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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

#171

Post by johannes1234321 »

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?

GitHub hast to follow EU legislation already - see GDPR for a famous one.

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

#172

Post by rezonant »

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…

You need to do a post-mortem on this. What exactly did Aurelia do to trigger this to start with? A contribution from a sanctioned country? A github issue posted by someone from a sanctioned country? How exactly are open source projects supposed to avoid this possibility if they don't happen to literally be Rob Eisenberg? How many other project repositories have been disabled because of this problem? Is Github doing a review of the processes? Highly doubtful Aurelia's the only one affected, but it might be the only one so far to be able to make it to HN front page.

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

#173

Post by rezonant »

EisenbergEffect wrote: post #141

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…

How are we supposed to vet Github accounts to know whose contributions we can accept? This is crazy.

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

#174

Post by jessaustin »

willvarfar wrote: post #157
EisenbergEffect wrote: post #141

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…

So Iran could sponsor programmers to contribute to as many repos as possible? Then they can win a propaganda war of why Iran is progressive and good and the US is bad?

Haven't they already won that war? USA created ISIS, gave ISIS lots of weapons and logistical support, then assassinated the guy who beat ISIS while he was in diplomatic talks with supposed USA ally Iraq. In response, Iran says "we will destroy buildings at the following addresses", allows time for those buildings to be evacuated, then their guided missiles destroy exactly those buildings. USA military brass then downgraded Iran from their "let's go to war now" list...

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

#175

Post by bilekas »

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…

Really good to see a proper response here.

Thanks, and I'm sure this will be cleared up, but it is really strange how this flagging is taking place..

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

#176

Post by [deleted] »

fenwick67 wrote: post #155
tastroder wrote: post #48

Let's take a moment and appreciate the copy and paste support response "If a user or organization believes that they have been flagged in error, then that user or organization owner has the opportunity to appeal the flag by providing verification information to GitHub. Please see our FAQ for the appeals request form." https://twitter.com/GitHubHelp/status/1240682163193942018 Is that an official GH account? It's old a…

It doesn't seem off-putting to me. The form is there for a reason. Filling it out is literally easier than explaining everything to a support person on Twitter point-by-point. If you want help, you can spend 60 seconds and fill out a damn web form.

[deleted]

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

#178

Post by relaunched »

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...

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

#179

Post by zokier »

ljm wrote: post #159
ajross wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not a fair argument. You're demanding that GitHub prove the absence of any other mistakes. All they can do is fix bugs when they find them, the same as anyone else. If there's a systemic problem with the way they do sanction flagging, that needs evidence.

I disagree; it is a fair argument. This is the Tweet: > I woke up this morning and you shut off the Aurelia site, archived tons of our repos, and I can no longer access admin settings. You sited US trade sanctions and sent me a non-descriptive email with no remediation information. What is going on? This is devastating for us! "No remediation information," to me sounds like Twitter outrage was the remedy. A follow up…

> If a user or organization believes that they have been flagged in error, then that user or organization owner has the opportunity to appeal the flag by providing verification information to GitHub. Please see our FAQ for the appeals request form https://help.github.com/en/github/site-policy/github-and-tra...

https://twitter.com/GitHubHelp/status/1240682163193942018

> If an individual user or organization administrator believes that they have been flagged in error, then that user has the opportunity to appeal the flag by providing verification information to GitHub. If GitHub receives sufficient information to verify that the user or organization is not affiliated with a U.S.-sanctioned jurisdiction or otherwise restricted by U.S. economic sanctions, then the flag will be removed. Please see individual account appeals request form and organizational account appeals request form.

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

#180

Post by ajross »

ljm wrote: post #159
ajross wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not a fair argument. You're demanding that GitHub prove the absence of any other mistakes. All they can do is fix bugs when they find them, the same as anyone else. If there's a systemic problem with the way they do sanction flagging, that needs evidence.

I disagree; it is a fair argument. This is the Tweet: > I woke up this morning and you shut off the Aurelia site, archived tons of our repos, and I can no longer access admin settings. You sited US trade sanctions and sent me a non-descriptive email with no remediation information. What is going on? This is devastating for us! "No remediation information," to me sounds like Twitter outrage was the remedy. A follow up…

Those are just arguments that mistake shouldn't have been made. Of course the mistake shouldn't have been made, that's what "mistake" means.

Your post upthread was inferring the existence of multiple similar mistakes and demanding that GitHub prove they are impossible. They can't. It wasn't supposed to happen in the first place. It was a mistake.

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