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Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

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Re: Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

#91

Post by navaati »

AsyncAwait wrote: post #23
skrebbel wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, nitpick, nobody's blocking Persians. I'm not Persian but if I go to Iran I bet I'm blocked too. I'm strongly opposed to these sanctions, and I also think GitLab should've given people notice so they could get their data out. But I'm not sure it's a good place to pull the racism card.

I agree it's not racism on GitLab's part, but the U.S. officials behind these sanctions themselves do use phrases like that they want to 'choke Iran's economy', that is in the middle of a pandemic where people's respiratory systems are at risk, it certainly doesn't look good on their part. Also worth noting that GitLab has previously banned hiring from China/Russia, so it's no stranger to blanket bans of questionable…

They also ban hires from France FWIW, but that's because they wouldn't touch our labour code with a 10-foot pole haha.

Re: Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

#92

Post by AsyncAwait »

marcinzm wrote: post #73
AsyncAwait wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree it's not racism on GitLab's part, but the U.S. officials behind these sanctions themselves do use phrases like that they want to 'choke Iran's economy', that is in the middle of a pandemic where people's respiratory systems are at risk, it certainly doesn't look good on their part. Also worth noting that GitLab has previously banned hiring from China/Russia, so it's no stranger to blanket bans of questionable…

>Also worth noting that GitLab has previously banned hiring from China/Russia, so it's no stranger to blanket bans of questionable nature. I wouldn't consider not hiring from countries with aggressive foreign policies and non-democratic governments that use coercion on their own citizens (including employees of said company) as questionable. GitLab's main job is to protect it's company and it's customers not to try t…

> countries with aggressive foreign policies

If we go by that logic, the U.S. would get on that list.

> non-democratic governments that use coercion on their own citizens

If that was indeed the standard to go by, I'd agree, but the list would then need to be much, much longer and possibly include even some traditionally democratic countries like Australia who have an actual law where they can force employees to secretly install backdoors.

Saudi Arabia infiltrated Twitter and compromised some of its employees to obtain info on regime critics that could endanger their lives, as just another example.

The list would by these metrics include well over half the world.

Re: Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

#93

Post by [deleted] »

Causality1 wrote: post #76
ahelwer wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only thing Iran is guilty of is insufficient deference to US hegemony. Any other charge you levy can have its equal found in our so-called allies in the region, or even the US itself.

I'm in complete agreement that most of our "allies" in the region are fairweather friends and as morally bankrupt as anyone else. However, I'm also in favor of blanket sanctions against any nation whose parliament takes up a literal "Marg bar Āmrikā" collective chant.

[deleted]

Re: Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

#94

Post by boomboomsubban »

Causality1 wrote: post #76
ahelwer wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only thing Iran is guilty of is insufficient deference to US hegemony. Any other charge you levy can have its equal found in our so-called allies in the region, or even the US itself.

I'm in complete agreement that most of our "allies" in the region are fairweather friends and as morally bankrupt as anyone else. However, I'm also in favor of blanket sanctions against any nation whose parliament takes up a literal "Marg bar Āmrikā" collective chant.

So because they chanted "Death to America," you are in favor of imposing sanctions that will cause the death of Iranians?

Re: Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

#95

Post by doomlaser »

navaati wrote: post #91
AsyncAwait wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree it's not racism on GitLab's part, but the U.S. officials behind these sanctions themselves do use phrases like that they want to 'choke Iran's economy', that is in the middle of a pandemic where people's respiratory systems are at risk, it certainly doesn't look good on their part. Also worth noting that GitLab has previously banned hiring from China/Russia, so it's no stranger to blanket bans of questionable…

They also ban hires from France FWIW, but that's because they wouldn't touch our labour code with a 10-foot pole haha.

I didn't realize until today that Gitlab is entirely remote and has been since it was founded (long before covid) https://www.inc.com/cameron-albert-deitch/gitlab-tips-remote...

Re: Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

#96

Post by mirekrusin »

542458 wrote: post #89
PestoDiRucola wrote: post #28

Gitlab blocked Iran's Access* This happened because of US sanctions[0]. [0] https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/people-group/code-of-condu...

