US, UK Targeting Piracy Websites Outside Their Borders

nk497 writes "The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency is going after piracy websites even if they aren't hosted in the U.S., by targeting those with .net and .com domain names, which are managed by U.S. company Verisign. Meanwhile, a lawyer suggests even that [kind of connection] isn't needed to take a site to court in the UK, saying as long as the content is directed at UK users, that's connection enough to ensure jurisdiction."

Comments

Since US wants to play it this way

[cgeys]

I suggest that other countries start doing it too. Break any French law, face extradition. Break any Chinese law, face extradition. Break any North Korean law, face extradition. It doesn't matter that you have nothing to do with them. If US is doing it, why not others?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

Because the US has more guns.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[QuasiSteve]

It doesn't matter that you have nothing to do with them.

Except that .com, .net, .org and .edu all fall squarely within the domain of the U.S. as far as regulation goes, as per the blurb.

The other point made in the blurb is if you are targeting a particular nation's citizens, that you may also be subject to that nation's regulations.

Does that mean Amazon should be held liable for any naughty things entering Indonesia, for example? No, because although they'll ship things there, they're not targeting them. If they were to start offering their site in Indonesian and clearly marketed things to Indonesians, then perhaps they would.

This is really not much different from a bunch of Russians setting up a poker site on the Seychelles and then advertising specifically to Americans, require bets be made in U.S. Dollars, etc. You've probably already read on the crackdown operations on those.

Whether it is just is another matter entirely.

So while your comment is on the mark somewhere down the slippery slope, it's not particularly relevant as in fact people do have something to with 'them'.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Dunbal]

Nope. But the US has shown willingness to use the guns it has. Now explain to me again how this makes the US the "good guys" again.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[king neckbeard]

We wear cowboy hats?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[similar_name]

What are you saying 'nope' to?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[davester666]

"Meanwhile, a lawyer suggests even that [kind of connection] isn't needed to take a site to court in the UK, saying as long as the content is directed at UK users, that's connection enough to ensure jurisdiction"

No your honor. Clearly, we were targeting American's because our website only uses American spelling and grammar. And you're all wankers.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[das3cr]

White ones !

And our belt buckles say Good Guys right on em.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Dunbal]

The US having the most guns. Nope. The US might have the biggest military budget. It might have expensive toys. However it does not have "the most guns". Russia has 21 million conscripts under arms at any time. North Korea has 9 million troops. South Korea has 8 million. India and China each have about 5 million troops. The US has about 3 million. While you might argue that the US soldier is better equipped, yada yada yada, but what it comes down to is that an American soldier costs much, much more than any other soldier. Actual effectiveness against a real, similar sized army has yet to be tested, and honestly I wouldn't want to live long enough to see that. Be assured that Russia or China aren't pushovers like Iraq and Afghanistan, even if you consider their troops to be "inferior". Lots of little ants can kill and carry surprisingly big critters.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[0123456]

Perhaps you should make a better parallel? In this case, the offenders have US domain names.

.com is not a US domain name. .us is a US domain name.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[hitmark]

If they where .com.us and so on, that would make sense. As it is, USA have at best a "historical" claim on the jurisdiction of .com and the rest.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Blue Stone]

The thing is, for that to happen, a citizen's leaders (what we like to mistakenly call 'representatives') have to sell them out to the foreign powers concerned.

Tony Blair and the Labour Party were the ones who entered into the agreement to ship British citizens over to the USA on the merest of pretexts, without any UK judicial oversight.

Without a political leader willing to sell you and your countrymen out - or commit an act of treason against the people of his or her country, if you like - you're relatively safe.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[jimicus]

Nope. But the US has shown willingness to use the guns it has. Now explain to me again how this makes the US the "good guys" again.

The villain you see in Bond films stroking a white cat and saying "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die" doesn't really exist in real life. Not on a personal level, not on a national or international level. Everyone thinks they're the good guy, everyone thinks they're doing the right thing.

Hell, Osama bin Laden seemed pretty convinced that what he stood for was right. At the risk of invoking Godwin, as far as anyone can tell Hitler honestly thought that attempting to rid the world of the Jews was the right thing to do. And I bet you Kim Jong Il thinks he's doing a pretty damn good job of keeping his country well looked after.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[similar_name]

There are estimated to be over 200 million guns in the U.S. Not counting military and police. America is armed to the teeth.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Dunbal]

And how does this affect foreign policy (what was originally being discussed) again? When you're trying to wriggle out of the frying pan don't forget that if you wriggle hard enough you end up in an entirely different context, ie the fire. Wait, I get it. Now you're just trolling.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[cheekyjohnson]

Everyone thinks they're the good guy, everyone thinks they're doing the right thing.

No! They are factually the bad guys. My morals are factually correct and not subjective in the least.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[jjeffries]

You there! Call us "the good guys" or we'll shoot you with our many guns! Choose!

I thought so.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[QuasiSteve]

If they where .com.us and so on, that would make sense. As it is, USA have at best a "historical" claim on the jurisdiction of .com and the rest.

No, at best the following is true: .com registry holder: VeriSign .net registry holder: VeriSign .org registry holder: Public Interest Registry (operated by: Afilias) .edu registry holder: Educause (operated by: VeriSign)

VeriSign headquarters: 21355 Ridgetop Circle, Dulles, Virginia, USA

Afilias US office: Afilias USA, Inc., Building 3, Suite 105, 300 Welsh Road, Horsham, PA 19044, USA

Now, Afilias is headquartered in Ireland, so they could always choose to bugger out of the U.S., although I'm not sure what that would do with regard to being the operator for the .org registry.

But for .com and .net, the U.S. very much has jurisdiction over the main registry and by extension the data registered with them.

See also the recent newsbits about the U.S. having the jurisdiction to request data on Microsoft's cloud services servers parked in Europe and (largely) being marketed to Europeans.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[10101001 10101001]

Except that .com, .net, .org and .edu all fall squarely within the domain of the U.S. as far as regulation goes, as per the blurb.

Which is precisely why other countries have pushed for ICANN to not be under US regulation because it's absurd that .com, .net, .org, and .edu should be US regulated or more generally that it's under US authority to create/destroy new TLDs.

The other point made in the blurb is if you are targeting a particular nation's citizens, that you may also be subject to that nation's regulations.

Even if one were to believe that premise, what does that have to do with the situation? The fact that a lot of .com, .net, etc domains belong to US (or European) companies has a lot to do with where the Internet/Web first grew substantially. That doesn't mean .com, .net, etc inherently target Americans or Europeans. Similarly, a lot of the initial web sites were in English, not only because of heavy US involvement in the web's start but because English is a widely used second language and hence the closest to a globally inter-operable language.

Beyond that, I'd say it's pretty bloody obvious that plenty of pirates don't necessarily target a specifically nationality. Plenty of people in the world want to watch US made shows, play US made games, etc. Similarly, there's plenty of people in the US who want to watch shows from other countries (subbed or dubbed, if necessary), play games from other countries (translated, if necessary), etc. But, again, as English is very much a global inter-operable language, there's plenty of non-native English speakers who have become accustom to watching, playing, etc copyrighted works in English precisely because they're never translated into their native language.

In short, I'd probably feel a good bit different if this wasn't ICE seemingly just blacklisting domains as their own discretion, without oversight. Such a situation means ICE doesn't have to even bother proving in any way that any targeting happened, unless the domain happens to not be under their control; then they have to actually obtain cooperation from another government. And this situation just further highlights the point that .com, .net, etc should not be under ICE/US control.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[hedwards]

The reason why the fall into the domain of the US is that historically we were the least likely to pull this sort of crap. But, I don't think it'll last long if we continue abusing that privilege.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Belial6]

Given that he did not belong to the uber-race that he was promoting as the ideal, it seems pretty likely that he did in fact think he was doing the right thing.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[similar_name]

Nope. You tried to be smart about the U.S. not having more guns and it turns out you meant active troops. Oh we're talking about foreign policy? How many Russian and Chinese troops are deployed in combat around the world currently? Wait, what were you saying 'nope' to again?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

By that logic everyone working at Facebook would face extradition; breaking EU privacy laws is illegal....
Hell yeah off with Zuckerberg's head! finally!

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

The US might have the biggest military budget. but some of that money also goes to giving people a "free" education, and getting things build for tax dollars
in other countries that's another budget, but that sounds too much like socialism so in the US it is much easier to make it part of the defense budget ;)

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

no they fall within Verisign's area of regulation. One thing this guarantees for me is that I will never use Verisign again. If they are a part of the US govt , it should be stated on the TOS. But as a company I will vote with my dollars.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

All I can say is: Which country popularized the phrase "Stetsons are cool"?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[barq]

The villain you see in Bond films stroking a white cat and saying "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die" doesn't really exist in real life. Not on a personal level, not on a national or international level. Everyone thinks they're the good guy, everyone thinks they're doing the right thing.

Hell, Osama bin Laden seemed pretty convinced that what he stood for was right. At the risk of invoking Godwin, as far as anyone can tell Hitler honestly thought that attempting to rid the world of the Jews was the right thing to do. And I bet you Kim Jong Il thinks he's doing a pretty damn good job of keeping his country well looked after.

It is the 'Banality of Evil' argument. Hannah Arendt popularised the term after watching Eichmann in court. The question of how apparently ordinary people can do extraordinarily evil things was a central issue for social psychology after WWII (e.g. Stanley Milgram's 'electric shock' obedience experiments). The headlines focused on the surprisingly high levels of obedience, but the more interesting story is in the accounts given by participants afterwards. In short, the majority of people rationalise their actions in terms of good intentions. Bond style evil villains who wake up in the morning and plot overtly evil schemes are mostly fictional.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Your comment about the number of the guns in the US was in the wrong context and your response didn't exonerate you. Sorry. I suggest you bow out gracefully.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Captain Hook]

But for .com and .net, the U.S. very much has jurisdiction over the main registry and by extension the data registered with them.

The data registered with them is an address which is not necessarily in the US. By all means delete the pointer of any site you don't agree with, but how does holding a pointer to an address give you rights over a citizen of another country?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Forgive my ignorance, but why do we have domains like .co.uk out there then?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[digitig]

The reason why the fall into the domain of the US is that historically we were the least likely to pull this sort of crap. But, I don't think it'll last long if we continue abusing that privilege.

Which universe's history was that in? Show me any country that historically and currently wouldn't pull any dirty tricks they thought they could get away with to further the interests of those in power.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[digitig]

I think Switzerland would find it quite hard to declare a fatwa. It would have to go to referendum, and if it passed it would probably just mandate that somebody sit down and have a firm word with you. (Then they'd freeze your assets.)

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice doubles bro, but check out my triples

patrick_bateman.jpg

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

Military power isn't worth shit in this age. What the US has, is the biggest economic power of all. If they say, this country is a bad customer, then their import taxes will skyrocket, they'll have problems getting loans, their credit rating going to shit etc. That's the true power of the USA. And they use it every single day, they don't have to ruin everything to get a country to do what they want, just a few things, "hey you know that IMF loan you were expecting? chances are it's not going to happen if you don't do what we say.". It goes the other way around, using the carrot, not just the stick, but it doesn't sound as dramatic.
They do have an army and the strongest one, because it's NECESSARY, M.A.D. still exists.
Can you blame them? Not really, that's the benefit of being the most powerful nation.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[TooMuchToDo]

The US can deliver lethal force remotely more effectively than any other country can deliver their foot soldiers to our soil.

