and under a non-rigorous system they would simply never mate, and therefore have much less reason to participate in society -- depriving it of their expertise.

      There is another factor, as well. Historically, it has been shown that in unstructured environments, a greater number of females mated than males. The deduction to be made is that females will flock to a male they consider attractive, accepting the presence of other mates in exchange for the higher attraction and potentially stronger offspring. That we don't see this as often nowadays is precisely because of the point I'm about to make:

      Structured monogamous marriage is a method of distributing males and females equally, and provides all mates ("alpha" and "beta") with a reward for participating in society -- the "alphas" benefit from the additional expertise brought by the "betas", and the "betas" have a very high chance of successful mating. This was for quite some time enforced through arranged marriage, and I would even make the argument that arranged marriage is what made civilization possible.

      Polygamy would lead, ultimately, to alpha flocking again, and greatly reduce the encouragement for beta experts to contribute meaningfully to society. I would further argue that we have begun to see the effects of this in the USA with the considerable reduction in the sanctity of marriage and a (I would postulate) corresponding drop in technological leadership worldwide.

    4. Re:The fact is, US is just as bad as China by MindlessAutomata · · Score: 2, Interesting

      And what justifies the massive land grabs governments make, claiming ownership and domain of large swathes of land unused, uncultivated, lying bare? Because they said so?

      Your paternalistic liberal views can justify anything from genocide to censorship. Your argument could be used to justify Jim Crow laws in the old South. You are living proof of just how thuggish, violent, and controlling democracy can be. Demanding strict obedience and conformity, where the only right is numbers and might. Disgusting.

    5. Re:The fact is, US is just as bad as China by Un+pobre+guey · · Score: 5, Interesting

      No need. It's called commercial pop-culture. The beauty of it is that everyone gets it beforehand, like you, practically from birth.

      You don't see what is right before your eyes. You think that being able to post drivel on blogs is a showcase of freedom. We have among the worst education, medical care, and retirement policies in the industrialized world yet you exclude it from the discussion. We have a deep recession thanks to tyrants and their politician-minions, and you exclude it. We are fighting "The War on Drugs" and "The War on Terror" for the sole purpose of having tyrants loot our society side-by-side with drug traffickers and the financiers of Sunni Islamic terrorism, and you exclude it. We happily allow immigrants to come in and work as slave labor, then do everything to punish them and deny them services they have already paid for via the taxes withheld from their paychecks, and you exclude that as well from the discussion. But Oh My! We can post whatever we want on Slashdot and HuffPost and thousands of other forgettable sites! That proves we are free!

      Wake the fuck up.

    6. Re:The fact is, US is just as bad as China by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Did you even read the links you posted?

      A sampling:

      • Wei Jingsheng - passing military secrets
      • Zeng Jinyan - suspected of harming state security
      • Hu Jia - inciting subversion of state power
      • Gao Zhisheng - disturbing public order
      • Bao Tong - revealing state secrets and counter-revolutionary propagandizing
      • Shi Tao - illegally supplying state secrets to overseas organizations
      • Wang Bingzhang - spying, terrorism

      Get accused of those here in the U.S. and your ass will be in jail without a trial just like it would be in China.

    7. Re:The fact is, US is just as bad as China by AK+Marc · · Score: 2, Interesting

      For one, the definition of marriage in a communal property state includes that everyone in the marriage owns 100% of the property. Yes, that's 200% of property split evenly. So in the case of death of one person, the other is the 100% owner, with no need for a will or probate or such. With three people sharing the same property, there are issues of, say, one person running up a significant debt and the others can be held responsible for it. Or if you can marry more than one person, why can't they marry more than one person? So that your two wives each have two husbands, and thus the husbands of your wives would own 100% of your property, even though they have no association with you directly. Not that there's anything too hard to figure out about it, but there'd need to be some serious cleaning up of the law.

      And the practical nature of it was that rich males would have a harem, and women would never marry more than one man. This ended up causing some cultural issues as the rich men would get the attractive women, and the poor men would be left without options. I've heard it argued that the sexual frustration of such cultures is one of the things that feeds men into suicide bombing. And I think that such a plan would face opposition where people would point out that women could have harems and that groups of gay men could all marry each other and such. Just letting two marry seems like a massive hurdle, but to let an entire gay village get married would probably be an even harder sell.

      --
      Learn to love Alaska
    8. Re:The fact is, US is just as bad as China by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      "Attraction develops from ancient rites of selection which favored..."

      No, no, no, no, no, no. Have I emphasised that enough?

      Our genetic make up dictates what we will find attractive and how much we will value different factors. One such factor is status. The signs of status may be different in different societies and so, as we grow up we will learn to recognise those different signs. But status is still one of the core factors driving many. It's built in.

      Some of the variation in humanity is harmless but does not progress humanity as efficiently as others (homosexual relationships for example. I don't mean to judge them, just to say they don't produce children though individual same sex relationships may provide other advantages). Some relationships will produce lots of offspring with an approach to life which will prove successful in the current environment and those will flourish. Some will be attracted to all kinds of strange and perverse objects, practices, animals... and their genetic line will die out rapidly.

