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Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

haveibeenflocked.com

71–80 of 130 posts

Re: Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

#71
post #54

> The site’s only input fields accept license plate numbers (which are hashed client-side before transmission and cannot be harvested) License plates are trivially short, hashing them accomplishes no additional level of privacy if the hashes could be bruted in seconds on an antique GPU.

Being able to say "Our server never sees user-input license plate numbers", even though from a technical perspective the hash is just as identifiable, does have value. Even though it offers no additional privacy, it does let non-technically-minded users and so on feel safer, and that's valuable.

That "value" here lets them mislead policymakers.

Re: Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

#72

If Flock truly believed that the domain name infringes on their trademark, they would file an ICANN UDRP complaint instead of Cloudflare and Hetzner abuse reports. But they don't, because the former would require them to perjure themselves, and the latter just requires them to lie to a hosting company.

Knowingly filing false DMCA claims will also perjure them.

However, ICANN has a whole procedure they follow where complaints are fact-checked, whereas DMCA takedowns put an unreasonable burden on hosting providers that requires immediate action, and many hosting providers will take such action automatically to protect themselves.

I doubt they care about perjury. They care about results, and the DMCA gets them exactly that.

The phishing reports are interesting, providers aren't necessarily required to act as fast on those. Although, I suspect companies like Cloudflare who get used by countless phishers will probably also set up some kind of automated anti phishing system.

Re: Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

#73

> With the new Divinity game in the works, I decided to do a run as Gale in BG3. I don't support this decision but I respect it. Curious what the Cloudflare HNers have to say about this debacle.

Everyone knows that it all hinges on why they’re being Gale. If they’re doing it so they can romance Shadowheart then it’s permissable.

Re: Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

#74
post #12
post #7

Remember when Zuck called his fellow students at harvard who used facebook “Dumb fucks”? The US is accelerating into techno-authoritarianism, and all of these tech companies adopted “companies over countries” motto since the start, it’s not a surprise now.

it’s important to contextualize that quote: he called them dumbfucks specifically because they trusted him with their data.

If you operate in a world where your goal is to scam others then anyone displaying any amount of trust is obviously a dumb fuck.

Re: Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

#75
post #5

Related: Flock Said It Does Not Use Dark Web Data. Code Analysis Tells a Different Story - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46341674

Cyble, with a large team of dark Web researchers based out of India cover that while giving flock plausible deniability

Re: Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

#76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cloudflare would have to bring that suit since they were the ones defrauded. The site owners probably can't sue Cloudflare because of their contract. So the site owners probably have to go basic "tortious interference" and be ready to show actual damages.

No, if the site owners have been harmed by Flock + Cyble knowingly filing a false takedown notice then they can sue Flock + Cyble. If Cloudflare's reputation has also been harmed then they could sue Flock + Cyble as well.

[deleted]

Re: Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

#77

If Flock truly believed that the domain name infringes on their trademark, they would file an ICANN UDRP complaint instead of Cloudflare and Hetzner abuse reports. But they don't, because the former would require them to perjure themselves, and the latter just requires them to lie to a hosting company.

Cloudflare is becoming the great firewall of America more and more every day

Re: Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

#78

If Flock truly believed that the domain name infringes on their trademark, they would file an ICANN UDRP complaint instead of Cloudflare and Hetzner abuse reports. But they don't, because the former would require them to perjure themselves, and the latter just requires them to lie to a hosting company.

Knowingly filing false DMCA claims will also perjure them. However, ICANN has a whole procedure they follow where complaints are fact-checked, whereas DMCA takedowns put an unreasonable burden on hosting providers that requires immediate action, and many hosting providers will take such action automatically to protect themselves. I doubt they care about perjury. They care about results, and the DMCA gets them exactly…

>Knowingly filing false DMCA claims will also perjure them.

You are confusing false claims with filing DMCA requests on behalf of someone you don't have permission from.

>and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed

A false DMCA request is misrepresentation.

Re: Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

#79

If Flock truly believed that the domain name infringes on their trademark, they would file an ICANN UDRP complaint instead of Cloudflare and Hetzner abuse reports. But they don't, because the former would require them to perjure themselves, and the latter just requires them to lie to a hosting company.

>they would file an ICANN UDRP complaint

Those take on the order of months to go through. Even if they did so, you wouldn't notice until much later. Meanwhile cloudflare and hetzner are faster. If you want to reduce harm by taking down a site you can't just let it stay up for weeks while the ICANN process plays out.

Re: Flock and Cyble Inc. weaponize “cybercrime” takedowns to silence critics

#80

This is a Y Combinator company? https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/flock-safety dang/tomhow, does Y Combinator have a code of ethics that comes into play when one of your funding recipients does something unethical and/or illegal like this?

So these are the scumbags putting cameras in front of schools and sending tickets to people on Sundays. Thank you for making peoples lives materially WORSE.

Cameras at schools, I can see how that could be concerning. But what's wrong with ticketing drivers on Sundays?
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