Disagree? Predators, Reapers, Global Hawks, and that's just the unmanned variety. Rule the air and you rule (most) of the ground.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

One would think that physically shipping products to people would count more as targeting than localizing their site would. I don't know this work in all countries, but imfairly certain that offering heroin by mail to Madrid would be legally more actionable than localizing heroin.com in to Spanish.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[similar_name]

The original post was that the U.S. could do it because it has more guns. The response was a pedantic nope that the U.S. does not have more guns it just uses its guns. The original post was a might is right sarcastic statement. The reply was pedantic and wrong.

In context the U.S. has more might with any measure. If we are going to go redefine what the context is that's fine. If we are talking about active standing troops the US is not #1, but that's not what was originally said. If we're talking about number of tanks I don't think the U.S. has the most, but as far as I know they are the best at firing on the move. If we're talking about 'guns', the U.S. has an abundance and may be #1. If we're talking about number of citizens the U.S. is not #1.

The U.S. spends 46% of the world's military budget. This does not take into account Iraq and Afghanistan. The U.S. is expanding it's unmanned firepower and is the largest exporter of arms (9 or last 10 years). I have supported the original post, 'Because the U.S. has more guns'.

So while 200 million domestic guns have nothing to do with foreign policy. How does 9 million North Korean troops sitting in N Korea prove N Korea has more guns than the U.S.? The U.S. is not invincible but it does have 'more guns'.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

How does 9 million North Korean troops sitting in N Korea prove N Korea has more guns than the U.S.?

We're not going to invade NK with 200 million guns.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

"The other point made in the blurb is if you are targeting a particular nation's citizens, that you may also be subject to that nation's regulations."

Doesn't matter. That idea (in the context of the internet) breaks so many basic legal principles that it is just unworkable.

The only workable scheme is to treat sites like residences or businesses: if you visit that site, you are visiting that physical location. NOT the other way around. And so you are bound by the legal standards of that location.

That is the only way it can work and be consistent. Sites are not responsible for your decision to access them, so they can't be visiting you. You are visiting them. And any other scheme makes it too vulnerable to arbitrary interference by any government that wants to try to assert control.

And by "location", I mean that is has to be associated with either the TLD under which it is registered, OR the physical server on which it resides, but not both. It has to be one or the other, and we need an international standard to determine which. Governments will likely try to have it both ways and keep it ambiguous... which is just another reason why a solid standard is necessary. Because some TLDs can cover a lot of different political territories at the same time, I suggest that physical location of the server is the proper standard to use.

And that also implies that we need a better WHOIS system.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

See also the recent newsbits about the U.S. having the jurisdiction to request data on Microsoft's cloud services servers parked in Europe and (largely) being marketed to Europeans.

Claiming jurisdiction does not mean they have it. While Microsoft might disclose such data to the US government it's quite likely that the EU would disapprove of such move. And taking into consideration the history of MS/EU relations this might be pretty costly to uor friends from Redmont

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

"The other point made in the blurb is if you are targeting a particular nation's citizens, that you may also be subject to that nation's regulations."

I should also point out, specifically when it comes to targeting, my scheme of associating the laws with the specific site location makes the point moot: I can set up a tourist shop in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada and advertise heavily in the USA. That doesn't make my store subject to the laws of the US (although the advertising itself might be).

So my system also makes it consistent with existing laws regarding trade.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[mwvdlee]

Not to be pendantic, but "least likely" according to whom?
Most certainly not according to pretty much every country except the USA.
US has never been the most well-behaving country in the world.
They've been on the good side of "playing nicely with other countries", but only by a small margin.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[russotto]

The villain you see in Bond films stroking a white cat and saying "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die" doesn't really exist in real life.

I strongly disagree.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

"Which is precisely why other countries have pushed for ICANN to not be under US regulation because it's absurd that .com, .net, .org, and .edu should be US regulated or more generally that it's under US authority to create/destroy new TLDs."

"The reason why the fall into the domain of the US is that historically we were the least likely to pull this sort of crap."

No, the reason they are under US regulation is that they were created here, and originally regulated here.

Regardless of who "invented" it, or first promoted it, I'm glad you like the network system that (for all practical purposes) the USA originally built with its own effort and money. In the beginning, of course. But if you want to talk about absurdity, then how absurd is it that you think you can adopt the network system that we built, then demand control over it? Methinks thou dost protest a bit too much. You can always go build your own damned DNS systems. There isn't a single thing on Earth stopping you from doing so... um, except for that whole money and effort thing.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

Historically (I mean if you go back a ways), the US went to a great deal of effort to be as neutral as it could... the whole "friends with all, entangling alliances with none" idea.

Of course that didn't last forever, and -- especially since the 20th Century -- our "leaders" have gotten us involved in a lot of boondoggles that "The People" did not want.

Yes, I think it is obvious that in recent times the US has become somewhat imperialist... but that is largely due to a government that has gotten out of the control and out of the hands of the people.

We are trying to get it back. Believe me.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

It's only absurd to you because you came to the game late. The internet (arpanet, milnet, tcpip, http, dns) is an invention of the US. The rest of the world is now connected to it, but it is still run by the country that started it. Feel free to create your own network if you want, but expecting and demanding that everything be turned over is rather silly.

As for the piracy, I'm quite sure that the RIAA/MPAA/etc don't care if an Indian made movie is pirated in India. They only care that American made movies are pirated in India. If you don't like the rules, don't play, but don't play and when you get caught cheating demand the rules get changed when you knew them ahead of time.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[JockTroll]

Gallifrey used to be a planet, doesn't count as a country. You loserboy nerd.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[KingMotley]

.com is not a US domain name

You are mistaken.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

The villain you see in Bond films stroking a white cat and saying "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die" doesn't really exist in real life.

Of course not. it was Goldfinger who said that, and it was Blofeld who stroked the white cat. Two completely different people.

Geez.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

"It's only absurd to you because you came to the game late. The internet (arpanet, milnet, tcpip, http, dns) is an invention of the US. The rest of the world is now connected to it, but it is still run by the country that started it. Feel free to create your own network if you want, but expecting and demanding that everything be turned over is rather silly."

Mod parent up! This may not be a popular attitude, but it's no more than the simple truth (um... except I would say "built" rather than "invented").

There is nothing preventing other countries from setting up their own DNS systems, and interfacing with the one the US built. Literally nothing. Except time and money. So... quitcher bitchin'. If you don't want to build your own, and want to use the one we made, fine. But you don't have to, and that doesn't create any obligation on the part of the US.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[cold fjord]

Nope. But the US has shown willingness to use the guns it has. Now explain to me again how this makes the US the "good guys" again.

It really depends on the use the arms are put to, doesn't it? Kuwaitis were pretty happy when US led coalition forces removed Saddam's army from Kuwait in 1991. Of course there were many Europeans that protested against the US for planning to remove Saddam's forces from Kuwait, but virtually none when Saddam invaded and conquered Kuwait, thus demonstrating the moral bankruptcy of the "Peace" movement.

The French (practically no oil) were pretty happy when the mainly US and British forces of the Allies removed Nazi German forces from France. Likewise the Dutch (practically no oil), Danes (practically no oil), Belgians (practically no oil), and Luxemburgers (practically no oil). Many Italians (practically no oil) were glad to be rid of the Fascist government, as many Germans (practically no oil) were happy to be rid of the National Socialist government.

Australians (practically no oil) were happy to have not been invaded by the Japanese, which the US presence helped, and the Philippinos (practically no oil) were thrilled to see the Japanese (practically no oil) removed by American forces.

South Koreans (practically no oil) are quite happy that they are not governed by the North, a fate prevented by US arms. The South Vietnamese (practically no oil) almost made it, they defeated the 1972 invasion by North Vietnam with American air support. Unfortunately the "peace" movement influenced the US Congress to cut off all aid to South Vietnam, including medical supplies. South Vietnam fell to another conventional invasion by tanks and infantry divisions from North Vietnam.

The vast majority of Eastern Europeans (pretty much no oil) are happy to be free of Soviet rule, and many West Europeans (mostly no oil) are happy to have avoided that fate. American arms made a substantial contribution to that end.

The people of Taiwan (practically no oil) are still free today in large part to America.

The Iraqi people are free today, with a budding democracy, and are rebuilding their country. They are happy to be free from Saddam which wouldn't have happened without American intervention. Despite the large number of people killed by terrorists and insurgents (the vast majority of the dead), they were really no worse off than Saddam’s long term average death rate, and now violence is down overall by about 90%. They have a chance, but not a guarantee, of being able to build a decent country. That is a chance they never would have had under Saddam or his sons.

American arms have helped stop and reverse the world wide trend toward despotism at least twice, helping to turn the tide against fascism, and soviet communism.

America has used its military power in humanitarian relief efforts, such as after the 2004 tsunami, and in Haiti.

So, what has your country done?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[similar_name]

The U.S. wouldn't need to. On the flip side, NK is certainly not invading the U.S. anytime soon. Nor is any other country for the matter. The U.S. has 'more guns' for all intents and purposes in any context. The U.S. is in three engagements and has troops stationed in nearly every country in the World. Its Navy spans the globe. All with a volunteer military.

The United States is so well armed that in a debate about the validity of the statement 'Because the U.S. has more guns', 200 million guns shouldn't be counted (an order of magnitude larger than the largest army including actives and reserves). Nor are we supposed to count how much more well armed the U.S. military is. So the argument is basically the U.S. doesn't have the most soldiers. Ok but the U.S. still has more guns

Happy Birthday America Fuck Yeah!

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[jimicus]

I strongly disagree.

There's nothing wrong with disagreeing with Putin or Cheney, but to pretend they're laughing madly while formulating their next insane plot is to deny basic human nature - I strongly believe that even the most crazed power-hungry loonies are absolutely convinced that what they are doing is somehow for the greater good.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[cold fjord]

We wear cowboy hats?

The cowboy hat is a practical piece of headgear, suitable for people doing hard work outdoors. It keeps the rain off your head, the sun off your face, and the sweat out of your eyes. Since it is American kit connected with hard work and sweat, it is easy to understand why many people feel no connection with it. There is also little mystery that many of those who despise America, and cowboys for that matter, (including too many Americans) generally have a clown hat as their primary headgear.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[silly_sysiphus]

Thank you! Wish I had mod points....

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[tsotha]

Russia has 21 million conscripts under arms at any time.

Not even close. The Russian Federation has 1.2 million men under arms, with another 750k in reserve. 21 million men under arms would be 2/3 of the entire cohort of military age Russians. That kind of mobilization couldn't be sustained without wrecking the economy. Most of the Russian air force is obsolete, the Russian navy is rusting at the docks, and aside from a few elite units the Russian army is poorly trained and woefully under-equipped. T-72s, which comprise the vast majority of Russian MBTs (something like 90%), are no match for a modern tank and would need to land a flank shot to penetrate enemy armor. Which would be quite a trick with obsolete sensors and communications.

