
Australian telcos block access to 4chan, other sites - jumbopapa
https://www.9news.com.au/2019/03/19/16/47/telcos-block-access-to-4chan-liveleak
======
paganel
> the blog Zerohedge and video hosting platform Liveleak.

Let's say I get why they'd block 4chan and 8chan, but blocking a blog is just
over the top. Liveleak I also half-understand, but I also don't approve of it,
for a while it was one of the best online video resources on the atrocities
committed by ISIS in Syria and Iraq, just hiding our unwanted images under the
rug won't help much.

Later edit: For example videos of the Tikrit massacre [1] are only available
on Liveleak (I'm talking of the "mainstream" web), YouTube has nothing on it.
It is my very strong opinion that we need these images to remain in the public
psyche so that we'll try our best not to make the same mistakes again, and by
censoring access to this kind of videos we're not helping with any of that.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Speicher_massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Speicher_massacre)

~~~
anm89
You "half understand" liveleak and "you get" 4chan and 8 chan but should that
be the basis for law and what thought is acceptable in a free society?

Do we really want some political committee sitting around and arguing the
merits of these people's writing? What about weird kink websites? What about
radical political blogs that advocate for policy you find dangerous? You may
find some of these things abhorrent but there are almost certainly people who
would find certain things you believe abhorrent.

Any time you get into individual selection of what is acceptable thought and
what isn't you are crossing a very dangerous line. Even if the initial things
that are deemed unacceptable seem reasonable.

Edit: Telco monopolies relating to infrastructure are essentially state
actors. There is a big difference here between a Telco refusing to route
traffic and a bookstore deciding what content to carry.

~~~
fixermark
We are talking about Australia. They already essentially have a political
committee that decides whether any given videogame is acceptable for import.

------
Daviey
And yet, Facebook was the platform that was used to facilitate the live
streaming of the horrendous events we saw in New Zealand.

I am looking forward to Facebook also being banned.

~~~
falsedan
like guns, 4chan et al. have few positive features and many negative ones.
Unlike them, Facebook has a more balanced mix.

Please consider the sites as a whole, or please take your false equivalency
elsewhere

~~~
Konnstann
I would argue that Facebook has many negative features and few positive ones,
with the negative features far outweighing the positive ones. The fact that
Facebook spends so many resources making sure you can't ignore it speaks
volumes. Meanwhile, facebook "news" is mostly garbage, their livestreaming
service is full of livestreamed crime, not even touching what they do with
your data, and how much they capture that you don't even know about. 4chan,
meanwhile, is exactly what you make of it. All you have to do to not get
"shot" on 4chan is stick to any board that isn't /b/ or /pol/ and voila you
have heavily moderated anonymous imageboards for a ton of topics.

~~~
falsedan
You would argue that but you'd be wrong/out of alignment of the vast majority
of the world's population.

~~~
Konnstann
That's an excellent rebuttal, lots of people use it so if you don't agree with
them you are wrong. Most people use plastic products as well, please tell me
how wrong I am for not liking single-use water bottles or disposable utensils.

Facebook's userbase is dropping steadily, so I would say that more people are
realizing it isn't as great a piece of software as when they first made an
account. We're not arguing Stackexchange vs 4chan, its one social network vs
another anti-social network, one of which treats you like a gold mine, and the
other couldn't care less. I know which one I'd rather use.

------
QualityReboot
Good. Ban them all. Force everyone with an unpopular opinion off the major
platforms.

While we're at it, let's ban political debate and fake news. Ban NPR and ban
Breitbart. Ban religious debate too. If it offends someone, get it off the
platforms.

Let's make it so every controversial content and comment is forced off
YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook.

It's the fastest way to end centralization.

------
EGreg
Ok, I am going to say it.

I am not a free speech absolutist. But with the coming technology, like
MaidSAFE and others, it will become possible for people to communicate and say
whatever they want, no way to censor. Full stop.

The governments will go back to having moles inside each group they care
about, which is more targeted and harder.

For numerous examples of why free speech matters, the other way, look at the
latest article on at [https://qbix.com/blog](https://qbix.com/blog)

It’s like 3d printed guns, or desktop printers or copiers. Things that
governments heavily regulated through gatekeepers now can be produced by
anyone.

I will say this... if you add up ALL the mass shootings in the USA they add up
to less than 2% of all shootings. And if you add up ALL shootings and
killings, including by Boko Haram and so on, we have far less than 100 years
ago, 1000 years ago, 5,000 years ago etc.

Steven Pinker was right. We are getting far more peaceful, because of
technology. As long as we keep a check on population growth, we may even have
enough resources, not too much garbage and sustainable living in every
generation.

If anything, Boko Haram (which stands against Western education) is an example
of values from hundreds of years ago. They are more violent.

Today’s values are much less violent but they will only survive if we can live
sustainably, and that starts with women’s education and having children later.

