I really don't think it's some horrendous oversight to expect that people will be kind to a service that you offer.
If you offer anonymous and free image uploading it's not wrong to assume that not 100% of your traffic will be pornographic uploads and I also don't think it's wrong that if after years of your offering, if you get to the point where all of your uploads are porn, that you feel the need to shutdown your service.
Nobody is entitled to do bad things with good tools.
Anything illegal on these forums is going to be encrypted with the decrypt passwords shared over tor sites. It's not like people are posting a cleartext version of stolen_credit_cards.csv
The operators don't know what's being posted. This is a problem because it's what's called "inducement of a crime" - it's like if you say "We are a bar that doesn't check IDs" - you have a responsibility that comes with the operations. If you have a bunch of underage people in the bar because of your policy of not checking IDs, that responsibility falls on you. When you choose to forego responsibilities, you get that secondary liability.
See Kim Dotcom, MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd., 545 U.S. 913 and Arista Records LLC v. Lime Group LLC. The courts have spoken many times on this and with a single voice.
You can have a service, then turn your head close your eyes and say "we'll just let freedom happen" but that doesn't excuse you from being responsible for what happens.
> This is a problem because it's what's called "inducement of a crime" - it's like if you say "We are a bar that doesn't check IDs"
Obviously operating on another level but what's the difference with Whatsapp saying we can't read your messages, and the other even more privacy focused alternatives?
Does WA check if CP.zip is being sent through groups ?
It probably has more to do with the stated business rather than what's possible. For example, nothing is stopping you from going on whatsapp and, one hexadecimal byte at a time, writing out the entirety of a zip file full of whatever illegal stuff you want. Then, there's nothing stopping people from copying those bytes into a hex editor and recreating your stuff. This was used to great effect with DeCSS leading to the ideal of "illegal primes". The USG would have to ban typing any string of hex into anything to make this actually have teeth. But then you could move to binary, octal, brainfuck code that creates the file with shifts, etc.
But, with a company that hosts files you are liable for checking those files. There's also nuance here: you can't check everything all the time. You also can't check encrypted shit. But if you make no effort (see: the bar example) then that rises to inducement. Anonfiles, for example, is negligent in this regard. There's no law preventing you from allowing people to store encrypted files but there should be a way to not only comply with valid, warrant-provided, law enforcement requests but also keep track of such "prolific" uploaders as they are most likely uploading shit you don't want.
Source: I work in an industry that, unfortunately, has to deal with this stuff all the time. The internet is a sick place. Our legal team briefed us on our responsibility (in terms of storage and processing) along with the correct chain-of-command should something come up. Of course, we also have therapy available which is used more often than you'd think. In our case there's also some protection afforded to us for the things that may be stored because we comply with various law enforcement agencies when necessary. Posted further up you see:
> Recently, the last CP addict idiot basically killed us. We always remove those posts when we get a report (we can't see them by our-self, that's the point), but we were swamped by other things, and we didn't catch this one in time. It's a free volunteer project after all.
Which tells you they had zero idea what they were doing. If you're not hosting your anonymous service on an derelict oil platform deep in international waters you have a responsibility to get the correct legal counsel and set up a system for handling chomos. Ignorance is not an excuse, "volunteer" is not an excuse, AND you shouldn't make a service that protects chomos.
Anyone can upload encrypted data to anything. You can do the same thing with Pastebin or Google Drive or Reddit or AWS. And there are many lawful reasons to want to be anonymous.
> See Kim Dotcom.
Megaupload got in trouble because their employees actively knew about and participated in infringement. Mega.com, which encrypts everything by default so they don't know what it is, is... still there?
mega.com isn't an uploads site anymore and those domains were seized in 2012 by the us doj.
The point wasn't that encryption is possible but instead that it's a de facto practice so the operators don't actually know the breakdown of the content being uploaded unless they're only considering the cleartext.
Furthermore, this doesn't protect them from being responsible for the content.
You can disagree, but until you can form a majority opinion on the SCOTUS, your thoughts don't actually matter.
