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Microsoft Blocks FSF Donation Website As a 'Gambling Site'

Posted by timothy on from the what-are-the-odds? dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The FSF slammed Microsoft for categorizing donate.fsf.org website as a 'Gambling Site.' Corporate systems that use a Microsoft 'network security' program cannot access FSF donation website because of this and as a result, many people were unable to make donations. FSF has submitted a correction to Microsoft and they are now waiting for a response. However, John Sullivan warned corporate about Microsoft's proprietary network security programs."

22 of 301 comments (clear)

  1. Stay grounded by meekg · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hysterics and hyperbole do not serve us well.
    IF MS ignores the correction, sure. But that hasn't happened, has it?

    1. Re:Stay grounded by beelsebob · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Frankly, the idea that this could be accidental in the first place is ludicrous.

      Frankly, the idea that it wasn't accidental is ludicrous, I would doubt very highly that MS has humans categorising sites, instead it's probably all automated based on roughly the same tech as email spam filters.

    2. Re:Stay grounded by NotBorg · · Score: 5, Funny

      Hysterics and hyperbole do not serve us well.

      You must be new here. What have you done with 30651? Is he ok? What are your demands?

      --
      I want this account deleted.
    3. Re:Stay grounded by 1u3hr · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Frankly, the idea that this could be accidental in the first place is ludicrous.

      No, MS aren't stupid. They would know such a block could not stand for long and would generate much bad publicity for them. They'd much rather just ignore the FSF. Now they'll probably have to apologise to them. Never ascribe to malice what can be explained by stupidity.

      More likely the FSF home page, with all of its talk about "free software" was classified by MS's filters as a warez site.

    4. Re:Stay grounded by Xtifr · · Score: 4, Insightful

      No, MS aren't stupid.

      Citation needed. Bringing obviously-faked evidence into a courtroom seems like a strong counter-example to this claim.

      Never ascribe to malice what can be explained by stupidity.

      Wait, now you're saying they are stupid? :)

      More likely the FSF home page, with all of its talk about "free software" was classified by MS's filters as a warez site.

      That might make sense if it had been classified as a warez site. But it wasn't. If I had to make an honest guess, mine would be an in-house joke used during testing that got left in when they went live.

      That's assuming they do fix it and apologize. Otherwise, I think we're back to malice. ;)

  2. donate.fsf.org is just a redirect by xiando · · Score: 5, Informative

    You can go directly to http://my.fsf.org/donate/ if donate.fsf.org is blocked by your local friendly firewall. You can also use Tor to bypass blocks like these.

    --
    9/11: Never forget it was a false-flag operation
    1. Re:donate.fsf.org is just a redirect by betterunixthanunix · · Score: 4, Informative

      You can also use Tor to bypass blocks like these.

      Eh....

      It is not impossible to block Tor. A standard approach is to have the firewall block all Tor entry nodes, which forces people to use bridge nodes instead. Increasingly, though, there is an approach that is much harder to evade: blocking of connections that match Tor's "fingerprint" i.e. because Tor uses OpenSSL in a way that can be distinguished from Firefox+NSS etc.

      Of course, there is a bright side if you are dealing with a school or corporate firewall: you can always set up a system at your house that you SSH to, and use as a proxy server. That was something friends of mine used to do in high school.

      --
      Palm trees and 8
  3. malice or incompetence? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    what's that old saying "never attribute to malice what can be attributed to incompetence" or whatever? I mean this is MS we're talking about...

    1. Re:malice or incompetence? by AliasMarlowe · · Score: 4, Insightful

      what's that old saying "never attribute to malice what can be attributed to incompetence" or whatever? I mean this is MS we're talking about...

      Which makes malice in the guise of incompetence particularly insidious and effective.
      In the absence of clear evidence one way or the other, it's best to reserve judgment regarding malice vs incompetence where a recidivist company notorious for its dirty tricks is concerned. The aphorism you quoted (especially the "never" bit) is overridden in this case by Microsoft's track record of cunning malice, mind-boggling incompetence, incompetent malice, and malicious incompetence. It could be any of them.

