Did Homeland Security Seize... And Then Unseize... A Dynamic DNS Domain?
from the cluelessness-knows-no-bounds dept
Over the weekend, we started getting a bunch of reports from folks claiming that the dynamic DNS service afraid.org had been seized in the latest DHS/ICE domain seizures, and that all of the sites associated with afraid.org had been replaced with a notice that they had been seized over child porn claims. The main site involved was mooo.com. If you're unfamiliar with the way these dynamic DNS services work, they basically let you put a permanent URL, often using a subdomain like putsomesubdomainhere.mooo.com, and then you point it at whatever machine is actually hosting your content. For some folks and some projects, it's easier than getting your own full URL. But, of course, as a service, it can point to just about any kind of content. Remember, afraid isn't hosting any of this stuff. It's basically just acting as a directory.Despite multiple reports, and various blog posts from individuals really pissed off that ICE had accused them of trafficking in child porn, we didn't write about it earlier for a few reasons. First off, with each of the past few ICE seizures, various hucksters have claimed that their domains were seized as well, and it later turns out to not be true at all. In the last round, I ended up talking with a guy who claimed his domain was seized for a few days, before realizing he was full of it. Second, afraid.org and mooo.com came back online a day and a half later, with the admin claiming that the domain was "suspended at the registrar level", but not mentioning DHS/ICE at all. I emailed afraid.org's admin asking him for details a few days ago, and heard absolutely nothing in response.
So despite more and more people bringing it up in our comments, I was ready to let it drop. However, late yesterday, Homeland Security and ICE did officially announced more domain seizures, but these were different than the last four rounds we've spoken about -- which were a part of "Operation in Our Sites," and was focused on IP violations. Instead, this is called "Operation Protect Our Children," and was focused on child porn. Yes, Homeland Security is pulling out the old "protect the children!" line to defend domain seizures.
Unlike the "In Our Sites" announcements, however, with "Protect Our Children," DHS didn't actually name the domains. So, right now I'm just not sure if mooo.com was really seized... and then given back (which would be a surprise, if true). Since I'm at a dead end in the normal channels, I figured I'd just put the story out here, and see if we can dig up any proof either way. Was mooo.com really seized as part of this program... and if so, was it really given back? If so, why? Did ICE realize that seizing a dynamic DNS service that links to a ton of perfectly legitimate content would clearly push it over the line on prior restraint? Remember, nearly all of the "prior restraint" cases we've discussed as examples of why the domain seizures are unconstitutional involve pornographic materials. And, one of the counterpoints that people have argued is that those rulings only apply to porn, but not copyright (no one has a good explanation of why that would be, but we'll leave that aside).
So, what happened here? Did DHS/ICE demonstrate even more technical cluelessness in seizing a dynamic DNS directory that linked to tons of perfectly legit content, and then realize its mistake and give it back? Or were the reports of mooo.com's seizure overblown? Or did something else happen altogether?
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Filed Under: domain names, porn, seizures
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They actually shut down 84,000 sites for a couple days
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Re: They actually shut down 84,000 sites for a couple days
"Even at the time of writing people can still replicate the effect by adding �74.81.170.110 mooo.com� to their hosts file as the authorities have not dropped the domain pointer yet."
Um, when you edit your hosts file, you're making your own domain pointer.
And they like to criticize judges for not understanding the internet.
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Re: Re: They actually shut down 84,000 sites for a couple days
Add "74.81.170.110 mooo.com"
Add "74.81.170.110 techdirt.com"
techdirt.com shows the copyright warning
mooo.com shows the child porn warning
ICE is using a wildcard on any non-seized domain to show the copyright logo, not the child porn one.
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http://practice.chatserve.com/hosts.html
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to find it
start run "Cmd"
cd\
dir /s hosts
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74.81.170.110 thisdomaindoesntexistbutimtryingitanyway.com
74.81.170.110 mooo.com
The copyright warning is shown when I load the first domain, but mooo.com shows the child pornography warning. So ICE did target mooo.com for child pornography, and they did give it back. The fact they are using wildcards on everything else is the smoking gun. The seizure warrant against mooo.com is out there somewhere too...
