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GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

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Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

#131

Post by shadowgovt »

antoncohen wrote: post #18

What frustrates me about these kind of things is how impersonal they are. How many orgs/users does GitHub sanction a day? Too many for it to be able to email the users and ask clarifying questions? Or even have a human dig in and double check what the algorithm says. Basic human interaction would seemingly solve 99% of false account lockouts and takedowns. Even basic heuristics like this org has a repo with 11,000 st…

Personal interaction and special-case handling of individual issues does not scale. That's the curse of getting too big as an internet service provider of any stripe.

Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

#132

Post by luckylion »

natfriedman wrote: post #113

Hi HN, I'm the CEO of GitHub. Flagging this account was obviously a terrible mistake, and I apologize to anyone who was affected by it. We're investigating why it occurred and will make changes to make sure it doesn't happen again. I am glad that we restored access to the account in less than an hour after Aurelia filed their appeal. For context on why any account flagging is ever necessary, unfortunately, every comp…

> I am glad that we restored access to the account in less than an hour after Aurelia filed their appeal.

You mean after they went semi-viral on Twitter and landed on the HN front page. But I'm sure it doesn't happen again (to this repository, for this reason, in this year; everything else is on the table).

Using Twitter, FB, HN etc as your support-priority-queue system is a terrible idea.

Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

#133

Post by shadowgovt »

cryptonector wrote: post #24
antoncohen wrote: post #18

What frustrates me about these kind of things is how impersonal they are. How many orgs/users does GitHub sanction a day? Too many for it to be able to email the users and ask clarifying questions? Or even have a human dig in and double check what the algorithm says. Basic human interaction would seemingly solve 99% of false account lockouts and takedowns. Even basic heuristics like this org has a repo with 11,000 st…

In a world in which online presence is an essential attribute of... commerce, professionalism, etc., deplatforming cannot be allowed to be so trivial to effect and difficult (in many cases impossible) to challenge. At some point human rights have got to include sufficient due process to deal with accidental or unjust deplatforming.

It's an interesting thought, but at the moment at least, things are still too fluid to really nail down how that would work. What is a "platform?" What is "deplatforming?" If Github kicks me off and I can migrate easily to GitLab, have I been "deplatformed?" Is it morally correct to tie Github's hands from locking someone's account if they're using their git repo to host CP?

We're getting there, but pulling it off is going to require a level of international cooperation that is rarely seen (and tends to give a few key players a lot of power; if we do this, I hope everyone's excited to be living under the US's notion of what morality looks like. Or Europe's. or China's).

Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

#134

Post by ben509 »

mullingitover wrote: post #78

Isn't this a first amendment violation? Are we not on board with the notion that code is speech, and that the constitution applies to everyone, not just US citizens? With those things in mind, I don't understand how the Iranian peoples' free speech rights can be infringed just because their speech is in the form of code.

If Github is acting as agents of the USG, they're bound by 1A. Here, there's a direct instruction from the government telling them to do this thing.

But I'm not sure there's a 1A case against this form of trade sanctions. The government isn't saying Iranians (as an example) can't write code, or that US citizens can't write code. They're saying they Iranian citizens can't use a US service. It's being denied as an economic transaction, not as speech.

Art I Sec 8 specifically enumerates the power "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations...", and arguably sanctions are further allowed under the power "To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offenses against the Law of Nations;"

Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

#135

Post by [deleted] »

jackpirate wrote: post #130
natfriedman wrote: post #113

Hi HN, I'm the CEO of GitHub. Flagging this account was obviously a terrible mistake, and I apologize to anyone who was affected by it. We're investigating why it occurred and will make changes to make sure it doesn't happen again. I am glad that we restored access to the account in less than an hour after Aurelia filed their appeal. For context on why any account flagging is ever necessary, unfortunately, every comp…

