Why Isn't ICANN Speaking Out Against ICE/DOJ Domain Seizures?
from the ridiculous dept
Following the feds seizing bodog.com, Mark Jeftovic from EasyDNS wrote a really interesting post pointing out just how insane these domain seizures are. He focused on the fact that Bodog was run outside of the US, hosted outside the US, and the domain registrar was even outside the US. Thus, the feds went straight to Verisign to seize the domain. For what it's worth, while I share his concern about the insanity of this, I don't actually think this is new. As we discussed back in 2010, the government appeared to go direct to Verisign for earlier seizures. As we said at the time:It appears that Homeland Security contracted out the seizures to a private company, immixGroup IT Solutions, which set up the "seizedservers.com" domain that the seized domains now point to. The other bit of useful info is that the seizures appear to have been done directly by VeriSign at the top level domain level. VeriSign, of course, controls the .com TLD, and so Homeland Security appears to have just asked VeriSign to move the domains (with a court order, of course), and it did so.However, we agree with Jeftovic that this is crazy, and if it finally gets some more attention now, that would be a good thing. Another point that he raises is that the Bodog seizures seem to be based on a violation of Maryland state law, which raises additional questions about jurisdictional issues. You may recall a few years ago, that the state of Kentucky tried to seize a bunch of gambling related domains, and the world freaked out about a massive overreach by that state against websites that had no presence in the state. Shouldn't there be similar concerns when it comes to a Maryland state law... and the federal government?
But there's a bigger point in all of this, which Jeftovic raises at the end, which deserves a lot more attention: where the hell is ICANN on this and why isn't it speaking out against these domain seizures?
It's a good point that highlights what a joke ICANN has been on this front. It should have come out right when ICE started seizing domains. The longer it's silent, the worse it makes things.Where the fsck is ICANN in all of this?
They are nowhere. They are collecting their fees, pushing their agenda of as many possible new-top-level domains and despite the fact that SOPA, ACTA, PIPA et aim directly at the interests of their core stakeholders, for whom they are supposed to be advocates and stewards. ICANN is conspicuous in their absence from the debate, save for a smug and trite abdication of involvement (i.e. "ICANN Doesn't Take Down Websites") – translation: "This isn't our problem".
And therein lies the issue. ICANN needs to make this their problem, because it very much is. If ICANN isn't going to stand up, and vigorously campaign for global stakeholder representation in these matters, than they are not only abdicating any responsibility in the ongoing and escalating crackdown on internet freedom, they are also abdicating their right to govern and oversee it.
They need to be visible, they need to be loud and they need to come down on the right side of these issues or they need to be replaced.
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Filed Under: domain seizures, domain system, icann, internet, legality
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Maryland's civil laws
Property can be forfeited under a preponderance of the evidence standard; the government must merely prove it is more likely than not that the property was involved in a crime, a far lower standard than beyond a reasonable doubt. Property owners are effectively “guilty until proven innocent”: To contest a seizure, the property owner must prove that the property was wrongfully seized or that the owner did not have actual knowledge of the conduct. But Maryland civil forfeiture law, unlike most other states, avoids creating a profit incentive for local law enforcement. All proceeds from civil forfeiture flow to the state general fund or the local governing body.
Read the last part one more time. They make their money from the proceeds by getting the federal government involved. You are guilty in all civil forfeitures until you're proven innocent because you the state only needs a "probable cause" for forfeiture. It's ridiculous that so few states have laws against this, but Maryland still gets cutbacks from the Feds in regards to these laws.
Based on the evidence found in the 2010 "Policing for profit" report, these domain seizures are only going to get worse. Until people begin to tackle that, we'll have the DoJ using civil asset forfeiture in questionable ways to benefit all law officials with inflated paychecks.
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Re: Maryland's civil laws
State law isn't trump here at all.
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Re: Re: Maryland's civil laws
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Re: Maryland's civil laws
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Re: Re: Maryland's civil laws
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Re: Re: Maryland's civil laws
"Hurrdurrr... if copying mp3 isnt theft then taking your routers and gatrways isnt thert cuss... digital!"
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My question is ?
I know that would make a mess of the DNS system but if the EEUU do not care to break it why should the rest of the world.
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Re: My question is ?
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Re: My question is ?
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Re: Re: My question is ?
Imagine the situation reversed. A Canadian judge orders a takedown of the google.ca domain for some insane Canadian reason. Google files suit in the US claiming that since the site is legal in the US, then US DNS services should still point to google.ca. Why would the US court care what the Canada court did?
My fear is that eventually they are just going to... wait, no, I'm not even going to give them that idea if they haven't thought of it yet.
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Re: Re: Re: My question is ?
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Re: Re: My question is ?
The judge in France (for example) is ordering a company in France to allow to the french (mainly) to reach the correct server when requesting bodog.com and its not even difficult technically
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Re: Re: Re: My question is ?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: My question is ?
I almost sure that the international agreement to delegate the control the (g)TLD to ICANN do no include a clause to delegate to the US judicial system the control of the (g)TLD.