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Adding these to your HOSTS file
74.81.170.110 mooo.com
74.81.170.110 techdirt.com
Produces the following
http://img816.imageshack.us/img816/5999/icepak.jpg
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Wow
It will also be an interesting statistic. Does anyone have a list of all of the domains and sub-domains they have taken down and kept down? We can assume they support keeping these offline, but it would be pretty surprising if the number of websites they claim are causing harm is equal to even 1% of the websites they have taken down now.
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Relative importance
That should be obvious to anyone who reads here regularly. The industry views copyright infringement as a much more serious crime than child porn, so IP laws should abide by a lower standard and can ignore pesky issues like prior restraint and the First and Fourth Amendments. All authoritarians know that child porn serves a useful purpose -- it allows all sorts of government actions to have the excuse that we are just protecting the children. If child porn went away you would destroy innumerable grandstands and questionable power grabs that hide behind "We must protect the children" while actually doing nothing that effectively protects the children.
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Why the derision? Do you not think that sites dealing in child porn should be taken down? We know you love pirates, but do you love child molesters too?
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Mike's derision assumes that the "for the children" argument was just pretext. What if they were actually targeting child porn?
It seems to me that what happened here is that certain subdomains were found to have child porn, and somehow the entire domain name was taken down instead of the subdomains. We don't know why that happened, but it's apparent that the mistake was quickly reversed.
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What was their priority? They protected music, movies, and live streams of the Superbowl before they got around to protecting the children.
This looks like another "save the children" grandstand. Lots of press releases, and it does nothing to protect the children. The pornographers are still operating the sites under different names, and they are still exploiting the children they abuse just as much as they did before.
No one around here is trying to defend child pornography, but there are a lot of us that are deeply suspicious of government actions that sound good and do nothing.
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I never said it was just a pretext and you know it.
I said that seizing a lot more than just child porn allows small minded idiots to defend such things by accusing anyone who argues that it was overly broad of "loving child molesters."
Know anyone who would stoop so low?
Right. That's the point.
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that's because registrars handle domain names, not subdomains. that's the problem with pulling a domain name at the registrar level without warning.
in this case, pulling mooo.com pulls it's host records (CNames, aliases, etc.) as well, so while that's guaranteed to make hotkiddieporn.mooo.com inaccessible by that hostname, it also makes stampcollecting.mooo.com inaccessible by that host name as well.
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https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/ShadowCrew
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Removing websites from DNS isn't "targeting child porn"...tracking down the site owners and arresting them would be "targeting child porn". But, that would require things like proof that would stand up through an arraignment hearing, which is too damn inconvenient for the US government to bother with these days.
So, instead, they cost the site owner a few dollars to register a new domain with a registrar outside of the US government reach. So, if these sites really do have child porn, all the ICE has done is make it harder to prosecute the people responsible, while still keeping the content available.
Despite all this, I'm sure that the ICE employees are patting themselves on the back for their "success" with these operations.
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So as long as they were actually targeting child porn, it's perfectly ok to circumvent the normal legal process? If so, how far should that ability be extended? Would it acceptable to just lock people up indefinitely without ever filing charges against them, as long as there was a suspicion that they were involved in child porn?
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> children" argument was just pretext.
> What if they were actually targeting
> child porn?
Doesn't matter. Unless you're suggesting that it's okay for law enforcement to end-run the law so long as they have a good child porn reason to do so.
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"do you love child molesters too"
And that is the exact argument that politicians and law enforcement agencies make. You know it is untrue, but you throw it out there to make it impossible for Mike to defend himself. Even if he says his point is to defend free speech, you have linked any response to liking child molesters.
At times, you have intelligent and thoughtful responses. This took you down another notch (at least in my book) and makes you sound like a 6 year old on the playground "oh yeah - and you're ugly". Respond with something intelligent next time.
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This is so disingenuous. I don't even know what to tell you. If you believe that for a second, you are dumb; and I don't think you are anything more than opportunistic.
If you are going to claim some sort of moral high ground in any discussion, it is best not to make such outrageous claims.
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For some reason, I am not surprised by AJ's post.
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Your "talk" reminds me of the abortion debate. How do you suddenly turn everything around to make the "other side" look like terrible monsters?
Easy: Call one side "Pro-Life", and the other side "Pro-Choice". It's impossible to choose a side, because the implication is that you are either a murderer or a fascist.
End result: People shut up, they are too afraid to take sides and become much easier to manipulate. Mission accomplished.
