GitHub has corrected the issue, restoring our organization access and web site. They have reported that the org was flagged as part of an automated process. The flagging occurred because we have two external contributors from Iran (non GH org members). They told me that there should have been a warning and they are investigating why that didn't happen. The CEO of GitHub also reached out personally to try to speedily rectify the situation.
GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions
141–150 of 312 posts
Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions
#142Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's not how the First Amendment works. It applies to the government, not private businesses.
I think that's not right, because the reason the company is doing the censoring is to comply with sanctions imposed by the government. If the US says you can't host content praising Iran, and GitHub takes it down to comply, that's a 1st Amendment violation. However, code seems to be in a strange place, neither clearly speech nor clearly not-speech.
I argue code is absolutely protected speech. The government ran away[1] from a recent case that would've settled the matter conclusively.
[1] https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/is-code-free-speech/
Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions
#143Hi 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 believe that trade regulations such as ITAR apply to publicly-available open source software? I do not¹, and it appears that your employees do not believe this either.
GitHub is currently hosting multiple GPS implementations² that are clearly against this line in your ToS, in addition to also being against ITAR by not implementing speed limits for missiles:
"GitHub may not be used for purposes prohibited under applicable export control laws, including purposes related to the development, production, or use of […] long range missiles or unmanned aerial vehicles."
I think you should probably make a blog post explaining GitHub's stance on this issue.
[1]: https://www.unr.edu/sponsored-projects/compliance/export-con...
[2]: One of which is https://github.com/gnss-sdr/gnss-sdr. This repository does not implement ITAR-required GPS speed limits. Even if it was ITAR-compliant, the limits could easily be removed as it is open source software.
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Update: GitHub has updated their ToS to remove this line. It was present on July 27, 2019. The issue still stands with this current statement from their ToS ( https://help.github.com/en/github/site-policy/github-and-tra...), which forbids ITAR-regulated software:
"Users are responsible for ensuring that the content they develop and share on GitHub.com complies with the U.S. export control laws, including the EAR and the U.S. International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). The cloud-hosted service offering available at GitHub.com has not been designed to host data subject to the ITAR and does not currently offer the ability to restrict repository access by country."
Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions
#144Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you tried looking it up yourself instead of making me feed you info in what totally looks like bad faith that would be awesome.
FWIW, I have attempted to look it up myself, and unlike Github, GitLab doesn't appear to allow me a transparent view into their offerings in action without signing up to start my free trial. Which is a lot more engagement than Github requires of someone just trying to discover capabilities.
https://about.gitlab.com/features/
From what it looks like, the free trial is similar to GitHub‘s paid account but you can use the extra tools for free for the duration of the trial. Seems as transparent as GitHub.
Never used GitLab outside of running it myself but I think hosting OS software on GitLab.com is free.
Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions
#145Earlier quoted context omitted.
Country B is the one having many weapon of mass destruction and used it 2 times already.
And is the only country to have ever used such weapons in wartime, and on a civilian population, nonetheless.
I suppose you'd prefer that, instead, the entirety of Japan would have had to be bombed into oblivion using non-nuclear weapons, not to mention the extra loss of life on the Allied side that would have almost certainly occurred during a more traditional invasion that would have likely been necessary.
War sucks, and there are rarely good choices; it's nearly always going to be a choice between something truly awful and something just merely really bad. Nuclear weapons suck, but I dare say they saved lives -- on both sides -- when used in that instance. Of course, after more people had them, and we realized the implications of MAD, using nuclear weapons is (thankfully) more or less off the table for any non-suicidal nation.
Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions
#146Sanctions for online services are one of the worst things about working in this industry. Being forced to implement and maintain technical solutions to block access to every day citizens of certain regions because some guys in suits decided these are second tier humans is demoralizing as hell. How are people supposed to rise up and depose or vote for less tyranical governments if they cannot access information, or us…
> Sanctions for online services
Not my field, but my impression is there's an ongoing argument over whether severe economic sanctions constitute a form of collective punishment as prohibited under the Geneva convention. Usually it's in the context of trade and infrastructure. "Once your government submits to our policy demands, we'll permit your infant mortality rates to drop back down - until then, don't blame us for your suffering". But where access to information is seen as a universal human right, a similar issue might arise with online services.
Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
To pick an extreme example, do you seriously believe the US has less legitimacy in this respect than North Korea?
Yes, absolutely. The US is responsible for far more bloodshed than North Korea. How many coups were backed by the US government, how many nukes we have, our never ending war machine...list goes on and on. I don't think North Korea is anything more than a totalitarian dictatorship but I 100% would never believe what western media backed by US imperialist propaganda is telling me about them.
By the way, the South Korea's National Security Law still has the clause that "any person who praises, incites or propagates the activities of an antigovernment organization (that includes DPRK by design)... shall be punished by imprisonment for not more than seven years". And this clause is actually used (see Amnesty International's report https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/asa25/006/2012/en/ ), so it's literally illegal for a South Korean newspaper to print anything positive about DPRK.
Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions
#148Sanctions for online services are one of the worst things about working in this industry. Being forced to implement and maintain technical solutions to block access to every day citizens of certain regions because some guys in suits decided these are second tier humans is demoralizing as hell. How are people supposed to rise up and depose or vote for less tyranical governments if they cannot access information, or us…
>What exactly is the plan? Are we expecting that individuals who disagree with their regimes would leave their country and their families? It just feels like cold blooded retribution with no care for the regular every day population. That it will impact the country economically and hopefully result in the Government changing coarse or for the People of the country to not want to live in a shitty place with a poor eco…
That sounds good in theory, but in reality you end up with worse outcomes than doing nothing:
a) The target country just allows their citizens to feel the brunt of the sanctions while the ruling class hoards resources for themselves.
b) The target country starts a propaganda campaign to blame the sanction-issuer for all their problems, which the citizens mostly believe.
So ultimately you end up with regular-Joe citizens in the target country having a worse quality of life, while also being led to believe that your country is the evil one.
Another poster hit the nail on the head: the politicians in the sanction-issuing country need to be seen as doing something by their populace, regardless of what the result of that something is.
Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions
#149Hi 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…
So how do you plan to not overreact going forward? Or did the Microsoft acquisition play a role?
Re: GitHub shuts off access to Aurelia repository, citing trade sanctions
#150Sanctions for online services are one of the worst things about working in this industry. Being forced to implement and maintain technical solutions to block access to every day citizens of certain regions because some guys in suits decided these are second tier humans is demoralizing as hell. How are people supposed to rise up and depose or vote for less tyranical governments if they cannot access information, or us…
Apparently, the idea is that those "Crimean or Iranian" would get pissed off at their government and revolt. Which, as the practice shows, doesn't quite work taht way. They get pissed off at the sanctioning government as well, and are less likely to believe that that government actually worries about their interests and rights and not, say, as using them as a free battering ram against their current government/regime…
> They get pissed off at the sanctioning government as well, and are less likely to believe that that government actually worries about their interests and rights...
Oh thank god they’re less likely to believe that, because at least in this version of reality no government actually worries about the interests and rights of the human beings on the other side of the planet; if they say so they’re just bullshitting.