The US government is taking advantage that the operator of the .com is a american company that operate their main server in US to bypass the ICANN procedures and international agreements.
I don't know of any law in France that codify that the Verisign zone file originating in US must be the canonical zone file so the judge in France do have the same problem in ordering Verisign France to change its France Server that the US judge have in ordering Verisign US to change theirs
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Re: My question is ?
it's pretty simple - the domain space works because there is only ONE .com system, not 20 or 30. There isn't a local version of .com, there is one, and it is obtained through a US company, which is subject to US laws and the US legal system.
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Re: Re: My question is ?
As has been said a mess for the DNS system but as would be said in spanish
"maricón el ultimo"
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Re: Re: Re: My question is ?
You guys are a laugh a minute.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: My question is ?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: My question is ?
The question is what would happen when one of this non-US companies decide to behave as an american company and cheat the system under their local laws and F*ck everybody else. And what is stoping them?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: My question is ?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: My question is ?
.com commerce domain I didn't know commerce was a EEUU exclusive
if we where talking of the .us one I don't think anyone would complain
if a judge can decide in US to modify an international domain why can't a judge in another country modify it in his own country.
The operation of the main .com Zone in the US is a historical gentlemen agreement the US get to operated but the US government do no mess with it, when the US government unilaterally decide that it can take over it and size the domain of a foreign country company register in its own country operating legally in its own country is breaking the agreement why should the rest of the world keep there side of the bargain.
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Re: Re: Re: My question is ?
Actually, there is. If a mirror stops correctly mirroring, it can break all kinds of things in ways that can be difficult to diagnose. That server would also have to be cut loose an an authoritative server, and people using it would be balkanized.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: My question is ?
But no technically reason that the company operating the server can't do it
Basically the Order is telling the mirror server stop considering authoritative the US server in respect this particular domain.
plus if they get enough mirror places to do it would be the US one that would stop been authoritative and get balkanized
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Re:
FTFY
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Re: Re: Re:
He said and I quote "This is exactly why we need a non-centralized infrastructure."
Emphasis on "non-centralized" which should exclude the UN body.
A distributed system is not a UN system.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
Something like a p2p distributed system. Anyone can join in a given pool and be authoritative. Anyone can mirror existing zones with checksums, etc. There are simple ways to achieve this to make sure authentic data is preserved at all times.
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Re:
FTFY
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Re:
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Re: Re:
20 years from now, the current generation of internet punks will be running the big companies, and they will be fighting legal battles to get the future internet punks to stop stealing their stuff. Time has a way of changing how you see things.
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ICANN is corrupt to the core
Let me tell you the name of game, boy...
We call it "riding the gravy train"
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If a domain is registered outside the US
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They changed their name to ICANT
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Why not get involved?
For those of you who are pissed off ICANN's lack of a stance on seizures, why not try to do something about it?
ICANN has a public meeting coming up later this month.
It's in Costa Rica, but anybody can participate remotely via http://costarica43.icann.org
The Public Forum, during which anybody can make a statement or ask a question, whether they're in the room or not, starts at 2pm local time on Thursday March 15.
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Re: Why not get involved?
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From a comment thread on Slashdot
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dmv
they need to stay neutral and make this a problem for the courts.
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Re: dmv
Which is what they are doing. They are handing over domains based on court orders, nothing less.
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Re: Re: dmv
Having the power to do so doesn't automagically make you an expert on other fields.
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Re: Re: Re: dmv
ICANN has to work within the law of the country it is located in. If a US court order says "shut down this domain and turn it over the ICE", then ICANN needs to do it, or spend a ton of money trying to fight to say they shouldn't... and losing, because they are just not really in that position.
It doesn't require experts, it only requires reasonable probably cause.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: dmv
[pet peeve]
The legal term is "probable cause" and means "reasonable ground for a belief".
Combining the definitions of "probably" and "cause" would be "in all likelihood bring about".
I see this fairly often and it annoys me. These are different terms and are not interchangeable.
[/pet peeve]
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Re: Re: Re: dmv
you don't keep your child from swimming because she doesn't know how. you take her in the pool and make her learn. the longer you wait the harder it becomes.
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ICANN's silence and people's upset
I'm not going to hold my breath about it though nor am I waiting for a sudden conversion experience on ICANN's part.
But it does help to participate in things like their upcoming public meeting in Costa Rica by taking part on line if not in person.
http://costarica43.icann.org
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Internet war
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the insiders trail
ICANN grew out of that - and in typical corporatocracy driven U.S. government fashion, it was done in a way that ensured governments (mostly the U.S. government) could continue to keep their foot planted firmly in the doorway of the new "unbiased" entity.
Please. Verisign, ICANN - pathetic shills for those in power who have no willingness to go through actual constitutional channels
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Good try, ICE
[ bovada.lv ], which is hosted in a Latvian domain.
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Bodog.lv --> Bodog.eu --> Bodo.co.uk
Which is live and available for anyone who wants to join....
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Blinks
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