You being a lawyer in training know very well how this works.
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But... BUT... CENSORSHIP!
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If it looks like duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, it probably IS a duck.
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Even if they are targeting child porn, the question still remains - do the ends justify the means?
Bypassing due process, applying punishment prior to a conviction along with possible Constitutional conflicts concerning speech are STILL unacceptable, even when targeting child porn IMHO.
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It's like spraying down a crowded sidewalk with machine gun fire to catch a rapist..... sure it may work, but is it worth all the innocent people caught in the crossfire?
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How much of the child pornography has been destroyed? None. It's all still on the original servers and you can still get to it if you know the IP address of the server.
How many child abusers have been arrested and will face trial as a result of the seizures? None. The seizures merely give the abusers a heads up that the police are after them and it's time to disappear.
How much damage has been done to thousands of innocent companies and individuals publicly accused of distributing child pornography? Massive amounts. Simply being accused of being involved in child pornography is enough to destroy reputations. I really do hope the owners of the web sites involved sue not only ICE, but also the individuals involved in such reckless political grandstanding.
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If it turns out you are innocent, they'll release you in a few days.
It's for the good of the children you know! If your are against this then you must be in favor of child porn.
I just hope they'll come busting down your door soon...
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A friend of mine was accused of having child porn on his work computer. (I am pretty sure he never did anything beyond downloading out of curiosity).
His case never came to court. He was murdered by a vigilante.
I am sure that the vigilante would claim he was doing it "for the children".
When I was young I was taught that two wrongs don't make a right. Someone needs to teach ICE/DHS that lesson.
The fact that I feel the need to post this as an AC shows how bad the situation has got with respect to this class of crime.
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Troll much?
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Why? Did they seize some child molesters? Because all I read was about domain names and I'm pretty sure no child has ever been assaulted by a web address.
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I don't know how to respond to anything as obnoxiously, sickeningly disingenuous as this.
I have tried multiple times to write out a response, but it is clear that you have no interest in a logical debate, given that others have already called you out on this and you continue to defend it.
I am not just deeply offended, I am left saddened that anyone would stoop to such a level and think that it was an appropriate point of argument.
And, worst of all, you don't even seem to realize that in making this very statement, you have proved the point that we were trying to make. When you hoist a banner such as that, you allow all sorts of other rights to be trampled, because anyone who points that out can then simply be falsely and libelously accused of "loving child molesters."
It's the worst political trick in the book. It suggests deep corruption of the soul. Please, rethink this tactic of disingenuous debate. It is beneath any moral human being.
A human being can be against overreaching attacks on free speech without "loving child molesters." In fact, we can be more against child molesting than you can possibly ever know. But we can be against child molesting by wanting the government to *actually go after and punish child molesters to the fullest extent of the law* rather than seizing domains pointing to tens of thousands of sites -- most of which had nothing whatsoever to do with child molesting.
We can be absolutely against child molesting and hope that our government wouldn't just seize a bunch of domains -- most of which had nothing to do with child molesting -- but would actually go out and arrest those responsible for those horrifying and hideous acts.
We can be absolutely against child molesting and worry about how the government can trample all sorts of rights, and then worry about how speaking out against such abuses will leave us open to little-minded, defamatory attacks about how we "love child molesters."
That statement was uncalled for, ridiculous, disgusting, and beneath any sense of common decency.
I can't begin to tell you how disgusted you have made me today. That you would take such a step, and not realize how offensive a statement is that you have made is just incredible.
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You didn't explain why you said this: "Yes, Homeland Security is pulling out the old "protect the children!" line to defend domain seizures."
How do you know that they aren't in fact trying to protect the children?
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Seriously? How about don't be such a damned tool. You made a completely ridiculous statement/question insinuating that Mike and those that think that overreaching in the name of protecting children love child molestors. It was a retarded thing to write. Despite the fact that you usually at least have some basis in law/fact to back up at least a portion of what you say, this was uncalled for and illustrated perfectly WHY ICE is trotting this explanation out. It's the same reason behind the name for the Patriot Act. I thought you were smart. I see that I was wrong. What you wrote was reprehensible, accusing support for the most egregious of crimes. Seriously, get fucked....
"You didn't explain why you said this: "Yes, Homeland Security is pulling out the old "protect the children!" line to defend domain seizures.""