The Russian military wouldn't exactly be a pushover for anybody, and you never know what's going to happen when the fighting starts, but the restructuring that occurred after the end of the cold war meant for 15 years or so there was no money for new military hardware, leaving mostly cold war junk. Of course it's mostly academic (I hope, anyway), since the two countries have more interests in common than otherwise these days, and nobody is interested in going to war with a nuclear power.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[10101001 10101001]

"United we stand, divided we fall". It holds true for a union of states. It holds true for a union of networks. But, yes, let's focus on the who built what (because the web sites in question and the actual networks to reach them are in the US and the whole .com changes only effect the ability of people in the US to access them) and not the lack of due process of law (which could at least be a beginning to justify how things are instead of a "it's my ball and if you don't like how I play you can go home, I don't care how little my new rules make any sense"). The fact that you wish to spin the situation as an us vs them debate instead of recognizing how the actions of the US through ICE fundamentally undermines the very founding principles of the US is disturbing at best and saddening at worst.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

"The fact that you wish to spin the situation as an us vs them debate instead of recognizing how the actions of the US through ICE fundamentally undermines the very founding principles of the US is disturbing at best and saddening at worst."

The fact that you apparently wish to deliberately distort my meaning is what is sad.

It's not a matter of "it's my ball..." at all. It's simply a matter of history! I didn't create that history, and neither did you. But complaining about it isn't going to change it, either. And neither is any amount of complaining going to create an obligation on the part of the US.

But since you want to be childish and put it in those terms, then this is the more realistic analogy: The US was playing with its ball, and others saw that it was good. They wanted to play, too. And the US let them play with its ball, rather than making them go get their own (which it easily could have done). Then, once everybody got in on the game and saw how much fun it was, they decided that rather than go get their own ball, too, so that they can play with it when and as they like, they'd rather have control over the one already in play.

That's the way it has happened, and no amount of insults or arguing are going to change that reality. So, (again using your terms): if you want us to continue to share our ball, and maybe even continue to help you get your own, then be nice and quit complaining. We don't owe you anything.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[TheGratefulNet]

exactly. I can now believe (as a US citizen) that we no longer deserve to be the internet police. we fuck up our own local affairs and spy on our own people. hell, given this bad behavior we should not even have ANY control over ANY backbone core routers (nsa is laughing at this very post. hi right back at'cha!)

however, its too late. we are embedded in the backbones and we can even choose to play unfairly if we want.

other countries are RIGHT to not trust us. hell, I don't trust us and I live here.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[TheGratefulNet]

No, the reason they are under US regulation is that they were created here, and originally regulated here.

back then, it was technically impossible to sniff at even wire speeds and do it on more than 1 wire at a time. core and edge routers did NOT have gov spy access shit built into them. users were mostly trusted techie types. AOL was not even a dream at that point.

things change. the net, now, is nothing at all like what it was even 15 yrs ago. the US didn't ruin things because 'things' had little value and it was a curiousity. now things are different.

you can't apply 'we created it' as any kind of reason for maintaining it. even original software authors are not always the best to keep the software going, over time.

we started it. great. now, lets find someone else to maintain it. but it has to be outside any one (or group) of government meddling.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

And by the way... my comment had nothing to do with ICE's actions, which I think are ridiculous. It had only to do with the statement of yours that I quoted.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[lexsird]

We haven't been the good guys for a long time. The American government has long been the puppets of multinational corporations. I am trying really hard to think of how corporate interests aren't always being served in every damn thing we touch as Americans. America fights to privatize everything it can, it's sickening. They have so many brainwashed into this bullshit "American Dream" which is nothing but smoke and mirrors.

Locally, I watched as our municipal water supply which was working just fine and had been for years, was shut down so that our community would have to switch over to privatized water, which ironically comes from a public lake. Our city lost control of our own water, and a way to generate revenue which it desperately needs. They almost sold the town reservoir to land developers, so they could shut down the park around the reservoir which is a park for the people. It was to be a gated community. Thankfully some citizens found out and went nuts on them at city counsel meetings, so they have backed off of that for now.

The point is, America is teaming with filthy crooked bastards that will fuck us all over. We see this on a local level and we have to watch the fuckers like hawks. Now imagine how fucked up this becomes at a State and Federal level where there are no "town counsel meetings" for people to hold these bastards accountable. It doesn't help with a dipshit American public that utterly refuses to do its civic duty of keeping these crooked cocksuckers in check by keeping tabs on them. America is too wrapped up in epic bullshit like American Idol or sports to pay attention to anything that is REAL or MATTERS.

This has been going on for decades here. The world had better wake the fuck up and realize that the American people aren't going to wise up and stop any of this horseshit. America is brain locked by corporations, they will be slaves forever or until the entire system crashes to the ground and they are fighting in the streets for a crust for bread. By the way, the rest of the world; you are next.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

"you can't apply 'we created it' as any kind of reason for maintaining it."

I'm not. I'm simply saying that's the way it happened. And that I am tired of others bitching about it, as though that would somehow change history. If they want control, let them ask nicely. Because in fact we did create it and do own it, regardless of whether that is a "good thing". All this shrill whining about "it's not fair" is simultaneously incorrect, childish, and irrelevant.

"we started it. great. now, lets find someone else to maintain it. but it has to be outside any one (or group) of government meddling."

I don't disagree. But let them ask nicely, instead of trying to whine or bully their way into it.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

Pardon me. Correction: my original comment was of course not about your statement. (How could it be? You were replying to me.) It was about GPs' comments that I quoted.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[0123456]

You are mistaken.

No, I'm not. If .com was a US domain name then companies outside America would not have a .com address. It's the universal domain for companies anywhere in the universe.

The US domain is .us.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

Rule the air and you rule (most) of the ground.

LOL. Shut up. A muslim hidden in a cave was ruling the US for a decade and all that UAV tech could not do shit about it.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[KingMotley]

By your logic, if .de was a german domain, then companies outside Germany would not have a .de domain, but they do. I have one.

The .com domain was started by the US Department of Defense (US based, lol), and is currently run by Verisign (a US based company). It's meant to allow any commercial company in the world to be able to register there, but to deny where it started and who runs it is silly. It's world wide because the US says so. The internet didn't just invent itself.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[The Daily Dreamer]

So, what has your country done?

My country has been invaded by the Japanese. They sent submarines to a couple of major cities to test our defences... and the main road from the beach to Canberra has a strategic hole in the rock that can be dynamited to bring down a nice big landslide over the road. (These days it's full of teddy bears and families stop to look.)

Americans were nowhere to be seen for a whole bunch of the stuff you mentioned.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[jonfr]

Just wait until this goes up the high level. Sadly, that is going to take around 10 years. Diplomats have long coffie breaks in this matters.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[10101001 10101001]

The fact that you apparently wish to deliberately distort my meaning is what is sad.

I am sorry if I distorted your meaning, but I did not do so deliberately. If I understand you, your core message is complaining doesn't change the way things are and you offer a solution of sorts, to effectively fork the whole DNS system totally ignoring the US.

Given how you state you believe the whole ICE situation is ridiculous...I suggest you start running your own DNS fork. Otherwise, I don't see the point in stating how my complaining may not in itself be an effective tool in achieving my desired end, since I don't see the point in complaining about what I'm doing and not doing when you seem to be doing the same thing. Such seems to reek of a desire for superiority on the issue by being the most correct on the issue. Also, I would prefer it if you didn't claim ownership of the internet personally and its construction while simultaneously presuming my nationality denies me potential joint ownership. Because if you say, as owner, how the internet should be controlled, then if I'm an owner too, I should be able to say how the internet should be controlled as well.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Burz]

Now explain to me again how this makes the US the "good guys" again.

A: The western world loves to watch Hollywood shows, and in those shows the USA are assumed to be the good guys about 98% of the time, and foreigners (esp. Russians and Chinese) are only portrayed as good if they are trying to become Americans or to help the govt of some English-speaking country (like the USA, Canada, UK or Australia) or Israel.

Next question...

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Burz]

America is brain locked by corporations, they will be slaves forever or until the entire system crashes to the ground and they are fighting in the streets for a crust for bread.

IMHO, most of that brainwashing (the corporatism and jingoism) emanates from two places: Talk radio and Hollywood (two very corporate, Wall-St. linked enterprises). Hollywood isn't just a source of distraction anymore and even their 'nicest' shows are saturated with odious consumerism and anti-democratic assumptions.

The corporate jingoist crook mentality isn't just a feature of the USA, its the MO throughout the English speaking world now and Hollywood's appeal has been significant factor in that development. They are the propaganda mill to end all others.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

"I don't see the point in complaining about what I'm doing and not doing when you seem to be doing the same thing."

My only "complaint" is that I'm tired of other people whining about how unfair it all is, when they could do something about it. Even if you don't like what that something is. But that was part of the point I made.

But I'm not doing the same thing, because this whole DNS thing isn't an issue for me. I don't have the option of "stop complaining and do something" about the issue, because it isn't my issue, and there isn't really anything to do.

But if you meant "do something about the complaining", well... I did.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[lexsird]

It's hard to argue that point. I was looking at the new girl in the latest Transformers movie and she was posed in front of a backdrop and on it was the Transformers name and logo, but also over a dozen corporate sponsors. I thought WTF, is this the movies or NASCAR? Yes, I only noticed the logos after looking at her for a while, so yes it was a hetro test and I passed it.

You must understand that Hollywood isn't Holywood. There is no sacred duty for them to be some kind of temple for our culture. They are pure capitalists and out to make as much money as they can. Sure there are independent films that are making strong headway. You can thank NetFlicks for many of them seeing the light of day for the public. As far as corporations, just start digging into whom owns whom and I am sure both Hollywood and TV are all their puppets. They would be slacking if they didn't, right?

Jingoist, now that is my "Word De Jour", I had to google it. It's appropriate though, good word usage! Where the fuck did you come up with that one from? I thought I had all the good political terms nailed down.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting that you're counting troops when it's well known the USA has moved to a primarily third-party contractor based deployment in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The US Central Command said there were 104,100 DOD contractors in Afghanistan in 2009.

Also, fuck you.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

As another concerned American who sees the same thing. This right here.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[st0nes]

No your honor. Clearly, we were targeting American's because our website only uses American spelling and grammar. And you're all wankers.

Even in American the plural of American is Americans, not American's.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[sumdumass]

Why don't you hold your knee back long enough to read the entire statement and ponder on it a bit because you let it jerk so hard your teeth fall out.

This is not about breaking any foreign laws, it's about jurisdictional reach in which you are targeting a foreign land, you will need to obey the laws of that land. This is no different then sending snail mail to french citizens in France in violation of french laws (perhaps some sort of fraud) and being charged with something and extradited to face those charges. It happens all the time and has been happening long before any internet has been around.

Look up a term called long reach jurisdiction. Most other countries already do this. The only main stipulation is the cooperation of the foreign lands in which most countries will not render a person charged if the death penalty is on the table or they do not view the justice system as being fair.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

"Yes, I only noticed the logos after looking at her for a while, so yes it was a hetro test and I passed it."

Haha. I love how you are so secure in your sexuality that you feel the need to interject this into a completely unrelated topic. Closet, much?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[davester666]

Just proves that there are wankers on both sides of the pond.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[rtb61]

It's called Public Relations http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_relations, the US was better at telling lies for profit PR=B$, well, at least until the internet reared it's ugly head (the truth can be pretty much that way versus the comfortable lie).

