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DDoS-Guard to forfeit internet space occupied by Parler

krebsonsecurity.com

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Re: DDoS-Guard to forfeit internet space occupied by Parler

#91
There might be a selective enforcement issue here?

If it turns out that lots of the IP address space is doled out based on semi-fraudulent claims like this (assuming that Guilmette's claim is correct that DDos-Guard doesn't really have a physical Latin American presence), but the only cases where the corresponding NIC takes action is when someone complains for content-motivated reasons, then... that's biased selective enforcement.

In principle, it would be like police enforcing certain traffic laws (say, about changing lanes or making a turn without signaling) much more strictly against black people than against white people.

And selective enforcement at the infrastructure level is much more serious than it happening at the edge level (see https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20190712/14400642581/failu... for why this distinction is important).

Re: DDoS-Guard to forfeit internet space occupied by Parler

#92
post #81
post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is so tiring. I'm a Swedish man. Last time I visited the US was several years ago. I'm not particularly sympathetic towards Donald Trump or Parler. I'm definitely not here to defend nazism. Not sure if it's intended, but if you intend to get sympathy and support for your cause (whatever that is) by calling me a nazi or implying my interest in internet infrastructure has anything to do with supporting nazism, the…

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Before I take you up on your offer, what qualifies as a nazi to you? Someone who is an official member of the National Socialist German Workers' Party? Someone who simply hates jews/minorities, thinks hitler did nothing wrong, and has a swastika hanging in his bedroom?

Re: DDoS-Guard to forfeit internet space occupied by Parler

#93

> The pending disruption for DDoS-Guard and Parler comes compliments of Ron Guilmette, a researcher who has made it something of a personal mission to de-platform conspiracy theorist and far-right groups. While this may solve immediate problems (such as the planning of unlawful or otherwise socially harmful events), we should consider the long-term impacts of de-platforming. Does censorship, even if justified, fuel a…

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>The blame lay solely at the hands of left leaning entities. [...] This has been a coordinated effort to deplatform political opponents.

How many entities did they end up deplatforming? The outgoing president, and a few right-wing forums? Meanwhile all the republican congressman and PACs are untouched. If they really want to shut down the opposition, they seem to be doing a pretty bad job.

Re: DDoS-Guard to forfeit internet space occupied by Parler

#94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bear in mind that there was never anything on Parler that wasn't on Twitter or Facebook. Cory Doctorow: https://pluralistic.net/2021/01/09/the-old-crow-is-getting-s... > It's reasonable to say that Parler should use a mix of automated tools and human judgment to block unlawful speech and/or hate speech - but it's NOT the reason that Appl/Goog have removed it. Both companies have made it clear in their public communic…

Sure, but, as I like to say, "defaults matter", and having to search long and hard to find the unpalatable content you want is much different than someone serving it to you on a plate.

Let's review what happened with Parler.

It started off as a small irrelevant site, as they all do.

Twitter and Facebook then started labeling content on their site with "fact check" labels. This is naturally fraught with scandal because doing this at scale involves a lot of mistake making and then you can find arbitrarily many examples of them authoritatively declaring something as false or "disputed" when it wasn't. There was a strong perception on the right that these tags were being attached to things on a partisan basis.

A number of people didn't like this and started looking to alternatives, so Parler started gaining users.

Then those jackasses stormed the capitol. Note that this was planned, openly, predominantly on Facebook.

The response is Something Must Be Done, so there is a mass banning of accounts, including the then-President of the United States. Doing this was even more controversial, there were questions about whether all of them deserved it, and a lot of people -- the vast majority them people who hadn't been banned -- started moving to Parler in protest. They hit ten million users.

This was now a moral panic because Parler is owned by right-leaning people instead of left-leaning people and the whole deplatforming system is based on the targets not having anywhere to go. So then regardless of who they really are, they now have to be demonized in order to justify their destruction, because they're getting too popular. Note that popularity and extremism are anti-correlated because extremists are by definition at the fringe, so the more people you have, the more diluted the extremists get. The logic was backwards if the real problem was what they claimed.

But people find a list of malicious posts on Parler to paint the entire site as that. These exist everywhere so of course they found them. Made all the easier by the fact that they were undergoing rapid growth and at that specific moment in time their moderation system was overwhelmed. Also, point to moderation features designed to promote stability and exclude extremism by limiting what new users can do and claim that they do the opposite under the unproven assumption that the site is already dominated by extremists and the same features would then be excluding non-extremists.