Do you not understand basic English? Or is it the concept of time that eludes you? No one said it was a pretext. You even wrote it out in your quoted sentence. It's a DEFENSE. They overeached, caught a bunch of sites that were apparently NOT involved in child porn, and then defended it by blanketing themselves with the all-trumping "for the children" defense. AND YOU PLAYED INTO IT when you made your mindless accusation.
"How do you know that they aren't in fact trying to protect the children?"
Sigh, IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT THEY WERE TRYING TO DO. What they did was wrong. It'd be like if they caught an ACTUAL child molester at a local McDonalds and then went in, arresed everyone in the building, and threw them in jail. Then, when questioned why they did so, they said they were trying to protect the children. And maybe they were. BUT THEY STILL THREW INNOCENT PEOPLE IN JAIL!
Seriously. I for one am completely done with you....
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They are NOT protecting any children by taking websites offline. If they really wanted to protect the children, they'd be arresting the people who put those websites online.
Is that clear enough or do you want me to draw you a diagram?
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Look, I don't doubt he hates child molestation. I was simply pointing out that his innuendo that these seizures were "for the children" was somehow pretextual was baseless. I see no reason to not believe that they are in fact "for the children."
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average_joe: I love the government, so I'm probably in the minority around here.
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You seem to need a lot of it in saying that you support a government blindly, without looking objectively at the destruction they can do by going after innocent people.
That is the most morally bankrupt position that one could take... Blind loyalty/nationalism is all well and good unless it comes at the detriment of imposing on other's rights.
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"We know you love pirates, but do you love child molesters too?"
"I don't doubt he hates child molestation."
I'm bringing back the drinking game where we all have to do a shot everytime someone completely contradicts themselves.
DRINK!
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Yeah, not even close. There was nothing resembling a rational point in your accusatory question. You made a reprehensable comment, got called out, and now can't even admit you were wrong in saying it.
And you wonder why people on this site treat you harshly? Sorry, I don't have time for the willfully ignorant that want to try to tapdance their way out of their own bullshit....
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I'm Irish, I'll be fine....
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That is quite easy to address, actually. If it were truly 'for the children,' they would not be going after DNS domains. They would be going after servers, and the people who run them. Taking the name, cutting off that one link, does nothing to fight child molestation/pornography. It makes them dig deeper, hide better, and be harder to find and prosecute.
This is why people are jumping on you for this comment. It was baseless, and a very low blow. Your explanation is meaningless in the context or reality of the situation.
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...and one you aren't far from using on a regular basis yourself.
It's amusing to see you get your manties in a knot over this, because this is where your stands tend to take you. If you want free speech, you have to support the free speech that you don't like as well. If the speech is illegal, and you think it is bad, then you should come down on the people who facilitate it, no matter what the manner is.
Service providers who offer their services to anonymous users are always going to be at risk to be part of illegal activity. Most people don't want to be anonymous just for the heck of it, they have reasons. You run "techdirt", not "sometechsite.moooo.com" for a reason. You aren't trying to hide.
The problem you face is this: You are against child porn, but you are also against action taken to stop it. Using your own standard conclusion system, it could be concluded that you support child porn because you support the companies that provide services to allow it to spread. Yup, file lockers, dynamic DNS services, anonymous chat rooms, P2P software... as you are supporting their legal use, you indirectly end up also supporting and protecting those who use it for illegal activities.
It's why you get called out often on P2P piracy. You have to be willfully blind not to realize what P2P is being used for by most end users. Protecting the rights of the few entails protecting the rights for people clearly breaking the law. Shouldn't you be asking yourself about the greater good?
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What happened here is the equivalent of taking his phone number out of the directory. It does nothing to stop child porn: the offender is at liberty to continue offending, at liberty to continue abusing children. S/he will destroy evidence, go into hiding. What happened with this massive domain seizure DID SWEET F**K ALL to STOP CHILD PORN!!!
Not only is the "phone number" taken out of the directory, all similar "phone numbers" were blocked. Imagine this happens to you, and someone calls your landline, only to hear a recording from the government saying "This phone was used to facilitate the movement and/or production of child pornography", all the while the phone's bill payer is still sitting at home oblivious to the entire situation.
