Posted on 11/29/2010 11:56:54 AM PST by Lazamataz
ICE (Immigrations and Customs Enforcement) apparently "seized" a bunch of domain pointers the last couple of days and has generated an immense amount of heat and damn little light.
I'll try to add a bit of light and hopefully, not much (if any) heat.
First, these sorts of things are not new. I used to get subpoenas from Customs on a somewhat-regular basis when I ran MCSNet. I considered them one of the more-reasonable government agencies, actually - they paid for their document production and were rational people.
For those who are unaware if you're importing something into the country (yes, digitally counts) Customs has a right to get involved. I know, I know, the all-on "open borders" folks will scream, but the fact of the matter is that this is in fact a specifically-delegated power.
Second, it appears they're actually getting court orders. This means they're convincing a Judge in a US District Court to issue the seizure warrant.
Note that they didn't seize the site - they can't, as it's outside the United States (beyond their jurisdiction.) Instead they seized the domain name pointers.
Meh. That's a lot of staff attorney time and trouble to get a big fat nothing out of it, which is exactly what they get going down this road. Why? Because all they can do is redirect the domain pointers which will do exactly nothing when the sites re-register under a top-level domain not under the US Government's jurisdiction - and there are lots of them.
(Excerpt) Read more at market-ticker.org ...
If you get the domain name registered at a toplevel registrant, not in the United States, the Feds cannot touch you. Please read.
Important article. Please read.
Important article. Please read.
ICANN-Accredited Registrars
http://www.icann.org/en/registrars/accredited-list.html
Find the most liberal country (Sweden?) and register a variant of your domain name and point it to the current site - then publicize the variant as an emergence backup.
5.56mm
That was great information. Thanks for pinging me on this one. LOL!
bfl
Actually, there’s no need to use a variant. You could simply register in, say, thailand, and it would be www.freerepublic.th
Barneyfrankrock.th!!!
They shut down http://www.Torrent-Finder.com but you can see the same site at http://www.Torrent-Finder.info
This was one of my favorite bit-torrent search engines.
Glad I’m not in the USA!
You’re pinging me? Huh.
Anyway, Jim Robinson already registered FREEREPUBLIC.INFO nine years and one day ago.
Thanks Laz, looks like you’ve hit it. Oh, sorry.
Sure. You were on the other thread. I don't hold anything against you.
Thanks, Laz. Not sure, but I believe that the over-reach of government bureaucracy is the reason Free Dominion of Canada relocated their server’s colo to Panama. Is it 1938 yet?
*.info domains are still under the control of ICANN (and the US government).
What Laz is suggesting that freerepublic.* be registered at some place outside the control of ICANN.
However, *.info domains are controlled by ICANN, too.
ICE isn't ICANN.
Bump
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