After an outcry over serving anti-trans stalking forum Kiwi Farms, Cloudflare says denying security services due to “despicable” content is the wrong policy
Cloudflare launched nearly twelve years ago. Over that time, our set of services has become much more complicated. With that complexity we have developed policies around how we handle abuse of different features Cloudflare provides http://blog.cloudflare.com/...
an exec from one of the largest studios saying to me during a meeting: “if we had the chance we would kill the internet”. Well, it sounds like, they are finally attempting it. Here's the post and it is a must-read: https://blog.cloudflare.com/ ...
Cloudflare is effectively lying here: Their security services ARE hosting services. They are a Content Delivery Network. Their protection against DDoS etc is by hiding the real IP and providing the content themselves. When you fetch from KiwiFarms, they provide the content. https…
Cloudflare wants dead trans people. This is their legacy by working with Kiwi Farms. They are knowingly complicit in the cyberstalking, harassment, and threatening of trans people to the point of suicide. They offer the protections that enable this to happen. https://twitter.com/…
Cloudflare has responded. I am currently preoccupied talking to media about the Kiwifarms user who showed up at my current address using the dox from their homepage. My team will have a statement released by the end of the day.
In this case it's more comparable to the police department knowing who an arsonist is that keeps burning down houses in the neighborhood and refusing to stop them. https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
They don't talk about it publicly... Except for when they bring it up, unasked and entirely unprompted, in a public statement. It's beautiful. I can't think of anything that I like more than I like this. https://blog.cloudflare.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
Wow. Strong move by @Cloudflare in its newly announced policy saying they will not exercise discretion to terminate security services to sites like the Daily Stormer going forward. The post by @eastdakota and Alissa Starzak is very thoughtful. https://blog.cloudflare.com/ ... 1/
so @cloudflare 100% has the ability to explicitly remove K*w*Farms based off of their TOS (below) but has decided to look at itself as a public service that is deserved by all rather than a corporation that's directly profiting off the harm of marginalized people. https://twitter…
Cloudflare says for its web host products it may remove if “incites or exploits violence” etc. Of course, Kiwi Farms does exactly this. But Cloudflare doesn't clearly explain why this policy only applies to hosting and not security products https://www.vice.com/... https://twitte…
Regardless of why Cloudflare applies one policy to hosting and not security, Kiwi Farms users regularly post content that discloses sensitive personal information with the explicit goal of inciting or exploiting violence https://www.vice.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Super interesting. “Just as the telephone company doesn't terminate your line if you say awful, racist, bigoted things, we have concluded ... that turning off security services because we think what you publish is despicable is the wrong policy.” https://twitter.com/...
“most of the concerns we see in our abuse process relate to our free customers”— @Cloudflare, indirectly admitting that paying customers are subsidizing the cost of their *choice* to literally provide a *free* platform for hate. Cool. Cool. https://blog.cloudflare.com/ ...
@Cloudflare @eastdakota This is nuanced. As I read this, they *will* terminate where the law so requires, including geoblocking for locally illegal content. And they will still kick people off Cloudflare's less-used *hosting* services based on their own discretionary policies. 2/
KF would be unable to keep their images and videos (esp of Christchurch and Buffalo Tops shootings) online from a bandwidth and cost perspective without Cloudflare supporting them. https://twitter.com/...
It's not immediately clear to me why Cloudflare's announcement isn't viewed in the same vein as Meta or Youtube announcing they were wrong to ban the most virulent terrorist or white supremacist orgs and wouldn't be doing it anymore.
All of this. @Cloudflare 's refusal to hold Kiwi Farms, the website stoking violence against trans and nonbinary people, to account is abhorrent. And shuttling hush money to LGBTQ organizations is insult to injury. #DropKiwiFarms . https://twitter.com/...
For weeks Cloudflare has stood behind their decision to provide services to a website that openly calls for the harassment, violence, and murder of transgender and nonbinary people, which even goes as far to reveal personal home addresses, putting these people in serious danger. …
CF's focus from the get-go has been on access to due process, and on their own ability to provide it if they took on the role of content moderator. (A key counterpart IMO is taking things down when courts, which CAN provide such process, say to do so.) 5/ https://twitter.com/...
The irony of them disabling replies and blocking critics. They can't handle criticism on Twitter but expect trans people to handle being cyberstalked, harassed, and threatened to the point of suicide. #CloudflareProtectsTerrorists https://twitter.com/...