And as for protecting the rights of the few? Isn't the whole justice system built on the principle of "Let ten guilty men go rather than jail one innocent man"?
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Seizing the domains isn't the start, and it isn't the finish. It isn't "well, we got the domains, let's call it a day". What they are doing it making it harder for these pedos to hook up and trade videos and trade secrets. It is also clear they know where these domains were hosted (mostly outside of the US) and are working with authorities in those countries to deal with the issue.
They did something that is small in the overall deal, but they did something.
There is little that anyone can say that can justify slowing down any part of a process that makes child porn harder to find, harder to share, and so on.
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They. Locked. Up. Innocent. Sites.
There is NOTHING, not even claims of trying to stop child porn, that can justify punishing the innocent....
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Excuse me for a moment while I go and simultaneously laugh my ass off, and go into a deep rage.
"It isn't the finish": then where are the press releases from ICE saying they've arrested X amount of child pornographers? All they're trumpeting here is taking the phone number out of the phone book.
"There is little that anyone can say that can justify slowing down any part of a process that makes child porn harder to find, harder to share, and so on".
And you good sir have fallen for the trap here. Did this massive domain name seizure actually make child porn harder to find and/or share?
Case in point: http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2011/0126/1224288327252.html
To summarize: An Irish Central Bank manager was convicted recently of possessing child porn. He had disks full of the stuff. Irish police went to his house with a search warrent.
They didn't take down the entire Central Bank website; they didn't block all the phone numbers of the houses in his area; they actually did some real police work, investigated, got a confession, got real evidence (CDs, DVDs, floppy disks), then jailed him.
Compare that smooth operation with what ICE are doing here. And then try to convince me that ICE's methods actually stop and/or slow the transfer of child porn.
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Not a single child was saved, not a single pedo was arrested - they just swept the sites under the rug.
Oh, and wrongfully accused 80.000+ people of trafficking child porn in the process.
Not to mention shat all over due process and probably a whole lot of civil liberties aswell.
Don't even try the whole 'Greater good' thing, because if that's your opinion your sympathies should lie with the 80.000 wrongfully accused.
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You are in a night club, having a drink. It's a big place, 1000 people. The bar gets raided because of drug sales and minors in the bar. Everyone who is in the bar is checked, and then released out the front door, past the waiting media. You are legal and don't do drugs, but your image ends up on the 6PM news as "patrons exiting a drug dealing, underage drinking" establishment. You were charged with nothing, but you were there, and you were associated with the place.
Sometimes, it isn't what you are doing, but what the people around you are doing that lands you in trouble.
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"Eventually, on Sunday the domain seizure was reverted and the subdomains slowly started to point to the old sites again instead of the accusatory banner. However, since the DNS entries have to propagate, it took another 3 days before the images disappeared completely."
People were fingered as child molesters for up to 3 days, this was not a matter of being checked and then let go.
To go with an analogy this was hanging a "Child Molester" sign on their mailboxes for anyone going to that adress to see.
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All these people had "CM" written to their chest as a drummer boy paraded them through as a Child molester for 3 days before just saying
"Sorry, my bad"
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And, now you fell into the second trap (the first being the "all for the good of the children" mantra).
If there was enough evidence to convict people of child pornography, something other than domain seizures would have been done (warrants served, people arrested, etc.). But, there isn't enough evidence, and there may not be any credible evidence (based on the quality of the "evidence" for previous seizures) that any crime was committed.
So, with no evidence that mooo.com in any way hosted sites that contain any illegal material, what you have just done with your post is libeled mooo.com.
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But they effectively publicly accused a large number of innocent people of being involved in child porn. In the present witch hunt climate that is enough to get people murdered. Aren't you concerned that an innocent person could lose his life because of this?
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Right... So, because I support people being able to buy digital cameras, then I must support kiddie porn too... (Ya know, it's much easier to take kiddie porn pics when you don't have to take the photos to a developer or develop them yourself).
Hmmm... I support the Internet too, so I'm ipso-facto supporting all the illegal activity that happens on it too?
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Heck, I can think of legit uses for a crack pipe. They are illegal to have in most places.
I support the Internet too, so I'm ipso-facto supporting all the illegal activity that happens on it too?