I'm sure 80% of Parler is crap, because 80% of everything is crap. But then how are we distinguishing it from Twitter? None of the evidence used to "prove" that they weren't moderating when they claimed to be couldn't be used to prove the same thing of their competitors. It's an isolated demand for rigor.

Re: DDoS-Guard to forfeit internet space occupied by Parler

#96
post #91

There might be a selective enforcement issue here? If it turns out that lots of the IP address space is doled out based on semi-fraudulent claims like this (assuming that Guilmette's claim is correct that DDos-Guard doesn't really have a physical Latin American presence), but the only cases where the corresponding NIC takes action is when someone complains for content-motivated reasons, then... that's biased selectiv…

I wonder if this is more of a case where a NIC will only take action if someone is motivated enough to do this level of research. So maybe less selective enforcement and more selective researcher attention?

Re: DDoS-Guard to forfeit internet space occupied by Parler

#97
post #96
post #91

There might be a selective enforcement issue here? If it turns out that lots of the IP address space is doled out based on semi-fraudulent claims like this (assuming that Guilmette's claim is correct that DDos-Guard doesn't really have a physical Latin American presence), but the only cases where the corresponding NIC takes action is when someone complains for content-motivated reasons, then... that's biased selectiv…

I wonder if this is more of a case where a NIC will only take action if someone is motivated enough to do this level of research. So maybe less selective enforcement and more selective researcher attention?

Yeah. This doesn't seem to have to potential to go as badly wrong as a lot of other high-profile examples of selective enforcement. The fact that events can play out this way and seem exceptional (ie. happening only due to political motive) pretty much implies that IPv4 addresses are not really scarce yet and remain cheap enough that hardly anyone bothers to root out this kind of misbehavior. Which also means it should be easy to acquire replacement IP addresses from a more appropriate registrar.

Re: DDoS-Guard to forfeit internet space occupied by Parler

#98
post #91

There might be a selective enforcement issue here? If it turns out that lots of the IP address space is doled out based on semi-fraudulent claims like this (assuming that Guilmette's claim is correct that DDos-Guard doesn't really have a physical Latin American presence), but the only cases where the corresponding NIC takes action is when someone complains for content-motivated reasons, then... that's biased selectiv…

Attacking the capitol building got LOTS of attention by a lot of people. It was an extremely conspicuous, highly publicized crime. So yeah, folks are looking into the people involved, and their associates. Much of enforcement relies on the public to notice and report wrongdoing.

Re: DDoS-Guard to forfeit internet space occupied by Parler

#99
post #91

There might be a selective enforcement issue here? If it turns out that lots of the IP address space is doled out based on semi-fraudulent claims like this (assuming that Guilmette's claim is correct that DDos-Guard doesn't really have a physical Latin American presence), but the only cases where the corresponding NIC takes action is when someone complains for content-motivated reasons, then... that's biased selectiv…

>In principle, it would be like police enforcing certain traffic laws (say, about changing lanes or making a turn without signaling) much more strictly against black people than against white people.

This is easily reconciled if you distinguish between the public officials doing the selective enforcing, and private citizens selectively deciding who to do research on. Let's say 20% of waiters at a restaurant under-report their tips to the IRS. It would be objectionable if the IRS decided to target one guy in particular because the agent had a grudge on him, but it's far less objectionable if the IRS acted on an anonymous report that the guy was evading taxes. If anything, it would be more objectionable if the IRS didn't act, and said "well 20% of waiters are evaders as well, so it would be unfair to investigate that guy because we don't investigate the rest".

Re: DDoS-Guard to forfeit internet space occupied by Parler

#100
post #87
post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Capitol riots are an interesting example of this dichotomy. On one hand, the riots were planned on hate filled platforms. On the other, those same platforms seem to have been a treasure trove of evidence for prosecutors. It’s incredibly complicated and I have no idea what side I’m on now either. Hell, I don’t even know whether we can call this a win or a loss for free speech.

> On the other, those same platforms seem to have been a treasure trove of evidence for prosecutors. It should be pretty obvious that this is merely a mitigating factor, and could never outweigh the initial damage done.

History says that you’re likely correct. But I’m going to be optimistic and hope that genuine good comes out of all of this. If this shows US military/police that they have a problem with extremists in their ranks, it might turn out to be a very good thing for the country. Again, you’re likely right and I’m likely naive. It’s not like that’s a new thing and nobody has learned it in the last century...
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