I’m a little confused at people who are mad at GitLab here. I’m under the impression that sanctions and export control laws tend to be fairly strict, and penalties for knowing non-compliance are harsh, including the possibility of jail time. GitLab’s hands are pretty tied here.

We shouldn't be upset at github/githlab/npm/dockerhub but our industry and ourselves - how did we let our projects/packages/tools/infrastructure to be hosted on such platforms in the first place? Hopefully this will trigger more activity on decentralised solutions; git is decentralised already, needs some ipfs/torrent/etc wrapper for issues/rest or maybe something based on fossil etc.

Re: Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

#97

Post by umvi »

fiblye wrote: post #60
dsabanin wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, Russia under sanctions, for annexation of Crimea, should just be left alone to leave their lives? Next time, if they decide to annex some other part of Ukraine, or maybe Poland this time, they should also be left to live their lives? Sanctions are not punishments. They are just a way to say – you're an asshole, and neither us nor our allies are going to play with you anymore.

I mean, taking steps to deter a country from annexing or triggering a war makes sense. But the sanctions against Iran are mainly based on old grudges. Pretty much nobody even knows why they exist beyond “they’re bad.”

I always thought it was because Iran hates Israel and has openly stated their goal to destroy and dissolve it. That paired with efforts to develop nuclear weapons = sanctions. It's probably more nuanced than that, but that was my basic understanding.

Re: Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

#98

Post by falcolas »

616c wrote: post #18
doomlaser wrote: post #2

> GitLab is not the only actor in this discrimination against Persian/Iranian people, we also blocked by GitHub, Docker, NPM, Google Developer, Android, AWS, Go, Kubernetes and etc. US sanctions compliance most likely Edit: confirmed by Gitlab: https://twitter.com/gitlab/status/1312183287402512384

Sadly to the point. I feel for Iranians in Iran (I know many, whether they call themselves Persians or Iranians as expats is their choice and I respect that). Having had the opportunity to meet the former in their homeland so so long ago, many Americans do not understand how grueling the sanctions regime system is for average Iranian citizens in their everyday; this is sadly a minor example as I saw based experiences…

What non-violent (yes, there is violence inherent in sanctions, but it is a rather different scale than war) alternative would you suggest for punishing a foreign country?

EDIT: I see this question has been asked in other threads, but not answered. Whether Iran should be punished is a separate question (one on which I am personally too ignorant to hold an opinion about) from how should one country punish another.

Re: Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

#99

Post by TheGuyWhoCodes »

christophilus wrote: post #26
ahelwer wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only thing Iran is guilty of is insufficient deference to US hegemony. Any other charge you levy can have its equal found in our so-called allies in the region, or even the US itself.

You’re not wrong, so far as I can tell. Not sure why you’re being downvoted. Iran has some serious issues, but they don’t appear to be worse than the Saudis or any number of other countries we (the US) consider allies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_and_state-sponsored_terro...

Re: Gitlab Blocked Iranians’ Access

#100

Post by Dunedan »

miracle2k wrote: post #88

People should resist the temptation to defend this. 1. Blocking Iranian IPs, as opposed to accounts, is almost certainly over-compliance. Note that the vast majority of websites do not do this. Even big ones, such as Gmail, do not do this. 2. It does not speak well of the United States justice system if someone could be prosecuted for failure to block Iranian IPs. If this were required, the law should be clear. Other…

> 1. Blocking Iranian IPs, as opposed to accounts, is almost certainly over-compliance. Note that the vast majority of websites do not do this. Even big ones, such as Gmail, do not do this.

I can tell you for certain that at least AWS and Atlassian do that.

I learned that while surfing from an IP address which was mistakenly associated with being located in Iran. I only discovered that, because said websites weren't available. As I got that fixed quite fast afterwards I haven't done more browsing, that's why I can only name these two companies, but I'm pretty sure there are much more big companies doing such blocking based on IP address geolocation.

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