Corrupt corporations are simply trying to drive politics via campaign donations, gifts, cheap loans et al, to keep profits that wouldn't exist with out already corrupted laws. Want to protect your IP, than piss off and keep it too yourself.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anarchduke]

Nope, the US definitely has the most guns.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[toriver]

Since when does an inventing country get to decide how an invention is used? Does Italy decide over your radio broadcasts? Does your car manufacturers check with Germany that anything they want to do is OK?

The Internet as such is not "run" by a country, it is a mesh of all the independent network operators in various countries that peer with each other, and their customers. If the corporation administering popular top level domains wants to be a stooge for the bribed/lobbied politicians of their country of origin, so be it; but I think more non-American companies will start looking long and hard on this and ask: What precedence does this set regarding the reliability of a domain under any of these TLDs now? What if some politician decides that British Petroleum are baddies that need to lose their .com domain? If ICANN and VeriSign abandon their neutrality as an international partner then by all means; TLDs are dead in an age of search engines anyway.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

America is too wrapped up in epic bullshit

Oooh, how many epic tokens do I have to farm to get bullshit?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

Honestly, Hitler makes a pretty good case.

He broke about as many laws as anyone else. During his ascension to power, the supposed holocaust, etc, he didn't break any laws. Hence, he must have been one of the good guys

Can you really blame a leader when they are so popular they get elected?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[coder111]

Well, I'm happy to see you so excited about these realizations. Maybe I'm cynical and jaded, but I thought along the same lines for a while now.

It's easy to criticize things. The problem is, how do we fix it? Democracy will degenerate into corporatism over time, and any government will get corrupted by corporations. Markets will be monopolized/dominated and will stop functioning. What is the solution to all this? If you had the power to change the world, what would you do? How would you make it?

--Coder

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[L4t3r4lu5]

A lot of those guns are in the hands of soldiers.

It is impossible to win a land war in Asia.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[JosKarith]

"Military power isn't worth shit in this age."
Orly? Tell that to a world that spends $1.2 x 10^9 a year on the millitary.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

try reading http://www.reuters.com/article/2007/08/28/us-world-firearms-idUSL2834893820070828
then restate your theory.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[metacell]

I agree with your WW2 examples, but I'm not sure most of what the USA has done since then has been helpful.

I believe the Soviet Union fell because their system was unsustainable - they were basing their economy on agriculture and natural resources, they were incredibly inefficient, and they were very slow at adopting technological innovation. Eventually, people realised they were better off in a more western-style society, and used peaceful means to change into a democracy. The arms race with the USA may have hastened their economic decline, but on the other hand, giving the Soviet leaders an external enemy (the USA) may have helped them to divert people's miscontent.

USA:s invasion of Iraq caused terrorism to increase dramatically. Saddam had very little to do with terrorism (and nothing to do with 9/11), despite being an oppressive dictator to his own people. After the invasion, Iraq became a chaotic hotbed where terrorists could be recruited and trained. Using a flimsy pretext ("weapons of mass destruction"), sent the message to Middle Eastern countries that no one was safe from invasion. I think the invasion of Iraq has made the muslim world more hateful and fearful of the West, and the world a less safe place for all Westerners.

As for my own country (Sweden), we give 0.7% of our GDP as foreign aid. That's a percentage of the total economy, not of the state budget. We're one of the few countries which manages to fulfill the UN:s recommendations for foreign aid.

We've also contributed UN troops to Afghanistan, Kosovo, Somalia, Croatia, Liberia, Macedonia, Bosnia, and so on, despite having no interests in those conflicts. Our troops are of course very small compared to the USA:s, but we're only a country of 9 million people.

We also accept large numbers of political and war refugees - many of them from wars the USA has started, like Iraq and Afghanistan. Someone needs to take care of them after their homes become war zones.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Dan541]

Spot on, but the problem is that it's technically possible for them to do this. So they do it.

This type of seizure is totally unprecedented. Criminals do not have their identity stolen even when found guilty in court. They still retain the rights to it. However with a domain name they seem to make an exception.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[metacell]

Um, the USA doesn't run the DNS system. It runs the .com, .edu, .mil, .gov and a few other domains. The DNS system is already decentralised, and different countries run their own domains, like .de for Germany, .uk for United Kingdom, .ch for China, and so on.

Also, I don't think you'd want the rest of the world to invent their own DNS system. That'd effectively isolate the USA from the rest of the world. It'd hurt the rest of the world a lot, but it'd hurt the USA more.

A minor nitpick: http and the World Wide Web was invented by Tim Berners-Lee in Switzerland.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[metacell]

There is nothing preventing other countries from setting up their own DNS systems, and interfacing with the one the US built. Literally nothing. Except time and money. So... quitcher bitchin'. If you don't want to build your own, and want to use the one we made, fine. But you don't have to, and that doesn't create any obligation on the part of the US.

How about a deal? We get to use your (American) TCP/IP and DNS protocols, and you get to use our HTTP protocol and HTML language, which were invented in Switzerland and paid for by European grant money.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[metacell]

But if you want to talk about absurdity, then how absurd is it that you think you can adopt the network system that we built, then demand control over it?

If the USA persists in censoring sites directly in the DNS system, sure, I think the rest of the world should create their own. But it'll fragment the Internet and be bad for everyone in the long run, including the USA.

I think you should reconsider for your own sakes.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[metacell]

But since you want to be childish and put it in those terms, then this is the more realistic analogy: The US was playing with its ball, and others saw that it was good. They wanted to play, too. And the US let them play with its ball, rather than making them go get their own (which it easily could have done).

And now that the rest of the world have built their own balls and play not only with the USA, but also with each other, the USA can no longer decide the game rules. It either has to listen to the other players, or go and play by itself. And that'll hurt the USA more than it hurts the rest of the world.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[metacell]

The action for which extradition is requested also needs to be illegal in both countries.

For example, if someone in the UK targets people in France with a scam, the scam needs to be illegal in both countries for extradition to occur.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

Uh... excuse me, but if you were paying attention to the conversation, you would have realized that this just isn't the case. People are demanding to play with the US' ball, not the other way around.

What you are saying is that it's okay to take somebody else's ball away, just because they let you play with it. I am not judging whether it is possible, but what I am saying is that it is on pretty shaky ethical ground, and that is an understatement.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[lexsird]

The first thing I would do is make it against the law for any government representative to take a penny beyond their salary. If someone so much as gives them a candy bar and they accept it, we hang both the person who gave it to them and the representative publicly. (And anyone involved) Campaigning outside of authorized venues is also against the law. There will be a forum of all the candidates, they will each have equal time to present their views. This will be a mandatory broadcast on all radio and TV channels to include cable. If the media is found guilty of promoting any politician there are two things that can happen, if it's a slight mistake, all the other candidates are given equal time on the air, on the broadcaster's dime. If it's a blatant violation, the broadcaster and all involved are publicly executed, including the candidate if he was party to it.

As far as voting, it should be a privilege. You should have to take a test, like a drivers test. Also participation in the grass roots process should be mandatory if you wish to vote. Our education system should have a mandate to teach what the grass roots process is from an early age. To enforce people to be part of the process we should tax them extra for not voting, if you don't vote and do your civic duty, there is a penalty tax of 10 to 25% tacked onto your taxes each year.

Anticipating the incredible chilling effect on professional politicians, we take it a step further and draw our candidates from a pool, much like we select jurors. In effect we draw from the rank and file of the people, kicking and screaming if must be, into office for ONE term. All in all, we need to focus on the purity of our representatives representing US, the people and not other interests.

But I don't see us ever being represented again. The system is too engrained with corruption. You can't fix something this twisted, yet powerful. It will destroy anything or anyone in it's way. A few rebels here and there will be crushed and they will capitalize yet again on another way to clamp down more control on us all.

We have to think like Frank Herbert's Dune. Which I am surprised they haven't read it and adopted that strategy in the Middle East. I think his Dune series was kind of an analogy of the oil situation in the Middle East. Think of The Middle East as the Planet Dune and the oil as spice. "He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing."

What is our spice here in the USA? I am afraid to say almost. I can condense it down to a perfect singular thing that could bring us down. If you disrupt our country from one end to the other, the smoke and mirrors disappears. That is the only way you will get rid of this cancer, you have to destroy the whole system as we know it and start all over again from the very basics. How does a single person do that? Pretty easy actually, I am shocked it hasn't been done already.

What is the magic that makes our civilization run? What magical element give life to about everything in the modern world? Electricity! I am not talking about knocking out power plants, there is no need. The complete greed of the power companies have left us with an infrastructure of electricity delivery systems that are in such shambles and disrepair that many are afraid the system will collapse if its strained. Enter the lone gun man out with a .22 caliber squirrel rifle who simply drives throughout the countryside blasting key transformers. *pop* there goes another section of the countryside without power. *pop* there goes another. *pop* there goes another one! *pop*...FUCK! another one! One guy could send them scrambling trying to figure out what the fuck.

Now imagine a group of assholes with squirrel rifles, or slingshots, or a big rock and all with cellphones and twitter. They all go to their assigned spots and at the same time shoot out transformers. *pop* half the United States is without power. The timing on this is also important for maximum effect. Do it during a holiday when the weather is extreme, like Chris

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd like to apologise to our many slashdotters out there in listener land. Grandpa missed his meds this morning. He has now been pacified and is sleeping off the rest of the day in his room. Visitation hours will resume tomorrow at the usual time. Thank you for your understanding and patience.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Burz]

I read what lexsird said about electricity, although I don't think the situation is quite that dramatic because we're not facing regular blackouts yet.

The problem is over-concentrated power and wealth. This stems from an over-concentration of actual power (electricity, oil, etc.) especially in unaccountable hands (private corps with little or no competition). Look at what the then newly-deregulated utilities got away with in California a decade ago... that was like the shot that started the surge toward what Naomi Klein calls Disaster Capitalism.

The best long-term solution I can see is to become very efficient and to promote diffuse power generation (like rooftop solar) as far and wide as is possible... I mean, try to get it into everything much like ICs over the past few decades. In this case the 'everything' is anything that looks or behaves like real estate. We need a power revolution to go along with the computing revolution.

Changing the nature of power in this way is like revolutionizing access to land and water (the two other areas that have to be looked after)... The wider culture should rectify itself.

In the short term, we have to apply this thinking to the media landscape otherwise they will (at best) engage in crazy-making on the above issues while robber-barons continue taking over.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[sumdumass]

Wrong, if I commit a crime in your country and flee to another, extradition happens whether that is a crime or not in the other country.

Now, the long arm jurisdiction is a concept that was created specifically because of situations you described. If you target citizens of a certain country for your scam, you have now technically entered the jurisdiction of that country for the purposes of committing the scam. Very few countries will use the fact that it isn't illegal here yet as an excuse for you to evade punishment for it.

Australia did this over a copyright violation years ago with Hew Griffiths. He even fought extradition claiming it wasn't a crime in Australia for what he was accused of. This has been going on long before the internet has been around too. The only difference now is that we hear about it more and it's easier to get caught up in something when there is no clear borders.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[metacell]

The USA doesn't own the Internet. Each nation and corporation owns its own physical networks and servers. The underlying ideas and technology (like TCP/IP) were originally developed in the USA, but is owned by nobody. Since the 1990's, the ideas and technology have been developed internationally. For example, the World Wide Web was invented in Switzerland for European grant money.

