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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.
RELEASE THE HOUNDS!
Accuracy matters not in Security Theatre.
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.
That should solve the mystery of why Wikileaks "went back" to EasyDNS for hosting. Shame that people didn't dig a little deeper when that seemed weird.
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
What is with the kdawson articles being posted by other editors?
Huh. I wonder where this weird idea of "innocent until proven guilty" came from... Hm.
Such pragmatic, sensible thinking is not in fashion at the moment.
I throw wikileaks into the same box as the tea-party movement. The anti-establishment craze will not last forever, though.
"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 press], not the government that works on behalf of the people, are the arbiters of what does and doesn't constitute properly-classified national security information.
They are not the only arbiters, but they do have a say, and they represent the people as much as the government does, if not more so. That the public has a say in what secrets its government keeps is an necessity for any functioning democracy. Wikileaks' actions are borderline anarchic and ill-reasoned, but the hunger with which the information has been reviewed suggests that the people want to know more than they have been allowed to.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
I would do the same. Not because of the great ideals of the latter, but the lack of them in the former.
Sure there are some investigative journalists around, but most are at most editors of news feeds. And by editing I mean changing the order of the words a bit, not even the editing that Wikileaks does.
And I do not care what Assange is. He could be a terrorist child molester for all I care.
It might very well be that the law is not respected, but then you must also look if the law is good. Unfortunately going the legal way to change the law also does not work anymore.
Remember that the USofA was not made because everybody was following the law. (Nor any other country)
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
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
Releasing a stream of illegally-released classified information from a democratic nation?
Your poor wording aside, it is not illegal to publish classified documents as decided by the Supreme Court in New York Times Co v United States. Leaking classified documents is only a crime for government employees.
Too bad people can't see this for what it is: a foreign national releasing illegally-obtained classified information in a coordinated effort to deliberately try to influence public opinion and US policy.
Other than your claim that Assange obtained the documents illegally, which I just showed to be a complete lie, that description applies equally well to Rupert Murdoch, but I don't see you calling for his arrest.
not the government that works on behalf of the people
If you had bothered to read even a fraction of what Wikileaks put out you wouldn't be so ignorant as to make the claim that the US government works "on behalf of the people".
It results in an environment where closed and repressive societies have an advantage in the information realm over open and democratic societies.
Did it even occur to you that you just spent your entire post attacking someone who has done nothing illegal and arguing that the media should shut up and only publish whatever information the government decides they should? Sounds like you would enjoy living in a closed and repressive society to me.
I came here for a good argument
Honestly, what are you trying to accomplish with the insults? Trying to hurt my feelings? Seriously, do you think that works? Your insults are just precious. I mean, calling someone a preschooler and a baby is just adorable and refreshing in these profanity laced modern times.
Trying to look the big man? I don't think anyone cares. Doing a little trolling? You get one response from me, just for fun. I like trolls. Especially adorable profanity avoiding trolls like you seem to be.
Carrying around that much anger can be really bad for your health. Anger management classes, meditation, or just some good old fashioned sex might help bring your blood pressure down before something important goes pop.
I do hope you enjoy the attention. Interacting with other human beings feels good, doesn't it? I know the type of interaction seems irrelevant, but you should try "friendly" interactions, they feel even better!
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
The name of the company is DynDNS.com. You know, the company that bought EveryDNS; disabled the ability to sign up for new EveryDNS accounts?
And has been in the process of transitioning accounts from EveryDNS to "DynDNS.com" custom services over 2010, probably so they can eventually discontinue the free services and force everyone to pay?
If they made the decision to kill Wikileaks' services, they should take responsibility for the shutdown, and not hide behind the legacy EveryDNS name which will be a distant memory in some time.
It's kind of funny... Wikileaks is guilty of the same thing they are pointing a finger at the US for. That, as you stated above, they have jailed one innocent man in pursuit of freedom. By that I mean... through Wikileaks actions, they have caused damage to quite a few different groups. Some of which did not deserve it... and were merely a victim to tjhe Wikileaks cause. Similar as you know, to the US accidentally damaging innocent groups on their push to provide freedom and democracy to the world (which really isn't their place... they need to play a more defensive role and pull back a bit). It makes me laugh a little at the similarity of the two. Both fighting for their cause... both a bit misguided. I have to admit, I'm not a huge fan of Wikileaks, but that is primarily because I'm quite sure they are ebing funded by specific groups that are specifically trying to damage the US. Cryptome had an interesting note on the irregularity of their financing.
Here is a letter EasyDNS sent out to all customers last night about this issue. I removed Mark Jeftovic's email and phone number for obvious reasons:
This notice is being sent to all active domain holders on the system.
