Domain Registrars & Free Speech..
Getting on to issues other than the formation of the NA-Ralo.... If ALAC has as its function to bring the voice of user to ICANN, then let us also discuss issues of concern to users. Case in point, Fyodor Vaskovich, a fellow CPSR board member had his site shut down by the domain name registrar GoDaddy. Facts are below.. My question - should ALAC and the user community involved in ICANN take up the issue of domain take downs by Registrars? If so - Were the actions taken by GoDaddy correct? If not, what can we do - and how can it be raised at the next meeting in Lisbon this coming March. I look forward to everyone's comments, specifically how we might (as a collective group) help raise this issue inside the ICANN community. regards Robert Guerra -- Survey: Are domain registrars free-speech friendly? http://news.com.com/2100-1025_3-6155614.html Go Daddy's controversial decision last week to suspend the domain name of a popular computer security Web site did more than merely raise questions about the extent of free speech on today's Internet. It also prompted owners of domain names to wonder about the reliability of their own registrars--and whether the domains they own are safe from suspension in the absence of a court order. -- The CPSR Compiler - January 2007 http://www.cpsr.org/news/compiler/2007/compiler200701 [snipped] Domain Registrar GoDaddy Suspends Popular Security Site Based on Complaint from MySpace.Com On Wednesday, January 24, GoDaddy shut down the domain name of popular security mailing list archive SecLists.Org based on an informal complaint from MySpace.Com. SecLists.Org is run by CPSR board member and security researcher Fyodor Vaskovich. Responding to complaints that they only gave Fyodor 52 seconds of notice between leaving him a voicemail and suspending the domain, GoDaddy general counsel Christina Jones was quoted in Wired saying "I think the fact that we gave him notice at all was pretty generous". In a News.Com article about the situation, she noted that in their terms of service, GoDaddy "reserves the right to terminate your access to the services at any time, without notice, for any reason whatsoever". The offending content was one of 250,000 pages posted by 3rd party users to the site, and a similar shutdown could happen to any web site which accepts user generated content such as forum posting or blog comments. In response, Fyodor launched the site http://NoDaddy.Com to detail this and other domain registration abuses by GoDaddy. CPSR contends that web content complaints are best dealt with at the site owner and web hosting provider level. Domain registrars have no control over the content of web sites pointed to by a domain name, and should not take responsibility for policing those web sites. If they do so anyway, registrars should at least provide the domain owner a chance to refute or address the complaint before shutting down domains without any sort of court order. The incident with SecLists.Org was widely reported. Here are some of the better articles: http://news.com.com/GoDaddy+pulls+security+site+after+MySpace +complaints/2100-1025_3-6153607.html http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/26/1542218&threshold=4 http://domainnamewire.com/2007/01/26/godaddy-faces-pr-nightmare-over- domain-suspension/ http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/01/godaddy_defends.html http://www.politechbot.com/2007/01/26/godaddy-pull-plug/ http://www.thewhir.com/blogs/Isabel-Wang/index.cfm/2007/1/26/GoDaddy- Takes-Down-Seclists
Thanks Robert, Declan's done a roundup of several registrar policies at CNET <http://news.com.com/2102-1025_3-6155614.html?tag=st.util.print> I think there's a definite free speech problem here, in that Internet users should have access to stable identifiers that are stronger than someone's legal bluster. For once, though, I'm don't believe the problem is entirely ICANN's fault. ICANN didn't require GoDaddy to implement this policy -- that was GoDaddy's choice. <http://www.icann.org/registrars/ra-agreement-17may01.htm#3> Where ICANN is to blame is in narrowed the field of permissible competition such that registrars aren't free to adopt substantially better policies. In particular, ICANN registration fees and insurance requirements might squeeze out non-profits who'd like to offer domains with policies more favorable to their registrants. Has anyone here ever tried to set up a registrar or subcontract with one? --Wendy Robert Guerra wrote:
Getting on to issues other than the formation of the NA-Ralo....
If ALAC has as its function to bring the voice of user to ICANN, then let us also discuss issues of concern to users. Case in point, Fyodor Vaskovich, a fellow CPSR board member had his site shut down by the domain name registrar GoDaddy. Facts are below..
My question - should ALAC and the user community involved in ICANN take up the issue of domain take downs by Registrars? If so - Were the actions taken by GoDaddy correct? If not, what can we do - and how can it be raised at the next meeting in Lisbon this coming March.
I look forward to everyone's comments, specifically how we might (as a collective group) help raise this issue inside the ICANN community.
regards
Robert Guerra --
Survey: Are domain registrars free-speech friendly? http://news.com.com/2100-1025_3-6155614.html
Go Daddy's controversial decision last week to suspend the domain name of a popular computer security Web site did more than merely raise questions about the extent of free speech on today's Internet.
It also prompted owners of domain names to wonder about the reliability of their own registrars--and whether the domains they own are safe from suspension in the absence of a court order.
-- The CPSR Compiler - January 2007 http://www.cpsr.org/news/compiler/2007/compiler200701
[snipped]
Domain Registrar GoDaddy Suspends Popular Security Site Based on Complaint from MySpace.Com
On Wednesday, January 24, GoDaddy shut down the domain name of popular security mailing list archive SecLists.Org based on an informal complaint from MySpace.Com. SecLists.Org is run by CPSR board member and security researcher Fyodor Vaskovich. Responding to complaints that they only gave Fyodor 52 seconds of notice between leaving him a voicemail and suspending the domain, GoDaddy general counsel Christina Jones was quoted in Wired saying "I think the fact that we gave him notice at all was pretty generous". In a News.Com article about the situation, she noted that in their terms of service, GoDaddy "reserves the right to terminate your access to the services at any time, without notice, for any reason whatsoever". The offending content was one of 250,000 pages posted by 3rd party users to the site, and a similar shutdown could happen to any web site which accepts user generated content such as forum posting or blog comments.