Nope, because you turned the scope back way too far, attempting to create to paint my view as a bizarre absolute. It is not. The internet in and of itself isn't a problem, any more than cars are a problem. Using incorrectly, either can cause issues. Cars used to smuggle drugs or weapons are a real issue, and should be able to seized without having first to take the person to court and prove the use - the cars should be seized, and then the process continues from there.
The internet is the same thing. The internet is fine. The use of the internet for child porn is not fine. Seizing the domain of child porn sites and then progressing from there should be considered normal.
What Mike is saying is that effectively he wants "real world" due process, while permitting "internet speed" law breaking to continue. In doing that, he is indirectly supporting the rights of child porn sites to stay online. He may not like it, but that is where his legal logic drops him. He supports the cesspool, and that cesspool including shit like child porn. That is what support of absolute free speech gets you.
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I can see where you're coming from. And I can understand it. However, I don't agree with you.
The law says "It is illegal to use the internet to distribute CP". The law also has rules about the prosecution of those accused of distributing CP, which must be followed. Do you know what happens when rules like these are recklessly broken by the police? The accused's lawyers use these broken rules to ensure their clients are freed.
Oh wait...the accused don't even get a trial. Or only months later, after their reputation is in tatters.
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average_joe: I love the government, so I'm probably in the minority around here.
Because governments never make mistakes and if they do, average_joe will defend them, because that's love.
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For some amazing mistakes that Governments make with regard to Statute laws.. you might be amazed at this http://www.dumblaws.com/ [and I expect this to go viral amongst your fellow students]
You might like your own state's law on how it is illegal to steal a �movable� even if it classified as an �immovable�. WTF! Oh and look at Arkansas.. Freaky! And yes, Australia is under the International link as well *sighs*
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AJ loves his government... a government that operates a pedophile ring shipping little boys to Iraq.
Then AJ attacks Mike for speaking out about pretend CP actions that achieve nothing - thus AJ must support these pretend actions that achieve nothing - thus AJ supports the continuation of child pornography and pedophilia.
AJ WHEN DID YOU STOP BUGGERING LITTLE BOYS?
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.....What, are you a friggin' idiot ? What don't you understand about this whole thing ? First of all....how is taking a website down protecting *any* children ? That's a BS argument. It doesn't find the abused children, it doesn't get them away from whomever is making the videos, or anything.......
.....as others said, due process would be a far better way to go, that may actually get results and not make the look like idiots. They could have identified the sites, and worked with mooo.com to actually apprehend suspects, duh. If you've *ever* used a dynamic DNS service, you would know that the Dyn DNS service knows the IP address of *every* redirection, and therefore, could actually narrow down and *find* the suspects....or, at the very least, cancelled their redirection account.
Cars are used for illegal activities...let's take your away. Guns are used for illegal activities, let's take all your guns. Cell phones are used in the commission of crimes, give up your cell phone now!!!!!!
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showing emotions on the internet... no good will come of this.
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This is NOT taking the sites down, this is the equivalent of taking down the house number on a known crackhouse - the house is still there.
But hey, if you'd rather hide child molesters than deal with them then ... sure ... whatever floats your boat.
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Even if there is some protected speech, the courts long since ruled that prior restraint doesn't apply where there is a lot of unprotected or illegal speech / actions.
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However, if the allegations are true, in taking down 10 domains, they shut down 84,000 websites that were full of perfectly legal free speech. Ouch. They threw out the entire maternity ward with the bath water on this one.
Even if it was a mistake, it suggests that they have done little to understand the kinds of sites they are targeting.
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If I find childporn on something.mooo.com and the only control is shutting off mooo.com, then that is what happens. Only the mooo.com people can control what is on their third level.
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Hiding the problem by taking some websites off the internet does not solve the problem. The problem is that there are people who abuse children, so track THEM down. In fact, that they're putting stuff up on the internet gives the police new ways to find out who they are!
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If the seizure only works on DNS level, and you're real "target" who really want to visit those site, you'd just need to place the site's IP to your local "hosts" file (I believe those used to visit wites which knowingly allow hosting such content have already done so. Even those who doesn't know enough to do this would likely to get instruction from other users on the site.) to continue visit the "targeted content". This proves this whole mission has nothing to do with "protect the children".
So people should stop use "protect the children" for reason to support domain name seizure. If you really want to protect, you should do what China does - issue court order to shutdown the site.
