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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

#231

Post by duckmysick »

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…

> unfortunately, every company in the world is required to comply with US sanctions if they do any business at all in the United States, e.g. serving US-based customers. This includes even interacting with US banking infrastructure. So being headquartered somewhere else doesn't help; you have to comply. And US sanctions as written do not allow us to provide commercial services or services which could be used commercially to sanctioned countries.

How come DHL is able to ship packages to sanctioned countries? I understand there are some limitations to what can be sent there from the US, but it seems like they are able to do so from other countries. Is the DHL US a separate entity or is there something else I'm missing?

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

#232

Post by bbrree66 »

firloop wrote: post #2

This is pure speculation, but it seems that GitHub's ownership by Microsoft causes them to be significantly more strict with the types of content that they are comfortable hosting. Expect this to continue as they expand up and down the stack; once their npm acquisition closes you'll see this there too. I think this should be a wake-up call to anyone staking their open source project on GitHub — if I let someone from…

Unsubstantiated speculation that is simply confirmation bias of what you want to be true without evidence.

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

#233

Post by Aeolun »

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 don’t think any company headquartered outside the US has to comply with those laws. It’s only if they value doing business in the US enough to do so.

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

#234

Post by blanche_56 »

relaunched wrote: post #208
dependenttypes wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ms. Ciresi’s most recent post on GitLab’s public thread, published five days ago, has been redacted by the company. Would you happen to have her post? Kind of amusing how they talk about valuing transparency when they censored her post.

https://m.imgur.com/a/grRvEWt

Well that does seem hysterical.

I wonder what kind of overlap exists between those who have been panicking about "Russian hackers" for the last four years and those who now believe that reluctance in allowing remote Russian developers access to potentially sensitive or valuable US code bases is "racist".

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

#235

Post by blanche_56 »

shadowgovt wrote: post #207
cryptonector wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If Github kicks me off and I can migrate easily to GitLab, have I been "deplatformed?" Most definitely you have. Especially if the reason and process used by GH is likely to also be in use at GL. > Is it morally correct to tie Github's hands from locking someone's account if they're using their git repo to host CP? The relevant question is: is it constitutional. In the U.S. I believe the answer would be a solid "ye…

> Indeed, there's no need to frame this as a moral question, and it's arguably foolish to do so. It is and should be only a question of policy, politics, and constitutional law. Morality drives the shaping of all three of those things, so framing it as a question of morality is unavoidable if one wants to do something other than the status quo (which is "A private service provider may choose to do business with or re…

[flagged]

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

#236

Post by yorwba »

relaunched wrote: post #178
sytse wrote: post #154

GitLab CEO here, thanks Nat for doing everything you can do to keep open source accessible around the world. We have to comply with the same restrictions and respect greatly that GitHub is taking the broadest possible interpretation of US sanctions law to help users.

Do you though? Really? https://www.wsj.com/articles/resignation-at-gitlab-highlight...

That article doesn't seem to link to the GitLab issue where they had the discussion, so let me link to the corresponding HN thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21437334

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

#237

Post by qaq »

RegnisGnaw wrote: post #137
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?

RPC already does it from forcing brands to remove Taiwan from list of countries on their sites to having Hollywood alter things they don't like in movies.

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

#238

Post by saagarjha »

Sephr wrote: post #143
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 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…

> Even if it was ITAR-compliant, the limits could easily be removed as it is open source software.

To someone willing to spend more than a couple minutes, the fact that it's open source is quite meaningless.

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

#239

Post by frankdenbow »

jslakro wrote: post #124
frankdenbow wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes sense if you think of them as separate companies (which is how they are run)

https://nouhailler.tumblr.com/image/21516226342

Maybe >5 years ago, culture has changed under Satya :)

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

#240

Post by mroche »

brodock wrote: post #217
mroche wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For my GitLab repos (where I maintain source/workflow) I use the mirror functionality to automatically push any and all all commits to GitHub. I configure the GitHub mirror with a link to the official repo and disable issues. Unfortunately, you can’t outright disable GitHub’s pull requests. I’ve seen plenty of orphaned PRs on repos that do tracking/review elsewhere and people just don’t read (or actively ignore) the…

looks like you can use Actions for that: https://github.com/marketplace/actions/close-pull-request

Interesting. I haven't looked at Actions at all yet but this is nifty. Previously I had seen people write their own GitHub bots to handle this sort of thing.
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