------
adamrezich
It's not mentioned in this article but from what I understand (and someone
please correct me if I'm wrong), "blocking" is happening at the ISP DNS level,
and anyone living in these affected areas can simply use a different DNS
service to continue using these websites unimpeded.

~~~
willvarfar
Is it so simple?

I stare at my iphone and start to wonder where I get to change my dns
settings...? So I've just spent five minutes poking around and I haven't found
it yet. So I've just googled it, and apparently you need 3rd-party apps to do
it...

Now, interestingly, I could imagine kids doing it rote if someone just tells
them how to install the an access-4chan app etc. For example, a couple of
years ago I watched in horror as a 10yo friend of my kids demonstrated how to
download an app (not from the app store) that would create a vpn to stop the
app-store from being able to connect and discovering and uninstalling all the
pirated games this kid then proceeded to install for my grateful kids! And her
hands flew over the screen, tapping away and typing in English, which is a
language she didn't speak let alone write in! Amazing rote. And very scary to
tidy up after her!

So yeah, kids will probably circumvent this kind of thing even if parents
can't.

~~~
milesokeefe
>I stare at my iphone and start to wonder where I get to change my dns
settings...? So I've just spent five minutes poking around and I haven't found
it yet. So I've just googled it, and apparently you need 3rd-party apps to do
it...

Took me about 30 seconds. Settings -> Wifi -> Tap the info icon for the
network you're on -> Configure DNS.

~~~
dzhiurgis
WiFi - yes. For cellular net it wa completely impossible for last 10 years,
until Apple finally came to its senses hence Cloudflare’s app.

------
batat
Just found out that Reddit banned /r/watchpeople for the same reason [1]. I
believe all these censorship attempts only makes it worse - we're experiencing
the Streisand Effect at its best now.

[1] [http://fortune.com/2019/03/15/reddit-banned-watch-people-
die...](http://fortune.com/2019/03/15/reddit-banned-watch-people-die-new-
zealand-mosque-video/)

------
throwawaysea
Deplatforming was always a bad idea that puts fundamental freedoms at risk.
Now that it has come to telecoms, something has to be done to denounce this
trend and stop it. When large privately-owned platforms (e.g. Twitter) or low-
level utilities (telecom companies) take action to censor information, it has
the same impact and carries the same risks as a government doing it. It
stifles expression, exchange of ideas, and imposes personal morality on a
broad set of people.

~~~
Aloha
Twitter is the modern day equivalent of a printing press, they can choose to
print whatever they'd like, or not - trying to liken them to a common carrier
is in my opinion absurdity.

The man who owns the press, controls the speech.

------
reuben_scratton
Ridiculous. "Hate speech" didn't kill 50 innocent people, a goddamned lunatic
with an automatic rifle did.

As Mark Steyn has remarked on this latest moral panic, "Less speech inevitably
means more violence - because, if you can't talk about anything, what's left
but to shoot up the joint?"

~~~
jiscariot
Similarly, if you argue speech can be a form of violence, you can easily
justify the use of violence against speech.

------
calvinqwerty
I find the chans interesting. The back and forth between the clans, whoever
they represent, mixed with some curious independent posters gives a small
picture of what's lurking out there in the darkness. In the private minds.
Mostly it's role playing I think.

~~~
kadendogthing
>Mostly it's role playing I think.

It's way past that point. It's kind of ridiculous anyone could even entertain
the notion that people are just joking around on these forums at this point.

How many more white supremacy terrorist incidents do we need to quell this
myth?

~~~
calvinqwerty
If the vast majority of the posters weren't passively posting nonsense and
memes there's be oceans of blood and guts in the streets.

------
ryandrake
Called it three days ago [1]. My prediction is the UK is next and the list of
sites will be even longer. This horrible event has become a bittersweet gift
to politicians who have been waiting for their chance to coerce ISPs into
blocking a few more web sites on their "naughty lists".

1:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19402858](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19402858)

------
motohagiography
It's hard to get out of ones bubble on this.

From the govts view, they are acting to contain sectarian violence long enough
that their society can find a stable equilibrium after a shock.

I don't think appeals to the principle of freedom of speech are meaningful
against acts of censorship because it is a tactical response in a perceived
crisis and not something that happens under ideal conditions where they can
afford to be held to principles.

However, tactical approaches like clumsy censorship signal a deeper weakness
that risks exacerbating sectarian resolve in all parties.

Cynically, the solution here may have been to rate limit content they didn't
want instead of blocking it outright, which is insidious, but toward the
desired outcome of defusing the spread of violence, people who want the
content can get it without having to position themselves against the
authorities (become outlaws) to do so, while removing it from casual
observation. Reddit's quarantines, and Twitter's shadow bans mitigate some of
the virality of reactions. Tagging traffic to these sites for slow path
processing would have been trivial, and blocking them was an unforced error.

Societies need to respond to events like these by demonstrating unity and
strength, which may mean acts of extraordinary tolerance - and not with
tactical approaches that make them seem weak and vulnerable to an insurgency.