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More importantly, are you mental? In the US, the CDA safe harbors protect a service provider from being held responsible for content they did not put on their sites.
This was not just a website that was shut down, it was a service provider. Please explain the difference between shutting down mooo.com and shutting down AT&T?
Again, I am assuming the allegations are true. If they are, ICE turned back on all of the sites - does that not sound like admitting a mistake.
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Wait - the computers need electricity - shut that off - then even the ones not on the internet will go down. Oh - batter backups and generators? Hmm...Well, I suppose if nobody had eyes...
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On a tld, the registrar only controls the second level, aka the "mooo" in mooo.com. They don't control thirdlevel.mooo.com, that is only a DNS record, controlled by third parties. You don't have to register third levels to make them work.
So the people who control the .com tld can turn on and off domains at the second level, but they cannot pick and choose third levels to deal with. It is an all or nothing choice. All of mooo.com goes, or all of it stays.
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That does not excuse going to the higher level provider. Again, that is not any different than shutting down the .com domain to pull a single site. Particularly when free speech is involved, the government is supposed to restrict their seizure to the smallest area possible around the illegal content - they used a bazooka to kill a fly.
Has mooo.com refused to work with them, they may have had a case for expanding their net, but they were not even aware of the seizures until it happened. That's a pretty big problem and I'm not sure if you understand and just don't care or if you simply don't think it is a problem that the vast majority of the sites they shut down were completely legitimate.
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It seems to violate safe harbors and prior restraint - and the fact that it is back up suggests that ICE actually realized it this time.
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They probably realized it on all the previously seized sites also. But knew they could get away with it because it would never make it to the evening news.
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I think mooo.com should have been protected as a service provider, but it is really the completely innocent sites that use mooo.com sub-domains that really got short-ended on this one. 84,000 websites were shut down because they shared a domain with a site that may (sometime in the future) be prosecuted for trafficing child pornography.
The DEA cannot seize my house because my neighbor is selling drugs.
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which is why there are safe harbor provisions, to keep this exact thing from happening.
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Too funny.
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I think the warning messages they are putting up before anyone is convicted is a liability to the government and taxpayers if they put it on an innocent website. Someone can sue for defamation. If they're seizing domains with a court order then they could just as easily put nothing on the site at all.
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in this case it's 84,000 apartments, so it's more like a putting the signs up on all the doors in a half-mile radius.
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However, if a building owner knowing allows crack houses in his building, and helps them to build more secure doorways and put up signs to make sure people can find them, he would have some responsibility.
As a domain owner, you are responsible for what happens in your establishment. Section 230 limits that liability, but does not negate responsiblity.
If you saw "freemovies.google.com", would you think that Google was now in the free movie business? If you see "childpr0n.mooo.com" do you make the same assumption about mooo.com?
I know that the Techdirt way is that nobody is responsible for anything ever, but still...
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You missed the point.
Let's put it this way:
Say childpr0n.mooo.com was a real site
ICE shut down FuzzyBunnySlippers.mooo.com - a site run by someone completely different than childpr0n.mooo.com or mooo.com.
Now, let's look at that from the apartment owner perspective. ICE raided an apartment building with 84,000 apartments and imprisoned EVENYONE for several days. They put up notices that their friends, coworkers, and family could see saying that THEY were child pornographers. Then, they released all of the people (did they still have some of the mooo.com sites offline at the end of this?).
Yes, mooo.com was hurt badly by this - and that in itself is probably unforgivable, but I can see why you would defend that position. However, what about all of the COMPLETELY INNOCENT people caught in the net for 3-5 days?
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Also, what many sites that want to hide do these days is this:
User dynamic DNS to point to an IP address, usually on a DSL connection. But it isn't their computer, just a machine their back doored and installed a rootkit on, putting ngix or similar small package webserver on there to act only as a proxy redirector. That redirection might point to multiple mirrors or even through a series of redirections before getting to the content.
The end result is that except for pulling down the dynamic dns, there is no real way to track or stop them.
If you want a history lesson in nasty tricks, go look at the history of Estdomains, Esthost, and other related companies. When people really want to avoid the law, they can do it without issue.
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right, and now that mooo.com is down, there's no way that they can sign up somewhere else. try again.
and since there are other dynamic DNS hosts who are also free, it's possible that there are multiple dynamic host names pointing to the same content who haven't been taken down. try again.