      What you *want*, is as much a result of centuries of natural selection as what you look like. You may think you have made a decision but you have no more made a decision to marry that girl than a bee has made a decision to collect honey, a bear has made a decision to sleep for the winter or most people have *decided* to have relationships with the opposite sex. That's just the way that all those years of natural selection made things turn out.

      Strange isn't it. We are what we are through natural selection, yet we *feel* as though we are free to choose. Spooky.

  2. This is just the beginning. by the+roAm · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Mark my words. This is only the beginning of high-profile shutdowns.
    The nest has been stirred and the wasps are now out in full force.
    There is, however, a light at the end of the tunnel.
    You cannot get by with stuff like this without angering a lot of people.
    Enough angry constituents and things will start to change.

    Lets just hope for the best as that's all we can really do.

    --
    ~The roAm
  3. Re:National Security? by bsDaemon · · Score: 3, Interesting

    They probably seized some equipment as evidence in an investigation and the numbers are just grossly over-inflated for sensationalist reasons. Seizing a couple of servers that have 10,000 customers each isn't the same thing as "ordering the sites off-line" -- it's seizing the hardware in order to protect chain of evidence and integrity of the data seized. It's still kind of a dick move, but I'm not really going to take the bitching of people who seem to be perfectly willing to watch movies but don't want to pay for them.

  4. yeaaah by unity100 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    in china government orders your site down, because they dont like it.

    in usa private people and companies order your site down, because they dont like it. they just need to use an excuse for invoking dmca.

    the only difference is, there is a storefront in usa, and people think they are 'free'.

    --
    Read radical news here
    1. Re:yeaaah by KlomDark · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Tell that to JFK. // Oh wait, you can't

  5. This is just pathetic. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Lets just hope for the best as that's all we can really do.

    That's the American, can-do, revolutionary spirit of our founding fathers! In fact, I think that's written somewhere in the Declaration of Independence. "When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, just hope for the best, as that's all we can really do."

    Have a revolution or don't. Don't pretend there's nothing you can do.

  6. Fascism is coming by AthleteMusicianNerd · · Score: 3, Interesting

    This didn't start with Obama either. This is ingrained in our society, and accepted by many in the name of national security. That's a very grave mistake. Books like "The Federal Mafia" have been banned, and New York Times reporters have been silenced by being thrown in jail. It is very troubling that this trend continues, and everyone should be protesting it.

  7. Re:Too Slow, Slashdot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    "apparently very serious"? come on, we all know how hosting companies piss on their pants the moment the fbi knocks the door. they oftne do WHATEVER they're told to do without a warrant. So it could be practically anything. Regardless, the poor guy isn't going to see his server in years. If he wants to know what's going on he should have said he has backups and is going to put the site back online momentarily, then the authorities would have probably tried to contact him.

  8. Bull... why be anonymous about it? by elucido · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Anytime you hear stories from anonymous government sources and anonymous agents, it's bullshit. Anybody who really works for the government and who really has something to say, will be able to say it on the record or provide authentic documents to back up what they are saying.

    Otherwise it's as simple as someone wearing a suit and tie with a fake badge telling people they work for the government. Anybody can say this, anybody can talk like this, I see it on Alex Jones all the time. Thats when they call it a conspiracy theory, and I'm calling it a conspiracy theory in this instance.

  9. subject line by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Could you at least get the heading correct. Government didnt shut down 73000 web sites but shutdown one with 73000 blogs.

  10. Re:I would like to help, but why kid myself by elrous0 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Rand Paul and the other libertarian Tea Partiers are just being used by the Republican establishment. The second Republicans are back in charge, they'll purge the party of libertarians and anything related to *individual* rights will be quickly shunted aside (only corporations and the wealthy will have the government "off their back"). Paul is just a dupe.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  11. US government forgotten their first amendment? by grahammm · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Are modern day blogs not much closer to the 'press' at the time the US first amendment was passed than are today's corporate media conglomerates? So is taking down a site containing so many blogs not interfering with the freedom of the press - which is something the US constitution prohibits their government from doing?

  12. US govt job? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Hello....we have over 30 million people in this country illegally right now, but the Federal government is busy taking down 73,000 private websites.
    Here are the possibilities
    1. They specifically reviewed the content of over 73,000 private websites and took action.
    1a. The manpower required to do that would be significant and could much better be used to actually secure our nation.

    2. They specifically reviewed the content of a few sites, and arbitrarily and unfairly downed tens of thousands of innocent private sites, cutting off their right to free speech and conduct private business.
    2a. The federal government asserted powers it does not have and unjustly deprived US citizens of their rights under the Constitution.

    3. They reviewed nothing and acted solely on information provided to the UNCONSTITUTIONAL Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator Victoria Espinel by DRM proponents.
    They directed action at sites ALLEGEDLY "offering unauthorized movies and music", last month U.S. authorities targeted several sites they claimed were connected to the streaming of infringing video material.

