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Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada

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Re: Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada

#521

Post by izacus »

xenophonf wrote: post #308
jordank wrote: post #80

My wife’s Slack account was closed yesterday. She created the account while traveling in Cuba (legally) years ago and hasn’t been back to Cuba or any other sanctioned country since. She is a cofounder of an org that uses Slack heavily and has now lost access to all her messages and files from the past couple years of work. There appears to be no appeal process here.

While it's perfectly legal for your wife, a Canadian, to go to Cuba, it's still embargoed by the U.S., and Slack as a U.S. company must comply with the embargo (even though your wife has done nothing wrong per Canadian law).

What other life-long punishments does she deserve for doing that horrible deed? Completely removed Google account with all her data? Permanent ban from any grocery store? Revoked driver license? Lifelong ban from Amazon, HN and other US services?

Re: Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada

#522

Post by izacus »

anthonys wrote: post #193
Cthulhu_ wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know they're private companies and they _can_ do it, but just because you can doesn't mean you should. Actually, if you look at the image, Slack is beholden to US law, export regulations and economic sanctions - companies doing business with countries they shouldn't are in big trouble. See also: Huawei, who despite sanctions continued to do business with Iran, which caused the US to give them a huge fine. I don't…

No they aren't above the law. But to clarify, they gave a service to people/teams who maybe they shouldn't have. Did the people signing up/using Slack know that? Maybe. Who's responsible to ensure it's enforced? Slack.

"maybe" shouldn't have. So not "certanly" shouldn't have, just "maybe"?

Re: Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada

#523

Post by samirm »

dustinmoris wrote: post #147

Wow the Twitter thread and the experiences which are mentioned here sound so extreme and crazy that I am seriously confused to what believe. - Is this all made up to prove some point? - Is this just how the US ticks right now? - Is Slack just completely gone mad? - Is this what companies believes is acceptable nowadays? - Is this the future of the web? The fact that I am not sure what to believe and that I wouldn't b…

What's there to be unsure about in terms of belief? Hundreds of people are having their accounts closed and that's a fact.

Re: Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada

#524

Post by SUr3na »

smnrchrds wrote: post #481
SUr3na wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's ironic that Golang.org is not accessible from Iran because of app engine.also several non proprietary repos like sourceforge. The only way to get go lang's source code is through github. It is only a matter of time untill Microsoft decides to block github for Iranians as well.I don't know why github is not currently blocked but I would not be surprised if it gets blocked.

None of the Google developer-oriented resources are accessible from Iran. For example, you have to use a VPN to download Android Studio or access Google educational materials. Golang is just yet another Google project that has blocked Iran.

My intention was to show that in reality it doesn't matter whether a software is open source or proprietary like sourceforge .golang has nit blocked Iran .I highly doubt anyone among go community and creators would think or know about this issue . it is only blocked because of app engine just like many other non-google websites which use app engine.

Re: Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada

#525

Post by simonsaidit »

winrid wrote: post #479
SamWhited wrote: post #305

I've been mad at the Go community in particular for continuing to promote Slack for ages, and this is exactly the hypothetical situation I always use to explain why (although there are other reasons too; Slack is a perfect embodiment of everything wrong with this industry, but that needs a fuller writeup). At a previous job we had to start doing this exact same thing when we were considering going public; this is the…

Try to propose running your own chat server at any medium to large company. No VP of engineering or CTO wants to worry about that and the possible security risks. If Slack messes up they can blame Slack but if you mess up and expose some Healthcare data to the outside world because of your chat server they are screwed.

I’ve seen exactly those reasons by those people in those size companies to explain why slack could not be allowed.

Re: Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada

#526

Post by [deleted] »

hnauz wrote: post #128
serguzest wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

* cough * Israel * cough *.

cough AIPAC cough You just have to see those anti-Israel boycott clauses that people have been talking about recently. And on the other hand, no problems with Saudi Arabia because they are friends with Israel. America is Israel's whore. It's sad when you come to think of it.

[deleted]

Re: Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada

#527

Post by walterbell »

SamWhited wrote: post #457
walterbell wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An effort is underway to standardize E2E encrypted group messaging in the IETF with the MLS [1] protocol. Open-source participants include Wire and Matrix. Commercial participants include Facebook, Cisco, Google and Apple. [1] https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/mls/about/ Wire is open-source today and usable by regular people, with E2E encryption and email-only accounts.

How is Wire developed and funded? This was my biggest problem with Matrix (unsustainable funding model for the protocol and no proper standards body). Why not just use XMPP? Yes, everyone hates XML, but the protocol is well designed, has sustainable funding (via the IETF and XSF), and there's lots of experience out there, and it's flexible enough to develop services like Slack on top of.

They are VC funded and sell services (Wire Pro, Wire Red) to large companies.

Re: Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada

#528

Post by sctb »

hnauz wrote: post #222
dustinmoris wrote: post #147

Wow the Twitter thread and the experiences which are mentioned here sound so extreme and crazy that I am seriously confused to what believe. - Is this all made up to prove some point? - Is this just how the US ticks right now? - Is Slack just completely gone mad? - Is this what companies believes is acceptable nowadays? - Is this the future of the web? The fact that I am not sure what to believe and that I wouldn't b…

The guy is bitching so much in the thread, claiming that he's been profiled based on his race (and not the fact that he connected to Slack from Iran at some point), that it's hard to take him seriously.

You've been breaking the guidelines a whole lot by posting unsubstantive flamey comments. Please stop—we ban accounts that keep on, especially if that's all they've been doing.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada

#529

Post by simonsaidit »

mgbmtl wrote: post #415
IshKebab wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if part of the reason we don't have any great open source Slack competitors (yes I know about Mattermost, Zulip, etc.) is that so many open source developers (or at least commenters here) seem to be under the illusion that IRC is a reasonable alternative to Slack.

What's wrong with Mattermost? We use it for our FOSS community (and I use another instance for our company), works well.

Our company still have a lot of guys on irc so a bridge was put in place to mattermost :)
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