The only "ball" in question is the .com DNS database, which is controlled by a US-American organisation. It resides on a few servers, which would be easy to duplicate anywhere in the world. If a country really wanted to have its own DNS database, they could probably set up one in a few weeks, to a reasonable cost.

The problem is that it'd be idiotic. It would fracture the Internet namespace so that different domain names connected to different IP addresses depending on where in the world you looked it up. If you logged in to a web service, and typed in the address to a third-party server, you could no longer be sure the web service saw the same site as you did. You couldn't be sure you and your friend were talking about the same site. Antivirus and anti-spam software would no longer be sure which sites they were blocking. And so on.

People are not protesting the "go play with your own ball" mentality because they're too cheap to buy their own DNS servers and set up their own DNS databases. They protest because they realise it'd hurt everyone, and it'd probably hurt the USA more than the rest of the world.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[metacell]

From Wikipedia:

By enacting laws or concluding treaties or agreements, countries determine the conditions under which they may entertain or deny extradition requests. Common bars to extradition include:

        * Failure to fulfill dual criminality - generally the act for which extradition is sought must constitute a crime punishable by some minimum penalty in both the requesting and the requested parties.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[cheekyjohnson]

basic human nature

I'd say that it's common, but not necessary. While I find it highly unlikely, there may exist people who act exactly as you describe.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[Jane Q. Public]

"The USA doesn't own the Internet. Each nation and corporation owns its own physical networks and servers."

I never said it did. In fact you are merely echoing what I have been saying.

"The only "ball" in question is the .com DNS database, which is controlled by a US-American organisation. It resides on a few servers, which would be easy to duplicate anywhere in the world. If a country really wanted to have its own DNS database, they could probably set up one in a few weeks, to a reasonable cost."

That was MY point. What's yours? Again, you are simply restating what I was already saying.

"The problem is that it'd be idiotic. It would fracture the Internet namespace so that different domain names connected to different IP addresses depending on where in the world you looked it up."

I wasn't suggesting that countries keep their own separate DNS systems for the same TLDs. Only that there is nothing stopping them from creating their own. Trying to maintain a separate DNS would indeed be silly.

"People are not protesting the "go play with your own ball" mentality because they're too cheap to buy their own DNS servers and set up their own DNS databases. They protest because they realise it'd hurt everyone, and it'd probably hurt the USA more than the rest of the world."

Nonsense. They could (hypothetically) create their own TLDs and simply interface with the DNS systems that control other TLDs. There is absolutely nothing technical preventing this from occurring... in fact it is being done now: each country has its own TLD today.

They are indeed bitching about wanting to "play with somebody else's ball". I personally don't mind so much if the situation changes so that .com, for example, were to become internationally controlled, but that wasn't my point. I was merely discussing the pointless whining about "the unfairness of it all".

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[sumdumass]

What is it with you and your reading comprehension?

GENERALLY does not mean ALWAYS.

The hew Griffith case I cited, was someone who actually used "it's not illegal here" as a defense against being extradited and is now in a Virginia prison. So we know that it has happened in the past.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[metacell]

So we agree that the action normally needs to be illegal in both countries?

I'm not familiar with the Hew Griffith case, but you're writing that Griffith claimed his action wasn't a crime in Australia. Is it possible the court didn't agree with him, i.e, thought the act was a crime in Australia, so dual criminality was fulfilled?

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[metacell]

I wasn't suggesting that countries keep their own separate DNS systems for the same TLDs. Only that there is nothing stopping them from creating their own. Trying to maintain a separate DNS would indeed be silly.

If the USA insists on blocking foreign .com domains, creating independent DNS databases may be the least harmful option. For example, a Korean company with a well-known .com address may not want to switch to a .ko address, and 1) lose visibility to their customers, and 2) risk that a competitor or spammer registers their old .com domain. Nor does the Korean government want that to happen to their businesses.

As you say, if people don't like the rules the USA decides for their ball, they should make their own balls. You can keep playing with yours in any way you like.

Re:Since US wants to play it this way

[sumdumass]

why don't you look it up then you can go on their word.

No, I do not agree that the actions need to normally be illegal in both countries. It would all depend on what the actions where and a host of other conditions involved. Some things, it would need to be illegal in both countries, others, it would not.

Typical western ideology

[Anonymous Coward]

"...as long as the content is directed at UK users, that's connection enough to ensure jurisdiction."

Typical western ideology, which advocates that the entire world belongs to them.

Re:Typical western ideology

[JMJimmy]

And why the internet is going to rapidly degrade into region specific websites where those areas with larger/richer populations will see excellent services and those with smaller/poorer populations will be severely under served.

Anonymity and freedom is what made the internet great; laws, fears, and corporations are what is destroying it.

Re:Typical western ideology

[Dunbal]

And why the internet is going to rapidly degrade

I prefer the term "evolve", into something new and wonderful and decentralized that completely sidesteps political grandstanding. Politicians are always a few years behind. It really only takes one person to come up with a suitable interface, and within a week everything is different. Look at how fast twitter became a common site - not that there's anything great about twitter, but that is the speed at which new technology is adapted into our modern lives. Give enough people a need (avoid censorship) and they will have a reason to a) invent or b) adopt a new technology that steps around it. We're all connected now. You can't simply disconnect us.

Re:Typical western ideology

[t2t10]

<sarcasm>Yeah, why can't the whole world be as peaceful and tolerant as the people who issued death sentences against the Danish cartoonists or Salman Rushdie?</sarcasm>

Re:Typical western ideology

[Noughmad]

And why the internet is going to rapidly degrade into region specific websites where those areas with larger/richer populations will see excellent services and those with smaller/poorer populations will be severely under served.

You mean there are going to be web services available only in America? And video sites will be able to selectively block videos in certain regions? And web-based game stores will have different prices depending on where you live? No, you must be joking.

Re:Typical western ideology

[JMJimmy]

You do realize that your example of Twitter is a perfect example of centralized services right?

My whole point is there won't be that quick adoption because country a will use service a, country b will use similar service b, country c won't have the service because there aren't enough people or enough money for it. Things won't grow as fast because they won't be available everywhere and fewer resources will be put into developing them.

Re:Typical western ideology

[JMJimmy]

I know you joke over simple examples but the difference between Canada and the US alone is already sizable. Compare Amazon.com vs Amazon.ca, restrictions on Skype, Hulu (and pretty much all of the US broadcaster's sites), etc etc.

Giving governments & courts this power over a shared resource leads to censorship (China/Australia/etc), taxation (California), and fragmentation - imagine Linux or any open source project having to have localized contributors or only being able to offer some features in some areas. Taxes to operate in a given country/province/city? Long distance fees for how far your data travels?

Where does it stop?

Don't quote me on this...

[cshark]

But I'm pretty sure most states in the US have the same targeting rule. That's how the assert jurisdiction over sites like Craigslist, Yahoo Local, and others. Of course, proving that the site is geographically targeted at one place or another is going to be tenuous with something like this.

Re:Don't quote me on this...

[jedidiah]

Local prosecutors have been successfully pulling this very sort of crap since the BBS days. It is really nothing new.

Re:Don't quote me on this...

[Anonymous Coward]

To be fair, as a general idea, digital media and law are in a really gray field right now. Imo, it's because the digital media in question doesn't conform to the standard of borders that currently exist. Media made can be directed in a way that makes the origin, or location of server, seem unimportant to some. With that said, again imo, this move is overstepping bounds, and violates a principal of privacy that we have as a precedent at least in American law. (IANAL, obviously.)

This, sadly, is a step towards 'global law' that should have been handed to an authority other than the US/UK gov'ts. Why does Interpol even exist when - when deemed needed - individual countries can make redundant structures?

Re:Don't quote me on this...

[Anonymous Coward]

These types of questions are what suggest that either the internet will fragment, all nations will agree to a rather broad set of law standards, or some sort of distasteful monitoring is inevitable..

Say, country A has decided not to legally recognize copyright at all. Country B has copy right law. Say I am a citizen of country A. If I access a website hosted in country A that hosts or points to media copyrighted in country B, am I doing anything illegal? If so, who's obligation is it to enforce this? Should country A demand that its ISP's block content based on other countries' laws? To what extent? What if one of those 'other countries' has extraordinarily strict laws and punishments? So, the media may be 'owned' by a foreign entity, but country A does not recognize that ownership at all. Should country A still be beholden to country B's laws of ownership? May country B rightfully hold country A liable (take a hostile position over this issue) or is this a 'legitimate' difference in cultural / legal position?

What if I am a citizen of country B and access that server in country A? Obviously, by my laws, I am infringing copyright. Who is then responsible for enforcement? Should the ISP's of country B be required to monitor my connection? Should they implement a blacklist? Should the government set up a monitoring border? Should country B 'attack' (legally or diplomatically) country A?

Re:Don't quote me on this...

[Anne Thwacks]

Should country B 'attack' (legally or diplomatically) country A?

Yes. Next question please.

Re:Don't quote me on this...

[wagnerrp]

The .com, .net, and .edu addresses are managed by a US based entity, and part of the contract of purchasing such a domain is that you obey the laws and regulations stipulated by the United States. If you wish to do things on your website that are illegal in the US, you can either block all traffic from addresses allocated to US ISPs, or you can purchase a domain for your specific ccTLD, which is not governed by US law.

Re:Don't quote me on this...

[king neckbeard]

or, y'know, the US could just not be dicks about this kind of thing.

Re:Don't quote me on this...

[king neckbeard]

It depends upon how you interpret copyright, mostly depending on whether you see copyright as a pragmatic tool or as an author's natural right. In the US, it's an agreement in which the public cedes a bit of liberty regarding copying to authors in hopes that giving authors this power results in more works being authored, putting the US deep within the 'pragmatic tool' group. Absent a voluntary international agreement for recognizing copyright of other countries, the citizens of another country have not taken part of that deal, so they have no obligations to not copy works of US authors.

Where a lot of the concern lies IMO is that much of the agreements that have been signed regarding copyright have strings attached, which makes calling them 'voluntary' questionable. If we see free trade as the norm, and restricted trade as a punishment, then Western nations are implicitly and sometimes explicitly threatening punishment for not doing something they have no obligation to do. That is imperialism/bullying/etc., and cannot be just.

Re:Don't quote me on this...

[ColdWetDog]

or, y'know, the US could just not be dicks about this kind of thing.

Why do you hate America?

Re:Don't quote me on this...

[toriver]

Why do you hate America?

How did you manage to find any hate there? Is all criticism hate? You start to sound like those right-wing Israeli politicians who consider all critics of their country's policies to be anti-Semites.

Sad ...

[gstoddart]

It really is sad to see US and UK companies playing this territorial-creep card ... oh well, maybe when their citizens start getting called for extradition to other countries they'll either explicitly acknowledge the double standard, or live with it and start making their citizens subject to laws from random places.

Mostly, I find it sad that copyright is the thing that these countries are most interested in protecting ... who needs liberty and democracy when we need to be sure nobody is ripping off some lame boy band that Sony has decided needs to be protected by the full brunt of the us DoJ.

And, I guess the UK only require that they "feel" they have jurisdiction ... that's a brilliant legal standard. Nice to know you can be extradited with a lower standard of proof for doing something which is entirely legal within your own country. The kid in question linked to stuff, and didn't even host it from what I read.