    Wait a minute. They "claimed" the sites were "connected" to the streaming of "infringing video material". Last time I checked, our judicial system maintained that we are innocent until proven guilty, the federal government was PROHIBITED under the Intelligence Oversight Act from spying on its citizens, and the US Federal government cannot run around shutting down businesses on nothing more than the speculation of competitors. WTF?!

  13. i2p by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Many personal websites are primarily to be viewed by extended groups of friend (meatspace or cyberspace). They could benefit from a bit of anonymity, personal control over their hosting, and freedom from dependance on a third party. I know that the freenet, diaspora, and tonika guys think that. But, this is a really great opportunity to point out the strong progress in speed and usability made by the I2P community over the last year. They offer a simple java program that when installed connects you to an anonymous network overlay in which you can irc, email, and publish websites from your machine. It also supports torrent and mule activity. Check out useable cipherspace that feels like the internet before AOL joined at geti2p dot net !

  14. Re:Too Slow, Slashdot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    If it was child porn, would Burst be facing an obvious gag order from the government?

    I agree, if it was kiddy porn we'd have 8 DAs, 12 prosecutors, 52 cops, and a janitor all parading before the press for having busted a kiddy porn ring please vote for me think of the children.

    National security is just about the only topic that can convince the government to shut the hell up, mostly because they can drive more fear by staying silent than they can by announcing that they busted some sexy russian spy who was undercover sizing up the neighborhood barbecue grills.

  15. Welcome to freenet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Freenet: "free" web hosting that can't be taken down or blocked without permanent removal or disruption of a majority of nodes on the network. Making Freenet itself illegal would be legally very difficult in any society that has "free speech".

    Bonus: Like torrents, the more popular content on Freenet is, the faster it can be fetched. So Freenet pages are immune to the /. effect.

    Drawback: Freenet only stores and retrieves data, so all pages are static [scripting not allowed for security reasons, HTML and CSS are also white-list filtered]. This is fine for a blog, or art gallery site.

    http://www.freenetproject.org/

  16. Re:The Fact Is You're Out of Your Mind by Attila+Dimedici · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I'm guessing users were trading child porn or the owner wasn't handling his taxes correctly.

    I mostly agree with your post. However, there is one thing I want to add. My inclination is that there is a good reason for these websites to be shut down. However, I am not willing to take the government's word that they had a good reason. I want to know the reason. If I agree that it was a good reason, all's well. If not, well then it depends on how many other people also think it wasn't a good reason.
    Basically, my point is that this event is not on its face evidence of the government doing something wrong. It is something to take note of and demand an explanation from the government. They don't need to provide the explanation tomorrow or next week, but by this time next month, we should know what happened and why. Maybe not the details, depending on what the reasons for this were, but at least an explanation of the reason for this action. Under certain circumstances the details and evidence supporting the reasons can remain under wraps pending court cases.

    --
    The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
  17. Don't fall for the "freedom" angle on this one by ne0shell · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This is not the "government oversteps boundaries chasing torrent users" story the site owner is doing his best to promote... The company provided "free" and pay for upgrade blog hosting which attracted numerous DMCA complaints. Unfortunately, the site owner had no content control system in place at all other than waiting for his datacenter to send DCMA notices. Imagine his surprise when after getting quite a few of these that someone decided there was a pattern of willful / negligent violations of copyright and filed a lawsuit. If this is what happened the "victims" all seem to be the last people in the entire World to know you cannot host pirated content on a US located server. If you do, there is a real risk that some agency will come and take your server away to be examined eventually and the owner of said server will face civil as well as criminal actions. In all honesty that's a best case scenario at this point as the other possibilities involve Federal offenses (child / beast / etc porn, tax evasion, hacking / phishing and so on). Now we have individuals who were hosted by blogetry complaining because the un-named agency did not leave the server in place and handle things on a site by site basis. What rock have these people been living under for the past four years or so??? Given the fact this sort of thing happens on other free blog hosting sites (the hosting of pirated material, not the sudden transfer of servers from datacenter to Quantico) it's pretty obvious that there is something more serious involved here or that the site owner was allowing a great deal of pirated material to be posted. Those other providers all have some form of internal content monitoring / abuse department as well as treating their clients seriously with hosting on hardware they own, connections they own and IP space they lease direct. Blogetry was using the least expensive, rent a server plan from a hosting provider datacenter. (At that level you can get maybe 6 DCMA notices before suspension if they're "liberal" about that sort of thing). So far the owner has blamed the datacenter he was leasing servers from (mostly because they refused to disclose information the law enforcement agency told them not to) and now it seems he's blaming the US Government. Why can't he point that finder where it belongs (inwards)? I'd advise the torrent community and e-freedom folks to keep some distance from this one. There's a huge chunk of data still missing here and regardless, this is not the poster boy for torrent user's rights we want or need.