In response, Fyodor launched the site http://NoDaddy.Com to detail this and other domain registration abuses by GoDaddy.
CPSR contends that web content complaints are best dealt with at the site owner and web hosting provider level. Domain registrars have no control over the content of web sites pointed to by a domain name, and should not take responsibility for policing those web sites. If they do so anyway, registrars should at least provide the domain owner a chance to refute or address the complaint before shutting down domains without any sort of court order.
The incident with SecLists.Org was widely reported. Here are some of the better articles:
http://news.com.com/GoDaddy+pulls+security+site+after+MySpace +complaints/2100-1025_3-6153607.html http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/26/1542218&threshold=4 http://domainnamewire.com/2007/01/26/godaddy-faces-pr-nightmare-over- domain-suspension/ http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/01/godaddy_defends.html http://www.politechbot.com/2007/01/26/godaddy-pull-plug/ http://www.thewhir.com/blogs/Isabel-Wang/index.cfm/2007/1/26/GoDaddy- Takes-Down-Seclists
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-- Wendy Seltzer -- wendy@seltzer.org Visiting Assistant Professor of Law, Brooklyn Law School Fellow, Berkman Center for Internet & Society http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/seltzer.html http://www.chillingeffects.org/
Fyodor Vaskovich, a fellow CPSR board member had his site shut down by the domain name registrar GoDaddy. Facts are below..
Hey, you misspelled "allegations". Ben Butler, the head abuse guy at Godaddy, is a very reasonable guy whom I know personally. I believe the outline of this story, but the 52 second stuff smells rather odd and I want to hear his version, too.
My question - should ALAC and the user community involved in ICANN take up the issue of domain take downs by Registrars?
Sure, and this presents a good opportunity to think about who we mean when we say "At Large". There is a tendency to equate At Large with, basically, registrants of vanity domains. (See johnlevine.com and airinfo.aero, for example.) I think this is very shortsighted. To me, At Large means all the people who use the Internet, like the people who read my non-technical books. If you compare the billions of Internet users to the millions of Internet domains, it is quite clear that 99% of Internet users have never registered a domain and never will, but they use domains every time they click on a link or send an e-mail message. These are the primary users that At Large should be representing. I am not opposed to the concerns of the <1% who are registrants, being one myself, but it is absurd to treat their concerns as At Large's only interest. The vast majority of domain takedowns are due to phishes and other fraudulent and criminal activity, with the takedown not challenged by anyone. If Internet users have a reasonable fear that they will be targeted and harmed by criminals, which they certainly do these days, they will avoid using the net, and avoid speaking on-line. To the extent that we do not act like this matters, we are not addressing their needs, and we're not addressing their free speech concerns, either. I do not know enough about this particular case to know whether Godaddy's actions were reasonable, but I do note that the case concerns stolen personal information from tens of thousands of Myspace users, users whose interests I would think deserve as much attention from At Large as a single domain owner does. There is no simple answer here, since there are a lot of legitimate competing issues and concerns, but it is clear to me that a simplistic equation that argues that domains == free speech is just wrong. R's, John
John: Thanks for the note. I've emailed Fyodor privately - to see if we can get his point of view directly. Fyodor... we'd be keen to hear from you, and take this up in the many spaces and venues that exist in ICANN to - 1. confirm the facts, and 2. see what policy implications this has for internet users in the broadest possible way. regards Robert On 2-Feb-07, at 11:40 PM, John R Levine wrote:
Fyodor Vaskovich, a fellow CPSR board member had his site shut down by the domain name registrar GoDaddy. Facts are below..
Hey, you misspelled "allegations". Ben Butler, the head abuse guy at Godaddy, is a very reasonable guy whom I know personally. I believe the outline of this story, but the 52 second stuff smells rather odd and I want to hear his version, too.
My question - should ALAC and the user community involved in ICANN take up the issue of domain take downs by Registrars?
Sure, and this presents a good opportunity to think about who we mean when we say "At Large".
There is a tendency to equate At Large with, basically, registrants of vanity domains. (See johnlevine.com and airinfo.aero, for example.) I think this is very shortsighted. To me, At Large means all the people who use the Internet, like the people who read my non-technical books. If you compare the billions of Internet users to the millions of Internet domains, it is quite clear that 99% of Internet users have never registered a domain and never will, but they use domains every time they click on a link or send an e-mail message. These are the primary users that At Large should be representing. I am not opposed to the concerns of the <1% who are registrants, being one myself, but it is absurd to treat their concerns as At Large's only interest.
The vast majority of domain takedowns are due to phishes and other fraudulent and criminal activity, with the takedown not challenged by anyone. If Internet users have a reasonable fear that they will be targeted and harmed by criminals, which they certainly do these days, they will avoid using the net, and avoid speaking on-line. To the extent that we do not act like this matters, we are not addressing their needs, and we're not addressing their free speech concerns, either.
I do not know enough about this particular case to know whether Godaddy's actions were reasonable, but I do note that the case concerns stolen personal information from tens of thousands of Myspace users, users whose interests I would think deserve as much attention from At Large as a single domain owner does.
There is no simple answer here, since there are a lot of legitimate competing issues and concerns, but it is clear to me that a simplistic equation that argues that domains == free speech is just wrong.
R's, John
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participants (3)
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John R Levine -
Robert Guerra -
Wendy Seltzer