This is truly sad, and it means American laws have been totally taken over by corporate interests.

Re:Sad ...

[SuricouRaven]

American? I think that could be said of most countries.

Re:Sad ...

[joocemann]

I hardly care about enforcing against piracy, but id like to point out that natonalism is very last-generation and will die with our parents. Communication, globalization, and information access has dissolved the imaginary walls we earthlings once put up. One world democratic order is a good and welcome thing; and once we cooexist it will be comical to learn of the trivial differences people once had.

Re:Sad ...

[Osgeld]

here is a hint, do not use a us domain

its like living at 123 elm street and killing some one then bitching that its not illegal to murder in your own country, thats fine go the fuck back and murder all you like, and similarly go get your blah.co.ch and pirate all day long without fear of the US interfering with your operations

Re:Sad ...

[fmoliveira]

You talk shit like this because you live in the so caled developed world. For us others these walls will continue to be very real. They only weaken when it is for the benefit of the powerful.

Re:Sad ...

[Dunbal]

I hardly care about enforcing against piracy, but id like to point out that natonalism is very last-generation and will die with our parents.

I'm not so sure. That same fervor that drives religion, politics and sports fanaticism is what drives nationalism. I think this (misplaced) feeling of pride about what someone else is doing or saying or playing so long as he a) goes to the right church, b) plays for the right team, c) belongs to the right party or d) lives in our neighborhood is hard wired into our minds. Just like dogs have a mechanism that makes them prefer to live in organized packs, we humans love to form little tribes, clans or cliques. Yes the country may become less important, values may shift, but at the end of the day if you're not from [insert your town here] then you're a damned foreigner. It takes a lot of intelligence to become aware of this instinct and override it. Most people just aren't that smart.

Re:Sad ...

[houghi]

The double standard is explicitly acknowledged several times already.

Re:Sad ...

[jalspach]

I am waiting for the first law that has the tag "copyright Sony 2011 all rights reserved" it is probably not far off.

Re:Sad ...

[cheekyjohnson]

It takes a lot of intelligence to become aware of this instinct and override it.

It does? I feel nothing about any of the things that you listed. Are you sure it actually takes that much intelligence, or do "most" people just not try?

Re:Sad ...

[0123456]

I hardly care about enforcing against piracy, but id like to point out that natonalism is very last-generation and will die with our parents.

I believe you have that backwards. Internationalism was our parents' thing with wonderful organisations like the EU and UN supposed to eliminate nationalism; now the younger generations are seeing the problems 'globalisation' brings and the EU is on the verge of collapse as Germans don't want to pay higher taxes so Greeks can retire early and spend the rest of their lives drinking at a beach-side cafe.

Re:Sad ...

[brit74]

> "It really is sad to see US and UK companies playing this territorial-creep card ... oh well, maybe when their citizens start getting called for extradition to other countries they'll either explicitly acknowledge the double standard, or live with it and start making their citizens subject to laws from random places."

Most of the time, when someone does some action, it only affects the local people. For example, if some country wants to legalize drugs, then it's the local population who is most affected. On the other hand, since the internet is international, there is no "here" or "there". So, on the internet, if one country legalizes drugs, it's the equivalent of people in that country being allowed to legally ship drugs *everywhere* in the entire world. I don't agree with extradition in this case, but the problem still exists that things on the internet are international in a way that other crimes are not. That issue is not going away, and it will continue to cause problems going into the future.

> "Mostly, I find it sad that copyright is the thing that these countries are most interested in protecting ... who needs liberty and democracy when we need to be sure nobody is ripping off some lame boy band that Sony has decided needs to be protected by the full brunt of the us DoJ."

Where did you get the notion that "copyright is the thing that these countries are most interested in protecting". You sound like a person who got a parking ticket, and you complain that the police aren't out solving murders and concluding that "I guess parking violations are the thing that these countries are most interested in cracking down on".

> "And, I guess the UK only require that they "feel" they have jurisdiction ... that's a brilliant legal standard."

Regarding the "jurisdiction" issue (and ignoring this particular case - since I feel the UK generally has reasonably decent laws to deal with it themselves), I don't think it's always unreasonable for the US or UK to do something, although extradition is probably going too far. Given the international nature of the internet, and assuming that the local legal system is a lame duck, then it might be reasonable for the US to intervene, but I'd lean more towards putting pressure on the local government. For example, when the russian website AllOfMp3 was up and running, they were selling music for a few pennies a song. It was obvious that they were pocketing all the money for themselves, but it was legal in Russia because of a loophole in Russian law. I never bought anything from the site because I could see they were just for-profit pirates, which is a really crappy thing to do. So, AllOfMp3 was (1) Legal in Russia, and (2) On the internet, so it was available to internationally to everyone, without respect for national borders. Do you think what AllOfMp3 was doing was completely fine simply because they were hosted in Russia and legal under Russian law, or do you, like me, think what they were doing was screwing over people and the international nature of the internet means it's perfectly okay for the US to put pressure on Russia to close the loophole?

Also, if I remember correctly, the US has gone after international computer crackers. (Again, another symptom of the internet being an international space.) What the crackers are doing might be entirely legal in their own country, but I can completely understand why the US might go after someone located in another country. Out of curiosity, are you going to argue that the US has no jurisdiction and it should just go sit on its hands and continue to let crackers wreak havok?

> "This is truly sad, and it means American laws have been totally taken over by corporate interests."

You seems to think protection of copyright is entirely equivalent to "corporate interests". But, then, I suppose you could also claim that laws against shoplifting are also "protection of corporate interests" - while that's technically true, it sounds far more ominous.

Re:Sad ...

[joocemann]

Your analysis is very short sighted or naive. You do realize that we will globalize more, not less, than our parents... those so-called lessons you think people learned are miniscule in comparison to common ground and respect that has been found with international communications and social relationships. I think your cave is limiting your perspective...

Re:Sad ...

[joocemann]

I'm talking about reality, and your third world existence *will* integrate either at first by duress or desire, it will. Its not shit talk, its simply reality. I could write pages of facts to show you the trend, or you can look to your participation on slashdot, use of english, and your digital relationships as blatant tells of our future. Borders will dissolve, uncomfortably.

Re:Sad ...

[0123456]

You do realize that we will globalize more, not less, than our parents..

No you won't.

The Age of Big Things is over. Western governments are mostly bankrupt. The EU and UN are jokes. I won't be at all surprised to see the US break into a number of individual states or small groupings of states over the next few decades.

That doesn't mean that you won't have Facebook friends in Wherethehellamiistan or buy ebooks from China, but it does mean that you won't be getting told what to do by bureaucrats thousands of miles away who have nothing in common with you. The future is local, not global.

And as we move off this planet into space, the laws of physics alone make centralisation impossible.

Re:Sad ...

[the_leander]

It really is sad to see US and UK companies playing this territorial-creep card ... oh well, maybe when their citizens start getting called for extradition to other countries they'll either explicitly acknowledge the double standard, or live with it and start making their citizens subject to laws from random places.

What do you mean "maybe"? It's already happening now.

Re:Sad ...

[tsotha]

You're understating the scope of the problem by concentrating on copyright, which is only one slice of a very big pie. The US government has greatly extended its reach to an extent that previous generations (of Americans, let alone people in other countries) would have considered outrageous. In the last decade or so Congress has decided US laws apply to US citizens everywhere and even citizens of foreign countries in many cases. Drug laws, gambling laws, tax laws... did you know a US citizen who moves abroad and renounces his citizenship is supposed to pay US income taxes for ten more years?

There was an item in the news this week that reported Iranian oil suppliers are threatening to cut off Indian refineries. Why? Because the Indians can't figure out a way to pay the Iranians for the oil. Banks are afraid they'll go on the US government's financial black list and be forbidden from doing business with US banks anywhere in the world.

The US Congress simply refuses to recognize any limits on its jurisdiction. Of course it wouldn't matter if other countries would guard their own sovereignty, but for some reason they don't. Hell, I'm an American and I wish other countries would tell Uncle Sam to take a hike when he starts throwing his weight around.

Re:Sad ...

[AngryDeuce]

This is truly sad, and it means American laws have been totally taken over by corporate interests.

What's even sadder is that everyone says this, and acknowledges it ad nauseum, yet nothing ever changes at all.

Where the hell are all the people that see the writing on the wall on fucking election day? That's what I want to know. We see rulings handed down like the abomination that was Citizen's United v. FEC and nobody does a goddamned thing about it. We bitch and moan and bitch some more about how we're being bent over by our ISP's, Telecoms, Big Media, Big Oil, Big Pharma, Big Retail,...does anyone actually DO anything about it? Half the eligible voters in this country don't even take the time to go down to their polling place and exercise their constitutional right to cast a ballot...and how often are elections, once a year, if that?

I live in a college town full of self-professed "socialists" that talk big of tearing it all down and starting over again...and then their Dominos Extra-Larges show up and they get back to playing the newest generic shooter on their Xbox 360 and taking bong rips. People that sit here and rail against exploitation in Asia, yet every single thing in their home comes from either Walmart, Target, or Best Buy. Everyone is an activist until it actually involves doing something other than sitting on their ass and tuning into tonight's America's Idol's Got Survivor Skills: Extreme Shore Edition.

Sorry for my language, but I'm tired of it. If you guys really want things to change, that means a little sacrifice, either in time, money, or comfort. As long as all we do is sit here and bitch about it, then this country is never going to change. If we're not going to get off our ass and vote them out, then our only other options are to either get used to it, or deal with it like our Founding Father's did.

Re:Sad ...

[fyoder]

This is truly sad, and it means American laws have been totally taken over by corporate interests.

Totally? I don't think so. Maybe 80%. You'll know it has reached 'totally' when the creeping corporatism that's been going on for a long time finally morphs into its even more evil sister, fascism. That's not an inevitability, just the current trajectory.

Re:Sad ...

[couchslug]

"One world democratic order is a good and welcome thing; and once we cooexist it will be comical to learn of the trivial differences people once had."

That shit doesn't even work in democratic COUNTRIES, let alone scale beyond that.

Re:Sad ...

[Anonymous Coward]

I think on the whole, humans need an "us" and "them". What could eventually unite humanity is a common threat to all like an alien invasion where we all have to work together to thwart it.

Anecdotally, I notice a lot of people's default "them" is "everybody else". When there's really bad weather, that's the "them" and people seem generally friendlier. If someone or something needs to be rescued, the "them" is the danger and people cooperate to make the rescue a success. At a funeral the "them" is the death of a loved one, and people generally put their differences aside. Watch for this sometime and notice the different dynamics.

Re:Sad ...

[Burz]

Are you referring to the international "respect" of fabricating lies to invade another country? And not just with Iraq. How about instituting an international network of torture, and an official policy to kill anyone labeled a "combatant" from anywhere on Earth outside a war zone and without a trial?

And that's just for starters.

I think it is your nebulous and cheesy 'big picture' that is lacking in perspective. When Americans have gotten to the point where the resources per capita is just approaching what the EU has now, it will become abundantly clear even to you that all that 'freedom' and "respect" was little more than the freedom of the average westerner to distract themselves with inconsequential or wasteful bullsh!t that kept them out of the way of the kleptocrats.

Re:Sad ...

