U.S. Internet providers bail on WikiLeaks
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U.S. Internet service providers are the first ones to bail on the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks. EveryDNS.net, one of the world’s largest free domain service providers, cut ties with the controversial website over what they say was a violation of their Acceptable Use Policy Thursday night. More specifically, the DNS provider cited the recent series of rogue attacks from computer hackers as the reason for ending their business partnership. According to the EveryDNS.net homepage, these multiple distributed denial of service (DDOS) attacks, done by angry individuals in protest to the site’s recent leak of illegally obtained documents and cables, violated the company’s terms of use because they interfered with their other members' use and enjoyment of their services.
The problem with this argument is that normally when a DNS provider drops a client it is because the client themselves has violated the contract rather than third-party protestors, according to Andre Rickardsson, who is an expert on file-sharing and information technology at Sweden’s Bitsec Consulting. "WikiLeaks is not behind the disturbance here, but individuals trying to disturb WikiLeaks' operations," Rickardsson said Friday morning in an interview with the Associated Press.
The other U.S. company to bail on WikiLeaks is Amazon.com, who recently stopped providing the website with their server rent service. Although Amazon has refused to comment, their decision came shortly after U.S. government officials questioned the publically traded company about their service to the WikiLeaks site. Senator Joe Lieberman commended Amazon for their decision and said that the company should "set the standard" for all companies working with the website.
Although other motives cannot be confirmed for EveryDNS.net and Amazon.com, there is no doubt that the two companies were exposed to large amounts of pressure coming from the international community who believe that Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, committed serious crimes with his release of the classified material to the public. Little has been done by the U.S. government thus far to shut down the website, with First Amendment rights tying up any immediate action. In the meantime, the cables are continuing to pour out as WikiLeaks has moved to a new Swiss academic network service provider and was forced to rent space from another European server.
Pressure continues to mount on Washington officials who have to undertake constant damage control as different unflattering cables are leaked every few days. The most recent cleanup has to do with allegations from top U.S. government and Afghanistan officials who claim that President Karzai has become a weak and irrational leader. These new cables could cause harder work for American and NATO efforts in the Afghanistan war as U.S. officials are desperately trying to turn the country over to the Afghanistan people by 2014. Karzai, who is known for his paranoia and mistrust of American officials, will likely not receive the leaked cables warmly.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
U.S. Internet providers bail on WikiLeaks - National News | Examiner.com
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