Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach • Hacker News Board

Re: Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach

#261

Post by pjc50 » Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 4:11 PM UTC

systemvoltage wrote: post #244

rosmax_1337 wrote: post #210

I find the article hopeful for the future of free speech on the internet. Even though the ability to host content on the net is one thing and lacking access to most platforms (where the users actually are) like youtube, facebook, instagram, tiktok is another. The most important thing nowadays is access to the siloed user bases for people who try to express dissident opinions, not the access to the net as whole, even…

> I find this section peculiar. Why does the company have "values"? I though companies were supposed to be looking after the intrests of their shareholders, i.e., profit. Do the shareholders consent to the lost profit being donated to political motives? This broader trend of companies becoming political organizations is terrible, frankly. This ship has sailed since about 2008: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmen…

> - No tolerance to anything but work. If you sexually harrass someone, instantly fired.

> - No woke HR training (no one watches it, yet no one has the courage to say anything about it)

Given that a chunk of the HR training is about reminding people not to sexually harass, I'm not sure how you can achieve both of those? Especially when you don't have an HR department. Who's investigating the allegations? In practice this kind of culture leads to "if you are sexually harrased, you have to keep your mouth shut or you will be fired".

Re: Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach

#262

Post by pjc50 » Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 4:12 PM UTC

SrslyJosh wrote: post #258

throwawayacc2 wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

If you believed that KF was performing "investigative journalism", you wouldn't be posting this with a throwaway.

If people really believed that doxxing was harmless, they'd be posting under their real names and addresses.

Re: Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach

#263

Post by chc » Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 4:13 PM UTC

mmmpop wrote: post #255

chc wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The group they're trying to target here is a terrorist group. Not even in a metaphorical sense. It's people who try to harass random transgender people to the point of suicide or murder.

Quoted post unavailable.

That was not my definition. Kiwi Farms will post their target's private info, the private info of everyone their target knows, send death threats to their target and their family, report false crimes to try and get SWAT teams to kill their target, etc. Ben Shapiro doesn't seem like a good person and I suspect he is probably sympathetic to many terrorists, but he is not himself a terrorist as far as I know.

Re: Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach

#264

Post by pjc50 » Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 4:13 PM UTC

dxuh wrote: post #208

Large corporations policing free speech is a horrible trend that often enough goes absolutely wrong and the only way to prevent censoring content inappropriately is to not censor anything at all. There are laws and courts that judge over what content should stay online and it should stay their responsibility. If we give that up, we replace democracy with a technocracy, that already showed us plenty of times is not so…

This means that the KF mob can take people offline.

Re: Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach

#265

Post by whalecancer » Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 4:13 PM UTC

robert_foss wrote: post #168

systemvoltage wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, we have a justice system based on what we agreed as a society. The rule of law. If you want to prohibit speech to white supremacists, fine, let’s pass a law and if it doesn’t hold constitutional muster, go ahead convince everyone to amend the constitution. But since our founding fathers made this process difficult on purpose, let’s take a different approach: that’s what social justice is. It is anti-democrati…

I do believe hate speech is illegal already. Certainly online harassment leading to someone committing suicide is. KF is a platform that facilitates these activities.

No post body was provided.

Re: Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach

#266

Post by Borgz » Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 4:14 PM UTC

creeble wrote: post #214

>We believe cyberattacks, in any form, should be relegated to the dustbin of history. Unless, of course, you are an _enabler_ of such attacks. This is where CF's hypocrisy shines through. instant-stresser.com str3ssed.co freestresser.co metastresser.com (dozens more) These are all sites hosted with CF DNS, who provide services that are literally the opposite of free speech -- they are in the business of _suppressing…

This is very interesting, thanks for posting.

According to completedns.com, instant-stresser.com has been using Cloudflare on and off for almost 8 years, and continuously for the last 3 years. It's also the 2nd result on Google for searching "free stresser". It seems impossible that this site hasn't been reported to Cloudflare by now, indicating that they have made the decision to continue protecting it. Very bad.

I haven't checked the other sites you mentioned, but if this pattern holds, it definitely changes my perspective on Cloudflare.

Re: Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach

#267

Post by sealeck » Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 4:14 PM UTC

ndiddy wrote: post #237

sealeck wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not actually commendable to host content for white supremacists and transphobes. Free speech may be deserving of protection, but white supremacists using the internet to coordinate real-world activities (such as terrorist attacks) doesn't actually qualify as "free speech" deserving protection against "authoritarians and individuals wanting to rip each other down".

I'm glad that Cloudflare didn't bow to the pressure here. I don't want to live in a world where people can extrajudicially boot a site off the internet by running a social media campaign for a few days to get their DDoS protection removed and then paying criminals to DDoS the site.

No post body was provided.

Re: Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach

#268

Post by pessimizer » Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 4:16 PM UTC

robert_foss wrote: post #168

systemvoltage wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, we have a justice system based on what we agreed as a society. The rule of law. If you want to prohibit speech to white supremacists, fine, let’s pass a law and if it doesn’t hold constitutional muster, go ahead convince everyone to amend the constitution. But since our founding fathers made this process difficult on purpose, let’s take a different approach: that’s what social justice is. It is anti-democrati…

I do believe hate speech is illegal already. Certainly online harassment leading to someone committing suicide is. KF is a platform that facilitates these activities.

Neither of those things are illegal in the US.

Re: Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach

#269

Post by XorNot » Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 4:17 PM UTC

Chris2048 wrote: post #147

pjc50 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

Perhaps we should discuss the problems with the term (and implications of) "stochastic terrorism" - namely, the conflation of a terrible, deliberate act with clear and consenting, perpetrators (terrorism); with that accusation that the wrong kind of free speech might lead to terrible consequences, and the implied accusation of malicious intent. Lets approach this as if ST was literally a crime - do the recipient comm…

There's a HackerNews user, goes by the handle Chris2048. And I just don't know what his problem is you know? Back in my day we had a solution for those types of people. If he wasn't hiding behind the internet I bet he wouldn't be so tough.

Just imagine if we knew who he was and he couldn't hide like that, wouldn't that be great? I recommend you all go look up his posts. That's Chris2048 on HackerNews, have a really good look at the things he's said. People shouldn't be able to get away with saying stuff like that, you know? One day he'll slip up and I bet someone will do something about it.

So tell me Chris2048, do you think the last two paragraphs, maybe said by a speaker to a large audience, show no malicious intent?

Re: Cloudflare's abuse policies and approach

#270

Post by whalecancer » Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 4:17 PM UTC

rhinoceraptor wrote: post #101

tekla wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I support free speech except the things that I don't like"

The site in question is one of the most notorious doxxing and harassment forums, linked to multiple suicides of their victims over the years. I'm not sure what principled political speech you think is being protected here.

No post body was provided.