[toriver]

Yes, it's the same thing as when Google wanted google.kz and Kazakhstan demanded the servers had to physically be within the country.

Or when the bit.ly URL shortener service censored links that redirected to sites the Libyan Government deemed inappropriate.

Except then it apparently was "wrong" according to (probably) some of the people who now defend VeriSign for their subservience to the industries that have morphed copyright from a culture builder into a profit tool.

Re:Sad ...

[metacell]

I believe you have that backwards. Internationalism was our parents' thing with wonderful organisations like the EU and UN supposed to eliminate nationalism; now the younger generations are seeing the problems 'globalisation' brings and the EU is on the verge of collapse as Germans don't want to pay higher taxes so Greeks can retire early and spend the rest of their lives drinking at a beach-side cafe.

Saying that EU is a step towards globalisation is only half true. The EU works for free trade between its member countries, but towards the outside world, it keeps maintaining tariffs and trade restrictions.

Re:Sad ...

[metacell]

It's happening, possibly to a lesser degree, in other countries too. For example, Sweden has decided that Swedish citizens can be prosecuted in a Swedish court for having sex with minors, regardless of where in the world it takes place. Some politicians are working towards doing the same for prostitution - a Swedish citizen could be prosecuted for hiring a prostitute anywhere in the world.

Re:Sad ...

[fmoliveira]

When it benefits the powerful it happens. But average 3rd world joe won't ever be able to work in the US, and you'll never drink coke with sugar instead of corn sirup again.

Re:Sad ...

[Anonymous Coward]

America's Idol's Got Survivor Skills: Extreme Shore Edition

Man, I love that movie..

Re:Sad ...

[joocemann]

3rd world joe immigrates here at nearly 1M per year, and the people of india/china are coming up so fast that the people in the US have not seen wage increase with inflation since 1972. This is globalization. In the end it won't matter where on earth you live, you'll get the same basic resources and wages as anywhere else... give it centuries..... the next century will be uncomfortable as we begin the transition and break through old thought. I welcome the change and am trying as much as I can to prepare for the resistance.

To be fair

[brit74]

To be fair, every place on the internet is accessible from everywhere. In that sense, there is no "here" or "there". Out of curiosity, what if the US and the UK were targeting websites that were spreading computer viruses, or websites that were used as command-and-control points for viruses? Should it make a difference whether or not those websites were hosted inside the US/UK?

Re:To be fair

[betterunixthanunix]

Out of curiosity, what if the US and the UK were targeting websites that were spreading computer viruses, or websites that were used as command-and-control points for viruses?

It would still be bad. Governments should not be filtering Internet communications, nor should they be enforcing their laws in other countries.

Don't use .com

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't want ICE to take down your site, use a domain from another country.

Re:Don't use .com

[Anonymous Coward]

My uncle can get you a very nice .ng domain, just send me some cash. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1nKR3gYRY8/

Re:Sad ..

[Anubis350]

Either you're trolling or I want a hit of whatever you're smoking!

What the hell!

[Dyinobal]

Why in the world is the The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency going after piracy websites, how in the world does something on the internet fall into their jurisdiction? I'd like to know in who's mind their job has anything to do with Piracy websites located outside the USA. Anyone?

Re:What the hell!

[Anonymous Coward]

Bribes,.

Re:What the hell!

[couchslug]

The Party of Disney is in the White House, and even moderate Republicans like Obama tend to be welded at the lips to the Great Media Sphincter.

What's horrible is the above should be a troll, but it's true.

The Department of Mission Creep (excuse me, "Homeland Security") is also wasting resources in pursuit of IP violations. All well and good until someone loses a Trade Center.

Re:What the hell!

[westlake]

Why in the world is the The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency going after piracy websites, how in the world does something on the internet fall into their jurisdiction

The shrort answer is that crimes that cross our international borders tend to fall under the jurisdiction of those responsible for protecting our borders.

Cyber Crimes Center:

C3 brings the full range of ICE computer and forensic assets together in a single location to combat such Internet-related crimes as:

Possession, manufacture and distribution of images of child abuse.
International money laundering and illegal cyber-banking.
Illegal arms trafficking and illegal export of strategic/controlled commodities.
Drug trafficking (including prohibited pharmaceuticals).
General Smuggling (including the trafficking in stolen art and antiquities; violations of the Endangered Species Act etc.)
Intellectual property rights violations (including music and software).
Immigration violations; identity and benefit fraud

US Immigration & Customs Endforcement: Ctber Crimes

Re:What the hell!

[bjwest]

Why in the world is the The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency going after piracy websites, how in the world does something on the internet fall into their jurisdiction? I'd like to know in who's mind their job has anything to do with Piracy websites located outside the USA. Anyone?

Customs enforcement means goods import control. In their minds, they're responsible for controlling the importing of data.

Re:What the hell!

[westlake]

The Party of Disney is in the White House, and even moderate Republicans like Obama tend to be welded at the lips to the Great /Media Sphincter.

The geek wants his free media fix.

His middle class entitlement. You can't "do" P2P without a substantial up-front investment in hardfware and services -- which means the plebs are relegated to the Red Box.

The politician sees multi-billion dollar investments in an industry that from its very beginnings has been a politically potent symbol of American culture and technical dominance

Republican or Democrat, that is a much easier sell to the voters in his home district, especially if that district is a production center like New York, Nashville, central Florida or southern California.

The Department of Mission Creep (excuse me, "Homeland Security") is also wasting resources in pursuit of IP violations. All well and good until someone loses a Trade Center.

Homeland Security brought almost all federal law enforcement agencies and services under a single banner - including the Coast Guard. Something that was long overdue.

Government multi-tasks.

The little fish always whine that the net is woven too tight.

Re:What the hell!

[EvilStein]

Easy. The Obama administration has been bought off by Hollywood Democrats. From his cabinet having *FIVE* former top RIAA attorneys, to a whole bunch of pro-Hollywood $$$$ senators like Boxer & Feinstein. Joe Biden consistently got failing grades when it came to tech privacy issues.

But America was clouded by the "hope & change" and "yes we can" crap. Geeks were shoved to the back of the room, and this is what we're getting.

then any US corp needs face US labor law for China

[Joe_Dragon]

then any US corp needs face US labor law for China work.

So apple you better look out as the I-stuff factory does not comply.

Extradition to other countries won't happen.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's mostly here in the US were corporations have corrupted the rule of law to the point where their interests come first. And unlike most other countries, we have laws now that have turned Civil cases into criminal cases.

If you or I had a copyright infringement case, we'd have to sue - it wouldn't be a criminal case. We'd have to find the person, sue in their courts, and cross our fingers if we can actually get any damages.

Someone infringes on Disney's (or any other large corporation) copyright, they can have the people with the badges and guns go after them.

Reductionist? Over simplification? I'm just an ordinary citizen and that's that way I see it.

We are not a Republic. We are not free. Today on July 4th our Independence Day, I'm going to treat it as any other day and feel the sadness for all of those young people who have died or been maimed fighting for the US corporate interests.

If Anyone Can Assert Juristiction Over It

[Greyfox]

Then anyone can. So do you want your internet held to the same free speech standards that you'd find in China or, let's say, Libya? Do you want some Muslim cleric sentencing US or UK site-owners to death by stoning because of their depictions of women? Do you want China issuing arrest warrants on some guy in Minnesota because he was talking about Tibet? Do you want some totalitarian United States regime arresting Soviets and... Oh wait we already did that. Well anyway, that's where this is leading us.

Re:If Anyone Can Assert Juristiction Over It

[gnasher719]

Then anyone can. So do you want your internet held to the same free speech standards that you'd find in China or, let's say, Libya? Do you want some Muslim cleric sentencing US or UK site-owners to death by stoning because of their depictions of women? Do you want China issuing arrest warrants on some guy in Minnesota because he was talking about Tibet?

Libya is a bad example, since the population is in the process of overthrowing their dictator, who thinks nothing of killing the people of his country to hold on to power a little bit longer.

But fact is that it would be quite possible for a US site-owner to be convicted to death by stoning if what they are doing is bad enough according to the law of some country, and if that country feels it has jurisdiction. If that happened, it would be unlikely that the site owner would be extradited if the problem was merely "depiction of women", but it would happen if what the site owner did was a crime worth a death sentence according to US law. And it would be very, very unwise of the site owner to visit the country in question.

He who has the gold

[benjfowler]

... makes the rules. America is set up purely so that the strong can prey on the weak. It's as American as guns and apple pie.

How better to demonstrate that (on the 4th of July), by showing that powerful moneyed corporate interests can reach out and grab you from the other side of the world, even on the flimsiest of pretexts, merely because their outdated and broken business models are threatened.

It's breathtaking how short-termist and self-interested this thinking is. Of course, Russia, China and Iran won't be allowed to extradite Westerners who 'injure' them in imaginary ways -- only US Big Media can, because they bribe and lobby US lawmakers and have good access to the Obama administration.

Re:He who has the gold

[t2t10]

Of course, Russia, China and Iran won't be allowed to extradite Westerners who 'injure' them in imaginary ways -- only US Big Media can,

Well, that's a relief!

I still prefer Disney's lawyers to Putin.

Re:He who has the gold

[Anonymous Coward]

I would normally agree with you. Except that the US does NOT have the gold. The US owes pretty much the whole country (how many trillions is the debt now?).

The US do have the guns, and the weight to bully other countries.

and, lets not forget, you also have excellent apple pie! :)

Death to DNS

[0123456]

All they're really going to do is hasten the death of the centralised DNS system. Which isn't a bad thing.

Shame it's taken a bunch of law-breaking pirates to really demonstrate the flaws of such a system.

Re:Death to DNS

[TooMuchToDo]

Expect torrent/gray area DNS to move towards things like distributed hash tables, most likely signed asymmetric keys. Torrent clients and sites are already using DHT for magnet links and finding other clients. It's not rocket science to keep moving down the OSI stack.

Re:Death to DNS

[Anonymous Coward]

Shame it's taken a bunch of law-breaking pirates to really demonstrate the flaws of such a system.

Don't forget about the people making copies of songs and music, they did their part as well.

Your point?

[Random2]

For those who don't know what the Berne Convention is, it's a treaty where the signatories treat the copyright of one country as if it is copyrighted in theirs. Most of the countries in the world have signed this convention.

So, regardless of what one may thing of pirating, the US and UK are well within their rights by doing this. So are many other countries, which either do not or are not making headlines.

I thought this was Slashdot, not Slanderdot?

Re:Your point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only that , but the U.S. was late to the party on this one. So I agree with you, Slashdotters seem to morphing into poll takers and facebook "likers" I doubt few have posted here could adequately explain the basic copyright law of their own country, much less that of another. But like the frogs leg, all that is needed to invoke an involuntary response is the "battery" of buzzwords like copyright and the regurgitation of dogma spew forth.

Re:Your point?

[gl4ss]

well, the arguing would then be about where the crime took place, if it's indian site and pakistan user, wouldn't it be up to the pakistan and indian auhorities to do the investigation and court proceedings? and is uk willing to make the court happenings and take the stand that the crimes happened on UK territory? if that would be a sure fire way to get into a warm meal in the uk I bet a lot of people would start doing hard core copyright infringing.

Re:Your point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Read it carefully... "as if it is copyrighted in theirs" that assumes that countries have different laws and infringement in one doesn't mean infringement in both.
Berne Convention also requires due process...

