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Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

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Re: Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

#31
post #25
post #12

The title is intentionally misleading. It's not the government but the judicial authorities, in Spain we have distribution of power. From the take down notice: > In Spain, judicial authorities are responsible for the supervision and control of websites in order to prevent the dissemination of criminal content as it is specified in the article 35 of our Law 34/2002 and the article 13 of our Criminal Procedure Code.

How is a judicial authority not a part of the government?

Government is often understood to be the executive part, somewhat like 'administration', I don't know if there is a better word to use.

Re: Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

#32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone in Spain got any context on TD and the current political context?

There's a massive ongoing police operation to suppress the catalan independence movement. The spanish paramilitary is trying to take down the source code of an app that people use to coordinate peaceful demonstrations. They say that this is to "fight terrorism" which is ridiculous, albeit there are already several people preemptively incarcerated, falsely accused of terrorism (still waiting for a trial).

I think that regarding the Catalan independence the Spanish judiciary system had proven itself to be at the level of the worst dictatorial country. People taking part in it should be shameful. When most of these cases will go up to the EU court they will likely get squashed.

Re: Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

#33
post #8

A) A little late now, since as is stated in the letter people are already mirroring the repo B) can the app really be spreading that fast, if people are having to download it from github, and override their devices security settings to install it? Also the words "serious public disorder" send chills down my spine for some reason. It sounds like it's right out of some dystopian movie.

It should - not only in all together too familiar rhetoric but because it is so exploitably vague - not only does it not require an actual offense but a reaction but it is so totalitarian that it easily encompasses a pretense of anything "not obeying" them, let alone dissent including going against their never spoken will.

To be frank anyone unironically speaking something like that brings to mind ethical arguements about smothering baby Hitler.

Re: Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

#34
post #8

A) A little late now, since as is stated in the letter people are already mirroring the repo B) can the app really be spreading that fast, if people are having to download it from github, and override their devices security settings to install it? Also the words "serious public disorder" send chills down my spine for some reason. It sounds like it's right out of some dystopian movie.

For me the worst part is where they say that Tsunami Democratic is a terrorist group when there is no proof that they are and in everyone of their media appearances they highlight that they will only use nonviolent approaches to fighting for independence.

Re: Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

#35
For a bit of context I'll leave my two cents here trying to be as objective as possible, leaving politics out of it as much as I can.

Following the judge's veredict of the Catalan politicians who coordinated the "proces", or series of political movements to attempt to secede Catalonia from Spain; demonstrations have arisen within Catalonia protesting said judgement - the politicians were essentially deemed as conspirators against the Spanish constitution and have been given varying prision sentences. Parts of those demonstrations have turned violent: clashes with police trying to stop blockages of streets and railroads, burning of cars and dumpsters, etc...

The Catalonian government's stance on this is difficult: as a pro-independence government they're trying to promote actions against the veredict but in some situations it has gotten out of hand and turned violent - something a government can't really condone.

Tsunami Democratic is an organisation that has been coordinating demonstrations and developed an app that allows people to know where demonstrations are happening, etc - whether these demonstrations turn violent or not is officially out of their control; the Spanish authorities (in this case, a judge in charge of investigating the circumstances around the more violent parts of the rioting) obviously believe that the app is aiding in coordinating violent attacks - whether that's terrorism or just violent rioting is something I don't know and I'm unsure we'll ever fully know.

That's the context, at the end of the day it's a national government asking for a repo to be taken down in accordance to the laws of their country, you might disagree with it happening fundamentally but its nothing new, the Github repo for takedowns has plenty - although they seem to usually be coming from China/Russia.

Re: Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

#36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a massive ongoing police operation to suppress the catalan independence movement. The spanish paramilitary is trying to take down the source code of an app that people use to coordinate peaceful demonstrations. They say that this is to "fight terrorism" which is ridiculous, albeit there are already several people preemptively incarcerated, falsely accused of terrorism (still waiting for a trial).

I think that regarding the Catalan independence the Spanish judiciary system had proven itself to be at the level of the worst dictatorial country. People taking part in it should be shameful. When most of these cases will go up to the EU court they will likely get squashed.

Sure, but it takes years. In the meanwhile, several arrested teenagers will have spent all that time in jail, some of them even incommunicado (!).

Re: Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

#37

Not 100% sure of the repo name, as it's not displayed in the document. At a guess this is the one, and it still seems to be on GitHub: https://github.com/tsunamidemocratic/tsunamidemocratic.githu... The GitHub pages hosted website still seems to be online too: https://tsunamidemocratic.github.io Perhaps GitHub is publishing the request, but isn't complying with the takedown?

Anyone in Spain got any context on TD and the current political context?

Basically Catalonia, the region of Spain that includes Barcelona, is attempting to gain independence. The Spanish government is attempting to prevent that. These protests are a result of this tension.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Catalan_protests

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Catalan_independence_refe...

Re: Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

#38

Not 100% sure of the repo name, as it's not displayed in the document. At a guess this is the one, and it still seems to be on GitHub: https://github.com/tsunamidemocratic/tsunamidemocratic.githu... The GitHub pages hosted website still seems to be online too: https://tsunamidemocratic.github.io Perhaps GitHub is publishing the request, but isn't complying with the takedown?

Anyone in Spain got any context on TD and the current political context?

The tsunami app it's trying to build a decentralized network on a way that anonymous individuals can control and send messages to specific peers, to coordinate "peaceful" demonstrations and make noise on their independence desire.

They managed to close the access to Barcelona airport and disturb the lives of thousands of individuals, and their plan is to continue doing so in an anonymous and unaccountable way.

Spanish government on the other side, it's trying to find who is behind this network, and making some bold moves, not because their effectiveness, but more to say that it's doing something instead of sitting idle.

Re: Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

#39
post #12

The title is intentionally misleading. It's not the government but the judicial authorities, in Spain we have distribution of power. From the take down notice: > In Spain, judicial authorities are responsible for the supervision and control of websites in order to prevent the dissemination of criminal content as it is specified in the article 35 of our Law 34/2002 and the article 13 of our Criminal Procedure Code.

The takedown notice was sent directly by the Spanish paramilitary, but it's supposed to have a court order attached to it, and that would be issued by an independent judiciary. So you're half-right - a bit weird, overall.

Re: Spanish government orders GitHub to take down Tsunami Democràtic repository

#40

Looks like the app repo is at https://github.com/s3rrallonga/tsunami It appears to still be online from UK, dunno about ES

That one seems to be a cloned repo, the blocked one is at https://github.com/tsunamidemocratic/tsunamidemocratic.githu...

It returns a "Repository unavailable in your location" message, which is kind of ironic since the website itself is still accessible from https://tsunamidemocratic.github.io

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