US Gov't Mistakenly Shuts Down 84,000 Sites

Chaonici writes "Last Friday, the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) seized ten websites accused of selling counterfeit goods or trafficking in child pornography. However, in the process, about 84,000 unrelated websites were taken offline when the government mistakenly seized the domain of a large DNS provider, FreeDNS. By now, the mistake has been corrected and most of the websites' domains again point to the sites themselves, rather than an intimidating domain seizure image. In a press release, the DHS praised themselves for taking down those ten websites, but completely failed to acknowledge their massive blunder."

Comments

Welcome to the USA

[bky1701]

Where due process only exists for the highest bidder.

Re:Welcome to the USA

[Anonymous Coward]

My favourite oxymoron is "American freedom".

Re:Welcome to the USA

[Garridan]

Indeed. If I were among these 84,000 site owners, I would be talking to a lawyer about a very large libel suit.

Re:Welcome to the USA

[sjames]

Only if they actually read and understand it, then weigh the competing interests carefully. Rubber stamping any old thing shoved under their nose doesn't cut it.

If a judge actually signed off on the 84,000 sites being grabbed, then he failed due process. If that's NOT what the warrent said then it's the FBI's failure. Either way, the domain holders WERE denied due process.

Naturally, whoever it is, I'll bet we can expect that sincere public apology to each and every individual domain holder and any of their visitors who were caused undue concern as well as a hefty settlement for the really serious libel any day now :-)

Re:Welcome to the USA

[OneThousandOneWebs]

Indeed. If I were among these 84,000 site owners, I would be talking to a lawyer about a very large libel suit.

The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) should at least now make clear that all those sites were unrelated to that kind of activity. A very simple way of doing this that costs next to nothing is by publishing a list of those 84,000 domains at their own site saying they had nothing to do with it. That way, site owners could link to that page and clear their reputation.

Re:Welcome to the USA

[Anonymous Coward]

If someone's JOB is to investigate things on the Internet.... If they have a months-long SPECIAL TASK FORCE to SPECIFICALLY exert extraordinary control over the DNS ROOT SYSTEM.

Did you seriously just claim "it is too much to expect" for them to understand the system they are directly targeting with international scrutiny aimed at them?

Srsly?

We're fucked!

Re:Welcome to the USA

[sjames]

For the judge, making sure he's not about to tar 84,000 innocents with the kiddie porn brush is all part of due process. That's why they get the big bucks and respect. If he can't handle that, perhaps he should go get an easier job.

Same deal for the investigators. They're supposed to be experts and supposedly did enough investigation to be quite sure of what they saw and who was responsible. It's their JOB to make sure and to know how the net works. Surely they should have investigated these issues. There's always walking a beat if investigation isn't their cup of tea.

They have just made perhaps the most inflammatory possible accusation against 84 THOUSAND people because of their carelessness. People get killed over accusations like this.

Note here that they didn't HAVE to put the accusation on that page. They could have just put "under construction" (innocent until proven guilty!) but they couldn't resist crowing about it.

Re:Welcome to the USA

[ShakaUVM]

Out of curiosity, is there a penalty for lying on a warrant? If there is, how does they get away with it? If not, why not?

The EFF recently found massive abuse of the system by the FBI, but it's not exactly new news. The ATF lied about the Branch Davidians (saying they were drug runners) in order to get all that nifty heavy military equipment you saw at Waco, but they were never held accountable for their lie.

Something like this, where the government can so casually shut down free speech sites by the thousands... really concerns me. If they can just allege something on a warrant and shut down the internet, our society is less free in this regard than Egypt. They got internet access back after 5 days. Waiting for a lawsuit to resolve itself in America takes... longer.

And delays on internet sites or computer equipment is like dog years, except more so.

When a friend's 486 got seized by the FBI (not for something he did, but for information on it), he got it back in the Pentium 2 days. Great, thanks. A delay that long is the equivalent of destruction of property.

Re:Welcome to the USA

[mwvdlee]

It's the freedom of the American government to do whatever their citizens don't want them to do.

Why ICE/Homeland Security

[Ksevio]

Can someone remind me again why this falls under the jurisdiction of ICE/Homeland Security?

Are child pornographers planning on invading the US or something?

Yet another eason

[geekoid]

tog et rid of DHS. It's a stupid extra layer of management put there by someone who thinks problems are fixed with more management.

defund them, give the funds to the agencies them selves.
DHS has done nothing but blunder everything it touches.

With every agency I an think of, I can list a HUGE number of success to a very tiny number of failures, but not DHS.

Twads.

Gov't Blunder News Spreads Like Wild Fire

[eepok]

... so come out with it immediately, fess up, apologize, and make a vocal effort to prevent such an error from being made in the future... AND THEN brag about your success.

Always admit your failures and shortcomings first that way it doesn't look like you're hiding them. This is A+, #1 advice for PR in the digital world.

and it's free!

Redirect?

[pokyo]

So what is the point of redirecting to that fear mongering image? Is it to educate people who happen to not know that child pornography is bad? This blunder wouldn't have been nearly as damaging to innocent people if it was just their site being unreachable, but no, instead they are openly accused of being pedophiles.