I'm not a lawyer but I did a few podcast episodes on this topic a few years ago so I did about a month of research on it. The hosting providers are responsible for the content within some reasonable expectation of how the site is structured.
Isn't the whole point of DMCA Safe-Haven rules, that providers are not responsible for the content they transmit...? As long as they respond to law enforcement to the best of their ability, of course (i.e. taking down after being notified). I agree that encryption is not exempting them from enacting takedowns, and that intention matters (as discussed in the MEGA case), but that should be about it.
If I build a filesharing site with clearly-good intentions, my employees don't promote piracy, and the content is encrypted, as long as I take shit down when authorities tell me it's Bad I should be in the clear, surely...?
That's probably fine. AWS S3 or say Google Cloud or Dropbox doesn't have these issues.
There's plenty of long lived providers.
That's different from if you had a service called, say, pirate-share with a search function that has options like "artist" and "director". These difference matter.
As far as I know, the courts have looked at anonymous file sharing sites as closer to the second group than the first.
I remember when the internet was basically only anonymous and I think it was a better time and that's kinda why I like tor. The problem is most people seem to only go there for crime as opposed to some weird ideological commitment to how online engagement should exist.
It'd be nice if there could be a more healthy balance between anonymity and crime that's more encouraging for people to be anonymous but somehow less supportive of criminal activity.
Basically I think "influencer culture" and branding oneself has destroyed things
> That's different from if you had a service called, say, pirate-share with a search function that has options like "artist" and "director". These difference matter.
Perversely, though.
Grokster and BitTorrent are largely used for the same things and they both have infringing and non-infringing uses. Grokster lost because they promoted the infringing uses. But why do we actually care about this?
It's not as if copyright infringement never existed before Grokster and nobody has been able to figure out how to use BitTorrent for it because Bram Cohen never mentioned it.
So all the rule does is impose censorship. Because otherwise the creators of these technologies would be outspoken proponents of copyright reform. But then their lawyers tell them to STFU, because if they say that existing copyright terms are morally unjustifiable and the RIAA is a pack of vultures who deserve to go bankrupt and things to that effect, plaintiffs will argue that they're promoting infringement and sue them for their political opinions. Especially if they fail to be perfectly articulate and precise while expressing that sentiment.
Is it not a de facto prohibition on developers and businesses expressing public support for the Pirate Party?
> those domains were seized in 2012 by the us doj.
The ones where they weren't encrypting the stuff.
> Furthermore, this doesn't protect them from being responsible for the content.
Laws commonly have knowledge requirements. If you go to the UPS store and ask them to deliver a metal cage clearly containing a screaming woman who has been kidnapped, and they do it, they're going to be in trouble. If you go and ask them to deliver a brown cardboard box of contents unspecified, that's a different matter, even if unbeknownst to them it turns out to contain some contraband.
Yea, CP on anonymous and messed up shares has been a problem for just about forever.
Saw a company that accidently DMZ'd their printer with a public IP, and this had to be over 15 years ago at this point. Had anony ftp open on it, and yea, exactly what you expect happened.
> I really don't think it's some horrendous oversight to expect that people will be kind to a service that you offer.
Its not like anonymous file hosting on the internet was a new thing two years ago. It very much is a major oversight to offer (or acquire) a service in an existing, established segment and have no idea what the usage patterns and challenges in that segment are.
> If you offer anonymous and free image uploading it's not wrong to assume that not 100% of your traffic will be pornographic uploads
Its file, not just image, hosting, but, yeah, you should probably assume that the stuff that the most controversial aspect of it is that it is just porn will be toward the milder end. And their piece doesn't say “porn” it says “abuse”.
In theory nothing assuming it involves only consenting adults. In practice it’s very exploitative of vulnerable people to such a degree that it becomes ethically fraught.
Two pieces of advice from a very drunk technologist.
One, never approach a community that lives and breathes startups using words such as "fairly certain," and "try." They have no power here.
Two, start the company, make a respectable business plan, and then whore yourself out. No one is going to be interested in a joint venture with a few paragraphs of information to go on.