~~~
nybble41
> I don't think appeals to the principle of freedom of speech are meaningful
> against acts of censorship because it is a tactical response in a perceived
> crisis and not something that happens under ideal conditions where they can
> afford to be held to principles.

This bizarre idea that principles are only relevant under "ideal conditions"
is part of the problem. We can't afford _not_ to hold governments to
principles, _especially_ under non-ideal conditions.

------
nodemaker
Ban all the popular toxic websites including facebook, instagram except maybe
google and other actually useful sites.

If a website adds no value / negative value to people's lives yet is used by a
significant number of people for a significant amount of time every day it
should be banned or time limited in my opinion. A bit similar to cigarettes or
sugary drinks.

Who decides? The government does based on recommendation by the judiciary. Its
their job to legislate

No one is stopping you from registering a new website so please dont argue
freedom of speech.

------
batat
I'm wondering if it's legal to block sites in Australia simply because "we
feel this is the right thing to do"?

------
iooi
Everyone is okay with restrictions on freedom of speech when it comes to child
pornography. But restricting 8chan is suddenly too much?

I'm curious where we draw the line and what the criteria is. It's clear we
need a line, since we shouldn't encourage the proliferation of child
pornography for example.

But should we tolerate a community that had a "Brent Tratton Appreciation
Thread" on the day of the NZ shooting? [1]

[1] [http://archive.fo/xmftv](http://archive.fo/xmftv)

~~~
reuben_scratton
It's because there's no situation in which you (I hope) or I could conceivably
be accused of being child pornographers. It will never affect us and the
people it _does_ affect are the worst of the worst and are identified as such
by police.

I have mild conservative sympathies and get accused by idiots of being a
"Nazi" depressingly frequently. It's screamingly obvious that the rush to
clamp down on "hate speech" is in reality criminalising political dissent.
Which is absolutely guaranteed to lead to more violence, not less.

------
FilterSweep
Why don’t they remove cloudflare protection on 4/8chan?

~~~
zbealeo
Who is "they" and why should "they"? Both websites act in according to US law,
should we punish every site that participates in your definition of wrong
think?

------
ratling
They and others should permanently block 8chan. TBH if NZ/AUS started DDOSing
it I'd be fine with that too but I doubt we're there yet.

The others I don't agree with long term (4chan is 4chan, Zerohedge is moronic
but mostly benign, liveleak is concerning but I get why they did it) but 8chan
is just cancer.

I get freedom of speech, but there has to be a limit _somewhere_. Those
animals would drop nukes for funsies if they had the opportunity.

~~~
gdhbcc
Then you dont get freedom of speech.

Defending rights isn't easy.

~~~
DanBC
Most of the world is fine with their version of freedom of speech. The
extremist version from the US is rare, and causes huge amounts of harm.

US business owners need to wake up to the fact that their products are seen as
publishers, not pipes, and that publishers in most of the world are regulated.

~~~
thatcat
Can you explain how US free speech causes harm?

~~~
fixermark
The white nationalist rally in Charlottesville was the sort of fascist rally
that other countries would categorically refuse a permit to. The US does not,
in general, refuse permits under the assumption that a group (even a group
with a violent ideology) will turn from a peaceable demonstration to a violent
riot. Federal, state, and local law is heavily bent toward assumption of good
faith.

Charlottesville had several injuries and one death.

~~~
s9w
An overweight woman died from a heart attack.

Meanwhile over here we have a dead German every day on average. If I were to
name the ethnic origin of the murderers I would get sued.

This goes both ways.

~~~
fixermark
I take it you're contradicting the coroner's report that Heather Heyer died of
a blunt-force chest injury? Given that the driver of the car was convicted in
her murder, you may want to walk that back.

~~~
s9w
Sure. And when a "new German" stabs an "old German" in the heart and kills
him, he died of "causes unrelated to the injury" to quote one of our coroners,
6 hours (!) after the attack. These things aren't worth the papers they're
printed on. A tool in the hand of politics

[1]
[https://www.welt.de/vermischtes/article181477442/Obduktionse...](https://www.welt.de/vermischtes/article181477442/Obduktionsergebnis-22-Jaehriger-
in-Koethen-starb-an-akutem-Herzversagen.html)

~~~
fixermark
... probably also worth noting: not unlike the US, crime metrics on immigrants
in Germany suggest that as a population, they're less likely to commit crimes
than native Germans.

[https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-
meter/statements/2016/may...](https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-
meter/statements/2016/may/11/donald-trump/donald-trump-says-germany-now-
riddled-crime-thanks/)

~~~
s9w
politifact, sure. Last year, there have been 28 rapes or sexual assaults in my
city. According to police reports, witness reports and phantom photos, 26 of
those are not from Germany. In the end-of-year reports, that number is close
to 0. Funny how that works. because double-citizenship, acquittals, people
never being caught, unknown identities.. you pick one