Re:Your point?

[metacell]

For those who don't know what the Berne Convention is, it's a treaty where the signatories treat the copyright of one country as if it is copyrighted in theirs. Most of the countries in the world have signed this convention.

So, regardless of what one may thing of pirating, the US and UK are well within their rights by doing this. So are many other countries, which either do not or are not making headlines.

I thought this was Slashdot, not Slanderdot?

*groan* It's not about the right to protect copyright, it's about who decides when a site should be shut down on what grounds.

If a site hosts both legal and illegal content, is it right to shut down the entire site (without even hearing the site owner)?

Let's Hasten the Decentralization of DNS

[jeek]

Let's get this idea out so that it gets implemented and leads to the decentralization of the DNS process...

How about the U.S. starts seizing domains everywhere at the request of a U.S.-led cabal that has, as a condition of entry, the requirement that members agree to a U.S.-centric policy on copyright infringement?

After the inevitable collapse of the current centralized DNS process, a couple of browser plugins and people will go on doing what they were already doing.

Re:Let's Hasten the Decentralization of DNS

[dufachi]

Let's get this idea out so that it gets implemented and leads to the decentralization of the DNS process...

How about the U.S. starts seizing domains everywhere at the request of a U.S.-led cabal that has, as a condition of entry, the requirement that members agree to a U.S.-centric policy on copyright infringement?

After the inevitable collapse of the current centralized DNS process, a couple of browser plugins and people will go on doing what they were already doing.

Only then, possessing or offering said plugin will be a Class A Felony punishable by 20 years in prison.

Re:Let's Hasten the Decentralization of DNS

[Agripa]

Only then, possessing or offering said plugin will be a Class A Felony punishable by 20 years in prison.

Driver's License? For what? A disk drive?

Re:Let's Hasten the Decentralization of DNS

[doublec]

Let's get this idea out so that it gets implemented and leads to the decentralization of the DNS process...

An approach that is currently in development is Namecoin. It's a decentralized DNS approach based on Bitcoin. Names are registered and stored in the namecoin blockchain. More information is available at the dot-bit project website. Currently the software is there for registering and looking up names. What's needed is easier to use software like browser plugins and DNS proxies that lookup via namecoin. Some of this is in progress like the proxy, DNS and whois capability provided by namecoin.us.

Re:Let's Hasten the Decentralization of DNS

[falcnor]

I'll second doublec on namecoins. It's a slick system of holding name information in a blockchain that cannot be stripped and shutdown by a simple will of authority. Come check it out at http://dot-bit.org/ and on FreeNode IRC #namecoin.

Re:Let's Hasten the Decentralization of DNS

[street_astrologist]

I can confirm that Namecoin is highly relevant to both this thread, and to the interests of Slashdotters in general. Anyone who is serious about decentralization of DNS should familiarize themselves with the project.

As an added bonus, it's a generalized namespace - so domains are just one possible application.

Corporate America

[Giantmoth]

Doesn't the Immigrations and Customs department have better things to do than the bidding of corporate lobbyists?

Re:Corporate America

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but they wouldn't get "payed anything extra" for their "exemplary dedication and performance at work".

Re:Corporate America

[Anonymous Coward]

He who pays the piper calls the tune.

Re:Corporate America

[westlake]

Doesn't the Immigrations and Customs department have better things to do than the bidding of corporate lobbyists?

Customs = Foreign Trade and Commerce.

The promotion and protection of which is a federal responsibility.

The Pixar feature costs $200 million to produce. If it is Toy Story 3, it grosses $635 million abroad in first-run theatrical release and anchors a franchise whose economic impact can be measured in the billions of dollars.

Lawyers and politician make it up as they go

[Anonymous Coward]

What is or is not jurisdiction depends on the whim of the lawyer or politician making the call. If it isn't in their jurisdiction then the politicians make a law to say that it is. If there is no law then the lawyer interprets an existing law differently to embrace whatever it is they want.

That's Ok for them. If you try to do the same thing you will be in trouble. Why? Because they will invent a law or interpret one which already exists to show that you can't.

I heard a lawyer the other day explaining what makes international law (he was discussing the UK's military action in Libya.) I was amazed to hear him say that international law is, in part, derived from how countries act. In other words, if a big enough country does it it becomes international law.

Lawyers and politicians are the scum of the earth not for what they do but for how they attempt to justify it. Dogs, crooks, liars and hypocrites the lot of em.

Government, Incorporated.

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone who is surprised that the US might engage in
behavior which might not be legal with respect to copyright enforcement
needs to refresh his or her understanding of the way the world operates.

This is not about what is "legal" or what is "right", it is about
money and power.

Remember all this the next time you consider sending more money
to the RIAA. Me, I will never buy music again, ever. and if that means
I have to only listen to the 130GB of music I already have that's just fine with me.

Re:Government, Incorporated.

[CelticWhisper]

You can buy music, just use this first: http://riaaradar.com/

Re:Sad ..

[joocemann]

Trolling how?

Not targeted at UK citizens

[michelcolman]

First page of piracy site: are you a citizen of the UK? Yes/No. If you click "yes", you will not get access. Wink wink...

Re:Not targeted at UK citizens

[Cito]

hehe could definitely see http://icefilms.info/ doing that

Take them to court?

[Anonymous Coward]

Lets see, you take the foreign website to court, they don't show up, they lose, they could care less and still keep operating and you can't stop them! Makes good sense to me! Most countries that didn't sign on to things like the DCMA could care less about piracy! It's a losing battle!

Re:Take them to court?

[Anonymous Coward]

"could care less"

So... they do care, then?

Link from 2006

[Bratmon]

Here's a link from an old website from 2006: http://humorix.org/10384

Not getting it.

[Anonymous Coward]

I just woke up, so forgive me if you're being sarcastic/going somewhere else - but since I've seen things, man, on the Internet, this point needs reinforcing:

Disclaimer nonsense such as this has no legal standing. Doesn't matter if you're posting some 24-hour nonsense on your emulator ROM site; doesn't matter if you're whining that law enforcement can't connect to your FTP of warez. Doesn't matter if you don't want UK citizens in your site, snatching your mp3s.

You're committing copyright infringement, and your disclaimers will not save you.

Who did not see that coming ?

[Anonymous Coward]

And now folk, you know why us from other part of the world saw the US hand over ICAN and DNS with a bad feeling and told you it would be abused. You told us "no it won't" and "we would rather have the DNS and ICANN in the US country of freedom blahblah blah". Well suck it.

ITU is rubbing its hand with glee

[mjwalshe]

this could end up with the UN/ITU taking over the TLD domain system if your not careful

Border Radio Precedent?

[Anonymous Coward]

In the 1930's, as a response to the increasing regulation of the public airwaves in the US, many broadcasters set up powerful radio transmitters just across the Mexican border and used them to beam powerful signals into the American market. These "border radio" stations provided alternative entertainment (e.g. Wolfman Jack on XEBR) to the public and advertising services to unscrupulous businesses.

The US governernment tried various tricks to stop these operators but stopped short of actually declaring jurisdiction over them.

We can see a parallel between these border radio stations and the Internet of today. However, whereas in the past sovereignty was recognized as something inviolable, today the attitude is somewhat different. The sanctity of foreign nations and their laws has become only a minor obstacle.

canada

[Anonymous Coward]

Has a nifty law that states what we do on the net canuck law only applies thus extradition based on a law that is not illegal here will fail.

They can go after whomever they want

[gottspeed]

Jurisdiction is a matter of commercial liability in this day and age, not what we're taught to believe anyway. I think Lawyers say jurisdiction is ensured in most cases for reasons that go beyond precedents or statute, its fear and conditioning that give way to jurisdiction ultimately (I just recently learned about my inalienable right of self determination). I suspect its why they threw the book at that Hispanic mom and her son years ago for downloading an MP3, they knew there was no chance of that debt slave doing ANYTHING about the charges. Theater.

You've all said it

[Anonymous Coward]

Well you've all covered it, basically. I was going to add a GoodLuckWithThat but its kind of implied by the backlash that is going to bury these parties in the peat bog of history.

its NOT about piracy

[jonwil]

Despite the "cover story" spread by the big media companies, all their action is not really about stopping piracy, its about stopping the biggest threat to the big media companies since Edison invented the phonograph.

Specifically, the Internet threatens to take away the control that the big media companies have as gatekeepers of what we consume.

Part of WHY I'm not a "registered 'LUSER'"...

[Anonymous Coward]

You said it yourself, on "tribalism" in fact, here in this quote:

" It takes a lot of intelligence to become aware of this instinct and override it. Most people just aren't that smart." - by Dunbal (464142) * on Monday July 04, @01:53PM (#36654170)

Never been a "big fan" folks folks that live their lives thru identifying with a pack or others that way, ESPECIALLY about sports (& I'm a former lettered NCAA athlete & starter in a sport too (Lacrosse) for a many time divisional or national champ).

Fact is - It always made me feel bad in a way for folks that live their lives as "armchair QB's" sort of... it really does, because it says quite a lot about them. Especially those that REALLY "get into it"...

(Mainly in hearing them say "My team won" or "Our team RULES" etc./et al)

I state that for the simple fact that very few of them actually have BEEN on said team(s) themselves in this life & if they wanted it BAD enough? They could have been... or done well & gone far in said endeavor (not just sport) anyhow, perhaps not reaching the "absolute pinnacle of achievement" but good enough to have been on the same ballcourt with "the best" @ any time.

E.G.-> I have often felt like asking them "Is YOUR name on the jerseys out there, & are you on the payroll or scholarship for said team?"

Now, as to "strength-in-numbers"?

I call it more like "You're weak and NEED strength in numbers, because you can't do it on your own!"

* In the end though, I wouldn't call it "intelligence"... that's a very LARGE word & folks might be offended by it.

(I'd call it more of a 'streak of independence' (per today's date July 4th/Independence Day), in not electing to be "part of the team/the 'in-crowd'" so-to-speak).

(BUT in the end? What do I know?? It's not really right to impose MY way of thinking on others, it's just what I elected to be like & do online, & in life... I am just trying to make it through without regrets is all...)

APK

P.S.=> Plus - as to my "registered 'LUSER'" comment above? Don't be offended... it's only a play on words & imo @ least?? Most of the registered folks here are decent folks!

However, it does indicate some of that, because I see an "elitist" atttitude for us AC's often being thrown around here too! I've seen absolutely SOLID & outstanding comments by the "AC crowd" here too, as good as ANY registered person's in fact... many times.

Still - *some AC's* have it over you registered folks: For example - I can post as much as I like & in fact, MORE if I elect to do so, than registered users can! No discriminatory "10 posts per 24 hours" limit 'holds me down' either (I have a very, Very, VERY FAST way around it)... Additionally, IF I want to compliment someone? I do it directly, no "mod points/karma chasing" required here... BEST PART THOUGH? I am by FAR less "trackable for trolling" than registered users are... by far...

... apk

Re:then any US corp needs face US labor law for Ch

[IrquiM]

My impression was that the Chinese had better labour laws than the US?

How about rendition?

[Anonymous Coward]

How about if they go to a friendly country where the perp gets picked up and handed over to, say, Syria and stoned to death for his crime?

It's what the USA does.