Slashdot Mirror
EasyDNS Falsely Accused of Unplugging WikiLeaks
kdawson writes "EasyDNS, a DNS and hosting provider, was mistakenly identified in press accounts as the entity that knocked wikileaks.org off the Net. It wasn't them, it was EveryDNS, a completely separate outfit. EasyDNS suffered a series of online reprisals as the false attribution spread. When WikiLeaks approached them to add to the robustness of their DNS support, EasyDNS said yes." And just to be fair on the disclosure thing- I've been using EasyDNS for many many many years and have always had great service, so I just thought it was cool that they stand up for the cause.
So many people, especially the slashdot crowd, are cheering on Anonymous and other parties who are DDOSing parties involved in the whole Wikileaks thing as some sort of testament to free speech. But this isn't free speech anymore, it's just mob justice and there's no due process in mob justice.
My postings are informational and does not constitute legal advice. Act on it at your risk.
Taco has never claimed to be a journalist. Slashdot has never claimed to be impartial. It's still basically Taco's blog, if you want journalism, try AP, or Reuters, or something like that.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
"WikiLeaks must be counted among the enemies of open society because it does not respect the rule of law nor does it honor the rights of individuals."
/tea-spit
Wikileaks expose corruption, torture, war crimes etc, but it's *wikileaks* who don't respect the rule of law or honor the rights of individuals?
Consider my gast flabbered.
The only thing worse than mob rule is oppressive tyranny.
Somehow a fear of the former has always been used, by the wealthy and powerful, to have the population embrace the latter...
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
and mob justice
it is why we have courts. it is why we have government
if everyone were their own policeman, judge, jury, and executioner, injustice would increase, not decrease, even with good intent, because of simple miscommunication
which is why increased gun ownership in peacetime civil society is a gateway to more injustice, not a salvation from it, and why libertarianism will never work: individuals are often confused, and some have bad intent. you need society to be regulated and made secure by a government structure that can be held accountable, and you need to pay for it. the alternative is simply worse
we need government to save us from ourselves: take all of the abuses of every government that ever existed, and guess what: the abuses of the individual are far worse. whether simple petty crime, white collar crime, or well intentioned but confused effort, individuals are worse than governments, when given no structure, no security, and no regulation
i fear my fellow man far more than i fear my government
and i will probably be flamed for saying all of this, but i don't care, bring it on. i like being the one who says the ugly truths about the world that no one wants to admit
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
If you're not part of the mob there's very little difference.
It started with the first commenter on the TechDirt article who "corrected" Mike Masnick. It turns out that Mike was correct and the poster inadvertently caused all kinds of problems for EasyDNS.
So, in order to punish those that did not support Wikileaks, the attackers effectively took out a DNS, thus denying access to Wikileaks.
There's something on the end of my foot!!! Shoot it!!!
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
China is not immune, either. The problem is that you're a nationalist, and not a patriot. A patriot would look at these leaks as places to improve America, as information that the voters NEED to know in order to make informed decisions. I sure as shit want to know if they State Department is engaging in political maneuvering at the behest of Visa and Mastercard. That's pretty fucking important in a free, democratic society.
The government does need secrets. But it should not be given ultimate authority of censorship, either. Even if it doesn't like some of the things being leaked. Because the alternative is China, just as you suggest.
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.