Your easyDNS username is:
Email address on file for account:
Date username was created:
Username was created from:
In this email:
1. The WikiLeaks Situation
-----------
1. The WikiLeaks Situation
-----------
It is not very often we send out an all-member email blast, so when we do, it's usually pretty important.
First and foremost, everything is ok. Please read the information that follows carefully but understand that we would never do anything that we thought put our members at risk.
The Basic Background:
=====
On Friday, Dec 6th, easyDNS was mistakenly identified in various online channels as the DNS provider who revoked DNS Services for the controversial website Wikileaks, and a large internet backlash ensued against us. In fact, the Wikileaks DNS provider was a free DNS provider in New Hampshire called "EveryDNS.net". At some point this was mistakenly reported as "easyDNS", and it gathered momentum from there. The problem was compounded on Saturday, Dec 7th when the New York Times picked up the story, also incorrectly identifying us as the party who "unplugged" Wikileaks. The U.K based Guardian did the same thing again on Tuesday, December 7th.
A timeline of events has been posted here:
http://easyurl.net/5119e
And our original rebuttal to the misinformation was posted here:
http://easyurl.net/a3191
easyDNS Added To WikiLeaks.ch DNS
======
On Sunday, Dec 5th, we were approached by a group acting on behalf of Wikileaks and asked to provide DNS for their fallback domain WikiLeaks.ch. We agreed to this on several conditions.
http://easyurl.net/fbbff
We did not take this decision lightly, and whichever side of the fence you fall regarding what Wikileaks is doing, after being falsley accused of unplugging Wikileaks and taking an enormous amount of backlash for doing so, we felt we did not have much choice in the matter but to forge ahead and take on this challenge.
http://easyurl.net/507d8
We actually consider this part of the situation to be well in hand. Tonight the Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail ran a story about this bizarre sequence of events and we expect it to run in the print edition (possibly as the cover story) on Thursday, Dec 10.
That story is here: http://easyurl.net/gandm
However, and this is large part of the motivation for this email, the Globe story concluded with the following quotation, which we feel sends the wrong message, as I mispoke when I said the following: "Our lawyers have basically told us that if they want to shut us down they'll show up with an injunction and we'll have to follow it and then try and have it overturned later," This may connote that we think we, as a company, may be shut down. We do NOT think this is going to happen at all. What I meant to convey in the quote is: "If they want US (easyDNS) to shut THEM (WikiLeaks) down, they'll show up with an injunction, and we'll have to follow it, etc etc". And if that happened, we would be terminating service to wikileaks alone. Further information about this clarification is here:
http://easyurl.net/gm2
We wanted to let you know as an easyDNS member, that we are taking every measure to ensure that this situation does not disrupt the continuity of your domain services at all. In conclusion, we believe we have taken the course of action that fits who we are as a company. If you've been dealing with us for any amount of time then hopefully you know w
Nowhere did I say that Assange obtained the documents illegally. They were illegally obtained and released by the leaker (presumed to be PFC Manning).
Should open, democratic societies not be able to maintain information that is secret for purposes of conducting diplomacy and providing for a national defense?
If any secrets are acceptable, then who gets to decide what is secret? The press? A troubled young soldier who believes he can leak without getting caught (and only did because he bragged)? A foreign national who openly admits he is trying to impact US policy? I mean, do you really think that's okay: the subversion of lawful processes in a democratic nation?
Or should that perhaps only be reserved for nations like China, who today are busy censoring any media outlet that is referring to one of their citizens having won a Nobel prize?
Is China going to be a better global steward than the United States, given that nations like Ecuador in one breath offer Julian Assange safe harbor (nothing more than a shrewd political move, no doubt, but still), while simultaneously not renewing the US lease on its Manta air base and instead giving it to China?
I mean, do you really not see a problem with this?
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.
...the subversion of lawful processes in a democratic nation?
The law is no different from a fellow man standing right beside you: It only deserves respect if it earns respect. The law, as it stands in many societies today, sucks. It's that simple. Following a sucky law, even in an attempt to change it, is futile and silly. If the lawful processes of a democratic nation are put together in such a manner as to stifle the reworking of the law through any meaningful practice, be it by imposing ignorance, or some heavy hand of force, then it is flawed. In that case, it is not only okay to subvert it, it is absolutely your duty as a citizen of that society to subvert it.
Do I consider Assange to be some sort of plucky hero of patriotism running about freeing oppressed men from evil societies? Nah. My views on Assange aren't even really that relevant. I do, however, consider it necessary to address the portion of your post that I quoted, because demanding strict adherence to the law without an examination of the justness or utility of the law is just daft and stupid. Besides 90% of us break the law in this country every day when we drive to work in the morning and speed a little bit. What a useless institution the law has become in the States. It's sad really...
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