This, more than Twitter labels and Facebook bans, is the most important part of the debate on what tech providers should and shouldn't do about bad stuff online. @Cloudflare Suggests It Won't Cut Off Anti-Trans Stalking Forum https://www.vice.com/...
Please recall that Cloudflare only ended their business with the Daily Stormer after Unite the Right in 2017, but in 2018 it took them mere weeks to boot off an indie sex worker community after FOSTA. https://arstechnica.com/... https://www.vice.com/... https://twitter.com/...
They are arguing that denying service to Daily Stormer and 8Chan was a mistake they wouldn't make again. It's a “compelling” argument regarding policing of speech, one I have struggled with before. But there's a clear line between speech and assault, so I strongly disagree. https…
This statement from @Cloudflare seems to suggest they now think it was a mistake to terminate The Daily Stormer and 8chan. #dropkiwifarms https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
The gall of @cloudflare posting this, while they're being called out for enabling abuse by providing their protection services to a known hate forum. https://twitter.com/...
The most sickening part about Cloudflare's statement is how they hide behind donations to the Trevor Project, an LGBTQ suicide hotline. They are complicit in causing the suicides of trans people by enabling doxing, cyberstalking, harassment, and swatting. https://twitter.com/...
Hey @Cloudflare, are you paying for a private security guard for @keffals given the recent attempt on her life directly caused by one of the sites you proudly support? Or are you all talk, and no money when it comes to compensating for providing free service to hate sites?
what's worse is LITERALLY YESTERDAY the same people they protect in Kiwifarms and their fellow travellers were busy denial of service attacking the Trevor Project's chat and phone lines, causing wait times to rise and clients to not receive help. https://twitter.com/...
Cloudflare says after it booted Daily Stormer and 8chan, in a “deeply troubling response” authoritarian regimes reached out to try to ban human rights organizations. Cloudflare doesn't acknowledge it could, just, not cater to authoritarian regimes https://www.vice.com/... https:/…
.@Cloudflare, this is extremely rich as a response to the demands that you take down Kiwifarms because they incite violence. You're just claiming it's about speech while ignoring the fact that this site tries to kill people. https://twitter.com/...
I hope Cloudflare is ready for a good chunk of the tech industry to judge them as scum. Actively choosing to harm my friends and peers means I want nothing to do with them — and will be extremely critical of those who associate themselves with CF. https://twitter.com/...
Cloudflare doubles down on providing services to K*F, and signals that they'd reconsider hosting Nazi sites. “20% of the web uses Cloudflare security services” shows us why we can't let private companies w/ no public oversight control critical infrastructure. https://twitter.com/…
This is so incredibly cowardly, the Lion from the Wizard of Oz would be jealous. Cloudflare protects hate groups, doxxing, and harassment, and that should be it's company image until they stop. https://twitter.com/...
I've recommended Cloudflare's free services for years, despite their free speech absolutism. Hearing them explicitly say “we regret banning The Daily St_rmer and 8ch_n” is deeply fucked. Check out @lizthegrey's livestream VODs for advice on migrating to alternate providers. https…
alternatively, Cloudflare could just choose to not do business with websites that are intended to engage in bad-faith harassment of people https://twitter.com/...
Personally and professionally, I won't give money to companies who have no compunction supporting hate groups. @lizthegrey has some excellent tips on how to migrate off of CloudFlare, especially if you're a paying customer. https://twitter.com/...
Cloudflare also says “Our guiding principle is that organizations closest to content are best at determining when the content is abusive.” But obviously, third parties can see Kiwi Farms' content. It is widely accessible, not just to the web host https://www.vice.com/... https://…
New: in a new post Cloudflare suggests it has no intention of cutting off Kiwi Farms, which has been leading a campaign of anti-trans doxing, harassment, and SWATing. Company's stance shows its reluctance to fully commit to the world of content moderation https://www.vice.com/...
this is a completely fucking useless take. they could have just said “no, fuck you, we love KF” and saved us all a whole lot of time. instead, they carefully avoided bringing the hellsite up at all, which is very interesting! https://blog.cloudflare.com/ ...
Cloudflare's response to the KF criticism is apparently “we updated our abuse reporting so it doesn't give your address to people who want you dead as long as you check a box. What more do you want?” https://blog.cloudflare.com/ ...
It took them more than a week to write this response and their answer is essentially, “Even though we did this in the past, we're not doing it now.” @Cloudflare, if you want to act like a public utility, the @FTC should regulate you like one. https://blog.cloudflare.com/ ...