

A New HTTP Status Code to Report Legal Obstacles - johns
http://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-tbray-http-legally-restricted-status/?include_text=1

======
Osiris
At the bottom of the page, "Thanks also to Ray Bradbury."

It appears they deliberately chose 451 in homage to the great Fahrenheit 451
(or more specifically, to the dystopian future presented in the book).[1]

[1]
[http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120725/06093819827/truth-...](http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120725/06093819827/truth-
erroring-ietf-proposal-includes-new-451-censorship-error-code.shtml)

~~~
popee
So, when will they start burning urls?

~~~
gojomo
The job now falls to the Writermen. They excerpt, rewrite & aggressively-
SEO... so that no original, true, or subversive ideas ever rank in top 450
search results (unless wrapped in neutralizing snark).

It's "SearchRank-451".

------
deepblueocean
This reminds me very much of the TCP Evil Bit [1]. That is, it seems like the
issue of whether anybody would actually set this is essential to the question
of whether or not it would work.

One could even imagine that governments would _want_ people to live in
ignorance of the existence of restrictions. It's 100% the Ethan Zuckerman Cute
Cat Theory of Internet Censorship [2]. The government would rather that you
have all of YouTube _except_ the subversive content, because then you might
not notice the restriction and so will learn not to care.

Indeed, from the document:

    
    
      "The use of the 451 status code implies neither the
      existence nor non-existence of the resource named in the
      request.  That is to say, it is possible that if the legal
      demands were removed, a request for the resource still
      might not succeed."
    

That suggests to me that the author is also aware of this problem.

It should be noted that Google has done an amazing job in trying to fix this
problem by trying to force whole services to be blocked when that's feasible
and by transparently explaining (in the UI itself!) when content is
unavailable for legal reasons. Kudos to them.

For that reason, I would say such an effort is worthwhile even if it won't
have much impact: it's quite likely that it will help further the norm that
when censorship exists it should exist transparently. That's a cause worth
fighting for, even if every step is going to be a huge challenge.

[1] <http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3514.txt>

[2] [http://www.ethanzuckerman.com/blog/2008/03/08/the-cute-
cat-t...](http://www.ethanzuckerman.com/blog/2008/03/08/the-cute-cat-theory-
talk-at-etech/)

~~~
pekk
People will set this to indicate that they had to censor something. Obviously
if you don't want the censorship to be detected, you will not use this code.

------
izietto
"This request may not be serviced in the Roman Province of Judea due to the
Lex Julia Majestatis, which disallows access to resources hosted on servers
deemed to be operated by the People's Front of Judea."

Ave Caesar, moritURI te salutant

------
dewitt
Discussion from last year: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4099751>

------
xentronium
Already used by LiveJournal in Russia:

Example: <http://drugoi.livejournal.com/3712998.html> (slightly NSFW) — if you
visit this URL from Russian IP address, you'll see something like this:
[https://www.evernote.com/shard/s72/sh/6e76310b-daec-454c-a66...](https://www.evernote.com/shard/s72/sh/6e76310b-daec-454c-a66b-abf9fb366db4/43b5e2c128e0bf4c6d439f2f64b528ed/res/60f8b86d-0431-415e-8c79-d347743139bc/skitch.png)

Allegedly, this page and photos are used to propagandize suicide.

~~~
drakeandrews
Warning, the link contains pictures of a man on fire.

------
c0ur7n3y
I think if these types of messages were as jarring as possible instead
discreetly displayed in the existing interface it would heighten people's
awareness of these issues.

~~~
alexwright
There's no reason a site couldn't serve content along with the 451 code, just
as HTTP200 is served with content.

In fact, that's a _SHOULD_ in the RFC:

    
    
        Responses using this status code SHOULD include an explanation, in
       the response body, of the details of the legal demand: the party
       making it, the applicable legislation or regulation, and what classes
       of person and resource it applies to.

~~~
fennecfoxen
Or how HTTP 404 is served with content.... (e.g.
<http://github.com/xyzzyeieio> \- there's a good 134KB text/html with your 404
error code)

------
EzGraphs
This perhaps would top HTTP Response Code 418 "I'm a teapot"

<http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2324>

------
dochtman
Mozilla is apparently using this in their AMO/Marketplace codebase:

[http://firefox-marketplace-
api.readthedocs.org/en/latest/top...](http://firefox-marketplace-
api.readthedocs.org/en/latest/topics/submission.html#get--api-v1-apps-
app-\(int-id\)|\(string-slug\)-)

------
kumarharsh
The most startling clause is this:

    
    
       The 451 status code is optional; clients cannot rely upon its use.
       It is possible that certain legal authorities may wish to avoid
       transparency, and not only demand the restriction of access to
       certain resources, but also avoid disclosing that the demand was
       made.
    

It seems this clause, as highlighted by deepblueocean in his "TCP Evil Bit"
comment, is what is most disturbing... Shouldn't it be made mandatory? Can it
be made mandatory?

------
zyglobe
China: "451 all the things"

~~~
ttflee
The GFW generally works on the TCP layer, resetting the session which delivers
some sensitive-keyword-containing payloads, both in and out of the boundary.

------
Svip
Damn it, not more HTTP status codes, I want 402 to work all ready!

------
ger_phpmagazin
The draft was published on Jan 11. Why is it relevant, today?

------
hawleyal
I prefer my internet without legal interference.