Re:This raises an interesting question...

[betterunixthanunix]

The followup question is more important: how many people will be willing to believe that it was all a mistake, as opposed to simply assuming that if the government calls someone a pedophile that person should be treated like the devil incarnate? People who are accused of anything related to child pornography can find their reputations tarnished years later, even if they are acquitted or if the charges are dropped. No rational thought it applied once the magic words are spoken.

Re:Let's just forget

[mywhitewolf]

and since when was it ok for the government to put a sign on a front door of a shop saying "closed due to pedophile investigation"

WHOAH Nelly

[TiggertheMad]

I was reading the comments and it just hit me: everyone commenting is missing the elephant in the room. Yeah sure, there is some problem with the process making sure the correct sites are taken down, but WHAT THE FUCK IS DHS DOING CHASING CHILD PORN PEDDLERS?

Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't that the FBI's jurisdiction? I was working under some sort of obviously fucked up thinking that DHS was protecting us from, oh I don't know, ....FUCKING TERRORISTS. You know, the guys with bombs and anthrax who want to kill us in droves. Does DHS have so much free time on their hands that they are chasing common criminals to kill time? (Rhetoric, I think this question has sort of answered itself..)

If any DHS personel happens to be reading this, please pass this on to the people running your little knitting bee: Hey DHS, you fucking nazi retards....FOCUS ON THE GUYS WITH THE ASSAULT RIFLES WHO WANT TO BUY DIRTY BOMBS.

Re:WHOAH Nelly

[billcopc]

PROTIP: If you want to be safe from terrorists, the DHS can't help you. Not unless its mandate is immediately changed to "removing troops from hostile soil and ending all military and trade-based international extortion schemes".

But that would be unamerican, right ? God forbid your government would let people be.

Re:WHOAH Nelly

[hairyfeet]

Actually they were pissed about their heads getting cracked by Saudi guns with "Made in the USA" stamped on it, but don't let that stop a good rant.

You know, I hate to say it, and this is probably the ONLY time this will EVER be true, but I actually have to go with Glenn Beck on this one: He said "Look at our history in the middle east, for all our talk of freedom and democracy we have propped up one monster after another. The Shah, the trouble in Egypt, all because we pay billion of dollars to truly evil scum. So it is time for us to be Switzerland. it is time for us to walk away and let them sort it out for themselves. Because all we are doing is wasting money we don't have propping up monsters that foster ever more hatred towards us."

And you know what? he is 100% correct. We have propped up one "el presidente" after another because he kisses the right corporate ass and have bred legions of peasants that would be happy to slaughter every single one of us, and for what? So some multinational can get cheaper bananas? Fuck them, it is time to be Switzerland. Hell we don't have the money in the first place, and the last century has shown NOT A SINGLE SUCCESS and a whole host of failures, one dictator after another after another. Why the hell shouldn't they hate us when the boot stomping their face and kicking in their door has the American flag on it?

Re:WHOAH Nelly

[hairyfeet]

Did the world not exist before the United States? Did the whole planet just run around drooling and bashing each other with clubs until we came along? Well if the answer is no what gives us the right to tell the rest of the world how to live, especially when we are torturing and doing evil nasty shit just like the bad guys?

And as for Israel, that too is none of our damned business. i live next to a conservative Christian college, where actual heads of state as well as mover and shakers come to lecture, and I've actually got to talk to a few on the subject. Ready to piss your pants in fear? You know what a very real and large portion of our middle east policy and attitude with/to Israel is based on? Ready for this? Jesus won't come back. i'm serious as fucking cancer, these people are basing our middle east policies on whether a guy that died 2000+ years ago has a place to park his fluffy cloud. No shit, I swear.

Now considering we have been fucking with everyone else for damned near a century, and pretty much constantly since WWII (in fact we haven't gone a whole 5 years without a war...errr..."police action" since) and have done nothing but cause trouble while enriching the pockets of a handful at the top I say....why not try something else?

We've been down this road for a century and it is obvious to anyone with eyes it isn't working, it is like the drug war only with worse body counts and even nastier human rights abuses. So why not listen to Beck and be Switzerland? You don't think the people of Egypt wouldn't have been better off had we STFU and stayed out? Or Iran?

To quote the late liar LBJ "We shouldn't be sending American boys to do what (insert name of county's boys) should be doing" and damn it he was right. We are NO better off and are doing nothing but creating the next generation of terrorists by pumping up dictators, while at the same time crushing our own children and destroying their future by piling on the debt for all these foreign thugs and the ever larger military required to "be the world's policeman" which frankly most of the world would rather we just stay the hell at home. So it is time for a change, it is time to "Be Switzerland". And if Ron Paul or anybody else wants to be president? Run on that platform. We The People are getting sick and tired of paying to support thugs and would prefer our boys home. It is time to be Switzerland!

Re:presume victimhood

[amolapacificapaloma]

Well, that assumption should be made for every accusation. Everybody should be considered innocent until *proven* guilty. Failing to do so gets us to the actual situation where even the suggestion that someone is related to any of that shit can ruin his life.