You don't have to be perfect, nor do you even need a full roadmap of ideas or plans, but people need to see that you're willing to put effort into it. No one makes a successful startup, especially in the medical field without considerable research and effort. If people don't see that you're willing to put in the time, they'll never get behind you.
The most you can do is write a professional letter calling Rdio out on their tomfoolery and how disappointed you are in them. Aside from that, sueing them is really your only option.
Everyone defines for himself what's the point of Bitcoin is.
For some it's anonymity. For others it's cheap way to pay for stuff. Or only possible way (if CC are not working in your country). Or an wealth storage vehicle and protection against inflation. Or vote against USD and wars. Or a tax evasion tool.
This might be cool in theory, but no way in HELL it's the 'easiest way in the world.' As of right now, only chrome can transfer files to chrome, and firefox to firefox.
Speaking of which, is there a website where people share what they "sync" with BTSync? There was a website called 12char.com, but it's dead now. Are there alternatives to 12char?
Although I fully support Clappers prosecution, his attorney is just going to say that he was protecting ongoing classified Government secrets, and the entire case will be dismissed.
As a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Wyden had been briefed on the top-secret-plus programs that we now all know about. That is, he knew that he was putting Clapper in a box; He knew that the true answer to his question was “Yes,” but he also knew that Clapper would have a hard time saying so without making headlines.[0]
That makes it sound like Wyden was attempting to force Clapper to release classified material so he wouldn't have to. Interesting that Wyden, despite knowing that Clapper's statement was false and aware of the program, chose not to dispute Clapper's statement, or release classified details of the program himself.
This is exactly it. Wyden purposely put him in an impossible situation so he could hang him with it later. If Clapper has done his job well in other respects then this incident is irrelevant.
Declining to answer is a sure giveaway of the answer in an open hearing ;) I suspect there's a number of situations where lying to Congress is not a crime. The "Gang of 8" and the "Gang of 4" are almost always aware of the truth, usually the entire intelligence committees. Members of Congress are not automatically trusted with the deepest national secrets just because they are elected.
People sometimes forget that although espionage is indeed a crime, Snowden did not release these classified documents to an enemy of the state, but rather the American People. Our founding father, Benjamin Franklin also committed the act of espionage in 1772 when he exposed and printed letters from Thomas Hutchinson, the royal governor of Massachusetts, detailing information about the revocation of civil liberties of the resistive American colonists. This act alone is one of the major linchpins that broke into the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the revolutionary War.
Without American heros such as Snowden and Ben Franklin, this country would not exist.
Most of his works were written anonymously using a fairly ridiculous number of different Pseudonyms including Silence Dogood, Poor Richard, ect. What did he have to hide? Might as well have been a terrorist.
If that was the case than any single person who uses a proxy, VPN, or Tor might as well be a terrorist; you're attempting to browse the web with a pseudonym. The REASON that they were used is because the use of assassins back then was pretty common, especially by the Empire.
HTTPS everywhere; that's all I have to say. Something like this is very malicious and very hard to detect -- unless you ALWAYS use SSL. I noticed right away that the DNS was incorrect.
There's a lot of negativity in this thread, so I'll simply say two things.
1) If you do nothing, nothing will change. Protesting might not be the best choice, but it's better than no action at all. This petition will change absolutely nothing, especially if it only reaches the minimum required signatures. There are 311,000,000 people in the United States which means a menial 100,000 signatures accounts for 0.0003215434% of the total population. Not even 0.01%.
2) Martin Luther King Jr changed the course of a nation with civil disobedience. To say it can't be done again is ignorant and foolish.
Being a developer myself, when I create a piece of code to do a specific thing and release it to the public it's not for monetary gain, but to help others than need it by using my source. However, if they wanted additional features added to it, you could have a pot, and once the feature is achieved the pot would be deposited to the developer.
If you offer anonymous and free image uploading it's not wrong to assume that not 100% of your traffic will be pornographic uploads and I also don't think it's wrong that if after years of your offering, if you get to the point where all of your uploads are porn, that you feel the need to shutdown your service.
Nobody is entitled to do bad things with good tools.