... to offer public repo access in US-sanctioned countries like Iran, Syria, and Cuba. You should also add North Korea to that list. Three years ago I spent a semester in Pyongyang teaching a course on open source software development, and as part of the course students created git repos and contributed to other repos that are hosted on github. So that you're not put in an awkward position, though, I won't tell you w…

[deleted]

Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

#136

Post by shadowgovt »

luckylion wrote: post #132
natfriedman wrote: post #113

Hi HN, I'm the CEO of GitHub. Flagging this account was obviously a terrible mistake, and I apologize to anyone who was affected by it. We're investigating why it occurred and will make changes to make sure it doesn't happen again. I am glad that we restored access to the account in less than an hour after Aurelia filed their appeal. For context on why any account flagging is ever necessary, unfortunately, every comp…

> I am glad that we restored access to the account in less than an hour after Aurelia filed their appeal. You mean after they went semi-viral on Twitter and landed on the HN front page. But I'm sure it doesn't happen again (to this repository, for this reason, in this year; everything else is on the table). Using Twitter, FB, HN etc as your support-priority-queue system is a terrible idea.

As we've seen with all major internet service providing companies, getting customer service right 100% of the time does not scale. Errors happen. The mean time between errors approaches 0 hours as the ratio of users to human beings on the planet approaches 100%.

Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

#137

Post by RegnisGnaw »

natfriedman wrote: post #113

Hi HN, I'm the CEO of GitHub. Flagging this account was obviously a terrible mistake, and I apologize to anyone who was affected by it. We're investigating why it occurred and will make changes to make sure it doesn't happen again. I am glad that we restored access to the account in less than an hour after Aurelia filed their appeal. For context on why any account flagging is ever necessary, unfortunately, every comp…

Do you think as the EU and PRC grows politically and economically, they will start throwing around similar sanction requirements as the USA? Will GitHub be forced to obey those as well?

Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

#138

Post by shadowgovt »

miracle2k wrote: post #51
chatmasta wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GitLab is fantastic, but GitHub has the most eyeballs and best discoverability features. As long as that remains true, GitHub will remain a better place to launch an open source product than alternatives.

Note that Gitlab hosts on Google Cloud, which blocks all traffic from sanctioned countries on a network level. No IP packages from US sanctioned countries reach any service hosted on Google Cloud, including OpenSource gitlab repos.

Yep. Sum it all up, and the easiest way to not be disadvantaged on the Internet is to not be in a sanctioned country.

Which is, well, rather the point of the sanctions.

Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

#139

Post by luckylion »

shadowgovt wrote: post #136
luckylion wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am glad that we restored access to the account in less than an hour after Aurelia filed their appeal. You mean after they went semi-viral on Twitter and landed on the HN front page. But I'm sure it doesn't happen again (to this repository, for this reason, in this year; everything else is on the table). Using Twitter, FB, HN etc as your support-priority-queue system is a terrible idea.

As we've seen with all major internet service providing companies, getting customer service right 100% of the time does not scale. Errors happen. The mean time between errors approaches 0 hours as the ratio of users to human beings on the planet approaches 100%.

Sure, but there's plenty of space between offering Google-level support and getting it 100% right. Aim for 100%, not for Google. It's not their terrible support that made them successful, don't copy that part of their operation.

Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions

#140

Post by dathinab »

jackpirate wrote: post #130
natfriedman wrote: post #113

Hi HN, I'm the CEO of GitHub. Flagging this account was obviously a terrible mistake, and I apologize to anyone who was affected by it. We're investigating why it occurred and will make changes to make sure it doesn't happen again. I am glad that we restored access to the account in less than an hour after Aurelia filed their appeal. For context on why any account flagging is ever necessary, unfortunately, every comp…

... to offer public repo access in US-sanctioned countries like Iran, Syria, and Cuba. You should also add North Korea to that list. Three years ago I spent a semester in Pyongyang teaching a course on open source software development, and as part of the course students created git repos and contributed to other repos that are hosted on github. So that you're not put in an awkward position, though, I won't tell you w…

I wonder do they use VPN to obfuscate where they come from?
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