While GitHub is not really to blame (following the laws and all, no matter how silly they are) why would your employees login from Iran with their work laptops into their work accounts while "visiting their parents" anyway? Why is that not the actual problem? Lack of policies?
GitHub blocks entire company because one employee was in Iran
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Re: GitHub blocks entire company because one employee was in Iran
#52Can't really blame GitHub here... US laws are badly written.
It's alright to blame people for lawfully following harmful laws.
It's very easy to say that on someone else's behalf.
Essentially you're saying that Nat Friedman should risk 20 years in prison, and a million dollar fine per user in order to let Iranian developers use Github.
As much as I hate the idea of software not being freely available to everyone, I would not be willing to take that risk. I doubt many HN readers would.
Re: GitHub blocks entire company because one employee was in Iran
#53If the Iranian employee logged into the Github account, isn't blocking the account exactly what the law says they should do? If all they did was apply a merge request in one of the repos then would reverting the merge and blocking the account would be enough to comply? Is there some alternative way to comply with US export restrictions? The real question here is why people even consider using US cloud companies when…
The real question is why GH blocks an Indian company and all its Indian employees (all legal and outside the US sanctions list) when an employee logs on in Iran.
Does US law require application to such an extreme degree? If not, then why is GH doing it?
Re: GitHub blocks entire company because one employee was in Iran
#54Why don't we have internet havens yet? Companies are so clever in legally avoiding tax by registering companies in the most favourable jurisdictions and only running the absolute minimum of operations through tax expensive countries and so on, why don't we have the equivalent for avoiding dumb laws such as US trade wars, DMCA takedowns, etc.?
Can most internet operations not run through companies who are registered and have servers in a country where most of those laws don't apply to customers who are not US citizen?
Re: GitHub blocks entire company because one employee was in Iran
#55If the Iranian employee logged into the Github account, isn't blocking the account exactly what the law says they should do? If all they did was apply a merge request in one of the repos then would reverting the merge and blocking the account would be enough to comply? Is there some alternative way to comply with US export restrictions? The real question here is why people even consider using US cloud companies when…
It's not an Iranian employee. That's just someone visiting Iran and login to their GitHub account. GitHub reaction is outrageously disproportionate. They should just prevent login from Iran. They had no basis for blocking a legitimate customer in Europe based on this.
> ... one employee opened his laptop while visiting [h]is parents in Iran.
I suppose this implies that the employee is Iranian.
The U.S. sanctions are pretty aggressive, and I don't think preventing login from Iran is anywhere near enough to comply. The law is the problem here.
Re: GitHub blocks entire company because one employee was in Iran
#56If the Iranian employee logged into the Github account, isn't blocking the account exactly what the law says they should do? If all they did was apply a merge request in one of the repos then would reverting the merge and blocking the account would be enough to comply? Is there some alternative way to comply with US export restrictions? The real question here is why people even consider using US cloud companies when…
Would it not be sufficient to just block requests from Iran rather than shut down the account and the groups they are in? That way when they return home they can still access the site.
I believe that would be illegal. I suspect the reasoning is that the US is not on friendly terms with the government of Iran, which is a political squabble and not a conflict with the people therein, even though the practical consequences are indecipherable.
The US military has been wrestling with that reasoning for about 20 years. If the majority of attacks and intrusions on military infrastructure originate from a single nation state and there exists evidence that most such attacks are sponsored by that nation state it would make sense to simply block all IP addresses originating from that nation state. This does not occur because the attorneys will not allow it due to both diplomatic and legal reasons.
Re: GitHub blocks entire company because one employee was in Iran
#57Is GitHub going to take itself down when one of their employees goes to Iran for holiday and logs into their GitHub account? If not, then why are they treating others with such contempt?
Re: GitHub blocks entire company because one employee was in Iran
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's alright to blame people for lawfully following harmful laws.
It's also not fair to blame people (well, companies...) for obeying the law. Personally, I'd rather a world where companies obey the law than one where they pick and choose what laws they would like to obey.
You are making a strawman. Companies are often following the law strictly or loosely as it suits them.
GitHub could have warned the company before blocking and/or blocked access only from Iran. It did neither.
Re: GitHub blocks entire company because one employee was in Iran
#59At work I had to take a course on US export control. The restrictions they bully everyone into are pretty nazi. Likewise with SWIFT. As evidenced by TFA it's always regular citizens that suffer. Compare this with EU sanctions that are targeted to particular companies and individuals.
Yeah. A few days ago I asked why was us demanding kyc/aml regulations from countries when in us itself its easy to set up an anonymous corporation because laws. Its supposed to protect people from doing transactions and getting your "privacy violated".
Re: GitHub blocks entire company because one employee was in Iran
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not an Iranian employee. That's just someone visiting Iran and login to their GitHub account. GitHub reaction is outrageously disproportionate. They should just prevent login from Iran. They had no basis for blocking a legitimate customer in Europe based on this.
> ... one employee opened his laptop while visiting [h]is parents in Iran. I suppose this implies that the employee is Iranian. The U.S. sanctions are pretty aggressive, and I don't think preventing login from Iran is anywhere near enough to comply. The law is the problem here.
> I suppose this implies that the employee is Iranian
Sorry what??? I have family in India, but not because I'm Indian, I just have family there. I have family in Poland, not because I am Polish (well I am kind of, but not on paper). I have family in the UK, but I'm not British.
This is 2021, not Christopher Columbus times.