

Project AT&T - 4chan responds - andreyf
http://s6.invisionfree.com/ProjectATT/index.php

======
tvon
Worth reading:

[http://z6.invisionfree.com/ProjectATT/index.php?s=c670226f1b...](http://z6.invisionfree.com/ProjectATT/index.php?s=c670226f1b08026510786d310a63f589&showtopic=106)

Edit:

yeah, broken link and the original appears to be gone. Too bad, it was a
fairly level headed "calm down and let's see what's really going on" kind of
post. Next best post is this:

[http://z6.invisionfree.com/ProjectATT/index.php?showtopic=10...](http://z6.invisionfree.com/ProjectATT/index.php?showtopic=107)

Seems that access is restored for many people...

Edit 2:

What it used to say:

===============================

Okay, let's stop and be rational here. And if your stupid ass is too lazy to
read this, fuck off and go back to Habbo.

Here is what we know:

1) AT&T customers around the nation cannot access img.4chan.org;

2) AT&T claims that there is a security issue (no further details available to
end-users) regarding img.4chan.org that they have contacted Moot about; and

3) Moot is aware of the problem (I emailed him, and I'm sure others have as
well).

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but that's all we know.

I am significantly older than most of you, and I have a law degree. I have
significant public relations and marketing experience, and I have the wisdom
to see that we should wait before jumping the gun here. Moot is probably
shitting bricks right now with the amount of emails he's receiving.

This is essentially a he-said/she-said issue now, and AT&T may be full of shit
about the "security issue." But before the hordes of 14-year old boys and
their Skype accounts start sending massive amounts of pizzas to AT&T offices,
let's wait and see what happens. I suggest we give AT&T the benefit of the
doubt and wait to see if Moot responds (assuming there is a legitimate issue
between AT&T and 4chan) and if the matter can be resolved that way.

If, after a few days, it is revealed that AT&T is truly "censoring" parts of
its customer's Internet experience, then I suggest we work through the media.
There are legitimate news outlets that would be interested in hearing about
censorship, because the media has long been at odds with any sort of
regulation of information.

However, as a personal favor, please stop with the First Amendment shit. You
don't know what you're talking about, you sound like idiots, and anyone that
knows a bit about the First Amendment is going to laugh when they read your
posts... meaning our "cause" loses credibility. And let's face it, despite
that censorship issues have the potential to reach much further than 4chan,
when the public finds out what /b/ is all about, we're not going to be the
media darlings we need to be.

So for the time being, plan. But plan wisely. Don't threaten. Don't physically
damage equipment. DDOSs against a Tier1 ISP are about as useful as screen
doors on a submarine. Do these things at your own peril, but realize for each
retarded action you take in the name of a resistance, every time it fails or
gets negative press, you are fucking things up for the rest of us.

Let cooler heads prevail. Think before you act.

BlackMagister

===============================

~~~
smokinn
According to this mailing group message it could very well be a security
issue: <http://www.merit.edu/mail.archives/nanog/msg19609.html>

That makes a lot more sense than AT&T going out of its way to censor 4chan
anyway.

~~~
steveklabnik
4chan has always been under a DDoS.

------
jrockway
Man, it must be fun to have computer skills, a ton of free time, and no
interesting ideas. Nice logo.

~~~
marcusbooster
I see they went with ole' "glowing marble set in Copperplate eclipsing some
kind of quasar." For the client looking for the random Gimp filter.

------
froo
Ok, so I understand that AT&T blocking 4chan could qualify as an acceptable
topic for this site, but how is a forum dedicated to pranks against AT&T even
remotely Hacker News?

~~~
chaosmachine
If AT&T censoring the internet is an acceptable topic, surely the first
organized counter-attack is also hacker news.

~~~
froo
Umm, no.

AT&T censoring a website was fundamentally wrong. It violates your (as in
Americans) constitutional rights to free speech. That is something that is
interesting to read and discuss for the HN community.

Sending pizza's to the operational centres of AT&T (which was one of the few
topics currently on the site when I first looked) is not, sorry. It's an
immature response to a serious problem.

~~~
vaksel
people always bring up the free speech issue, here is a newsflash...all those
rights you think you have, only apply to the government. Corporations are more
or less free to do whatever.

~~~
potatolicious
Not that black and white - note that telecommunications is often a government-
granted (and mandated) monopoly. Some municipalities sign exclusivity deals
with certain telecom providers, and certainly spectrum limitations and whatnot
as granted by the government reinforces this.

Private companies engaging in censorship runs afoul of the law if the
government has a hand in them being there.

------
leif
<http://twitter.com/automeme/status/2866503271>

------
billclerico
The servers were taken down in response to several weeks of DDOS attacks - see
<http://www.merit.edu/mail.archives/nanog/msg19609.html>

much ado about nothing

~~~
omouse
If the DDOS attacks have been occurring for several weeks, why didn't they
take down the servers earlier?

------
ramidarigaz
I think this is a bad idea... There has to be a better way to fix the
situation.

~~~
potatolicious
Not to mention the last few "evil corporation" scandals have turned out to be
a lot tamer than knee-jerk armchair commentators would have us believe.

~~~
rms
Agreed. I would be willing to bet that 4chan is unblocked within 24 hours.
Someone at AT&T did something stupid.

~~~
HalcyonMuse
Indeed. San Francisco is reporting they're unblocked already. Also, it appears
that it was not someone doing something stupid... the most official-looking
explanation I've found is here:
<http://www.merit.edu/mail.archives/nanog/msg19609.html>

Nutshell: the affected subdomains were getting DDoS'd, and the colo housing
the relevant 4chan servers couldn't take it, so AT&T did the colo a favor and
started dropping traffic upstream.

EDIT: Aaaand now everything is down.

------
covercash
Digging up and cutting fiber is not going to make this situation any better...