The end result is that except for pulling down the dynamic dns, there is no real way to track or stop them.
so 84,000 sites have to suffer because DHS sucks at police work? try again.
When people really want to avoid the law, they can do it without issue.
it's a situation often referred to here as whac-a-mole. it's a waste of time and tax payer dollars.
which begs the question, if this isn't going to make a difference, why is ICE doing this in the first place?
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And then the Feds would actually be arresting the child pornographers, instead of doing absolutely nothing of use. What a joke.
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i don't think dynamic DNS means what you think it means.
dynamic DNS doesn't help you hide. it does the opposite, it helps people find you.
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I never thought about it that way, but you are correct that we should shut down the Internet, computer makers, gun makers, ... It's a long list of things I had never realized we should be shutting down to prevent copyright infringement and perhaps other violent crimes like murder.
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The rest of what you said is worthless. Taking down 84,000 websites because one could be pointing to a hidden server is just outright bullshit.
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Then, watch in amazement as the authorities don't just shut down the blogspot domain, and instead, work with Google directly to take action against individual subdomains.
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google is different.
middle aged voters who watch TV would notice if google.com stopped working.
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Oh, look, there's "freemovies@gmail.com"! Google must be in the free movie business!
/s
If you see "childpr0n.mooo.com" do you make the same assumption about mooo.com?
No, I make that assumption about .com!
/s
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blogspot.com is owned by google, and as you can see there are thousands of sites dedicated to free movies:
https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&biw=1280&bih=802&q=si te%3Ablogspot.com+free+movies&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=
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That's essentially what they did here. They shut down an entire service provider, including a HUGE amount of ENTIRELY LEGAL and ENTIRELY UNRELATED sites because one of those sites was hosting CP.
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One quick question ....
Now the question ...
Is seizing porn, of what ever sort, with in the charter for ICE-DHS in any way shape or form?
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RE: unbelievable
???
The name they have given this operation is truly unbelievable. These people need to stop watching so many of those Hollywood movies as they are clearly melting their brains.
Beyond that, temporarily impeding the dissemination of this filth does not prevent it from happening in the first place. These people need to get out from their desks and do some real investigating. Even 'dawg the bounty hunter' can handle that. If these hacks can't be bothered, they need to be replaced.
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If you'd looked yesterday, the Google cache of a bunch of mooo subdomains had the ICE seizure graphic on.
Right now, the top Google result for "mooo.com" brings this up:
http://newworld.mooo.com/
which funnily enough leads to a Wikileaks mirror. The Google cache still shows a placeholder for the ICE graphic.
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ICE is "protecting the children" from being exposed to Wikileaks.
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average_joke
Dont feed the trolls.
An AC put it nicely:
"They could have gathered useful information from the dynamic dns site's owner about who was using a specific account, their IP addresses used, and then do real investigation from there."
Real investigations are too hard and expensive though. It is easier to just take a "server marker" away, than actually stop crime. That way it looks like they are doing something without actually stopping anything. it is a GOV win win, only one who loses are innocent websites, and the children.
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Seriously. You'd think it'd be so simple for them to do this.
1) You see child porn on the website.
2) Grab the IP address of that subdomain.
3) Tracert the IP address and find the ISP.
4) Call up the ISP and request the home address of that IP.
5) Get immediate response since the child porn is actually still there and have proof of it because the idiot is running a server off that IP.
6) Arrest the sonovabitch.
Steps 1-4 are practically free. 5 & 6 require minimal effort. But of course, paperwork even too hard for these idiot. Every time I hear more about these ICE seizures, it makes me even more sad for my country.
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DHS/ICE seizures of domains
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Minor clarification...
They actually have an interesting business model:
- they will provide free DNS services for a domain, but if you choose this option, then anyone else is also free to create new subdomains within that domain
- alternatively, you can pay a subscription fee for your DNS services, and only you will be able to create subdomains (with the number of subdomains capped based on the level of subscription)
The first level acts as a promotional service for the paid levels.
I now return you to your regularly scheduled illustration of Mike's point :P
(Disclosure: I actually have a paid subscription with afraid.org to be the DNS provider for my own domain. It's a nice simple good value service)
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Q: "You took down 84,000 sites?"
A: "A PEDO! GET HIM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
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