      --
      Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
    2. Re:malice or incompetence? by houstonbofh · · Score: 4, Informative

      You realise that this is not Microsoft Security Essentials, but the network security product, right? So anyone behind it on the network... Like at a company, or corporate guest network, or school, or very badly designed hotel wifi?

  4. Re:Microsoft is the bad guy, how exactly? by betterunixthanunix · · Score: 5, Informative

    Why is everyone so paranoid

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween_documents

    Even if they don't allow it, maybe they would rather their employees donated in their own free time and not on their network?

    You could at least read and understand the summary (RAUTFS?). It is not just Microsoft's own network; this is something a Microsoft product that is used on numerous corporate networks is doing.

    --
    Palm trees and 8
  5. Re:Why is this news? by genjix · · Score: 4, Interesting

    There's speculation that their accepting of Bitcoin inadvertantly categorised them as a gambling website. Bitcoin is popular for gambling sites now because of the lack of restrictions for such sites to exist compared with normal gambling sites which can take days to deposit and many hoops to jump through. It does not seem malicious or incompetent that this mistake happened.

  6. Re:Why is this news? by robthebloke · · Score: 5, Funny

    I don't know why you say that, Microsoft have had an extremely good record supporting the installation of free software on their systems. Just look back at how easy they made it to install such common packages as the blaster virus, the chernobyl virus, conflicker, et al. Anyone who claims microsoft tries to stifle free software, hasn't really been looking at the facts.....

  7. Re:Why is this news? by Rei · · Score: 5, Funny

    I don't know who makes the ban list that my company uses, but fedora's site is blocked, classified in the category "Tasteless". Other Linux distros' sites are fine.

    I think someone has a sense of humor ;)

    --
    Rhetorical questions suck. Why ask a question if you don't want an answer?
  8. Re:Why is this news? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Hi, I'm on the Microsoft firewall team. I'll explain what's going on.

    First off I should say that the Free Software Foundation is in fact a type of gambling site seeing as how it can cause people to lose their sense of free market capitalism. Having free software means that for-profit software industries are losing money that would otherwise be spent on expensive and high quality software systems like Microsoft Windows. So yes the economy is losing money to free software just like gambler's lose money to the casino.

    Microsoft also endeavors to protect children from obscene and immoral ideas that are related to socialism, like the free software movement. So yes, "free software" is among the words on our block list. Other dangerous words that we will protect children from are:

    gun control
    global warming
    evolution
    Noam Chomsky
    Canada
    medical marijuana
    Green Peace
    Al Jazeera
    Julian Assange
    Israeli Apartheid
    corporate welfare
    union
    taxation
    Digital Restrictions Management
    public school teacher
    anal probe

  9. Re:Why is this news? by jrumney · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There's speculation that their accepting of Bitcoin inadvertantly categorised them as a gambling website. ... It does not seem malicious or incompetent that this mistake happened.

    That looks pretty incompetent to me.

  10. Re:Why is this news? by elrous0 · · Score: 4, Funny

    I concur that we should do everything in our power to protect our children from anal probe.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  11. Re:Why is this news? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    "Whatcha ya laughin' aboot, eh?"

    "You'll love this, someone mentioned Canada, eh."

    "Ooh, ya, that's a good one, eh!"

  12. Re:Why is this news? by TheMMaster · · Score: 5, Funny

    Yes! Don't let children near priests!

    --
    Fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity
  13. Re:Legal Response by LurkerXXX · · Score: 4, Informative

    Or...

    The FSF should realize that twdx.net, their provider, also hosts gambling sites such as http://www.poker-tester.com/ etc, and that their IP may have either been previously used by a gambling site, or was blacklisted in a block along with other gambling sites hosted at that provider.

    It's nice out today and doesn't look like rain. You can take off the tin-foil hat.

  14. Re:Why is this news? by flyingfsck · · Score: 4, Funny

    Yankee go home, eh? Don't come over here just fer cheap shoppin, meds and weed and then poke fun at us, eh? Lest we thump yer ass and burn the white house down agin, eh?

    --
    Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
  15. Re:Why is this news? by dakohli · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Of course the panel front and center which reads:

    Stand up for your freedom to install free software
    !
    Join 30,000 people in opposing Microsoft's Restricted Boot by signing this statement

    Has nothing to do with it.