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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.
There's actually quite a history of civil disobedience in the US. Boycotts, sit in's, protests all of which were illegal under the law and involved large numbers of citizens intentionally disobeying the law in order to get a point across and show public support. DDoSing Visa's Web site doesn't do any real damage to anything, with minimal financial damage and no one lynched. It does, however, bring attention to the issue and pressure corporations, lawmakers, and elected executives around the world to make a change.
When blacks were arrested by the hundreds for "hindering a bus" during the Rosa King chapter of the civil rights movement, those people were not using "due process" to change the segregation laws and they could just as easily be described as "mob justice" shutting down the bus system in a major US city. If the civil rights movement were happening now would they be arrested for terrorist acts sabotaging public transit?
While I'm not wholly for nor against the level of disclosure wikileaks seems to be presenting I do recognize this as a free speech/civil rights issue and if people feel strongly enough to risk their freedom via civil disobedience movements like this, I can respect that. To dismiss it as "undemocratic" or "mob justice" is to ignore very important lessons from our not so distant history.