April 11, 2003
proxy fight [Domains-by-proxy update]

The same case that brought Domains by Proxy to my attention demonstrates its shortcomings: Domains by Proxy doesn't proxy for long (via nettime-l).

Re-Code bills itself as "a new space for political satire using products that already exist in stores" -- it offered bar-codes, purportedly for printing and swapping with those on WalMart products. There's plenty of room for argument whether the site was "encouraging and facilitating theft and fraud", as WalMart claimed, or satirizing consumer culture [recall voteauction.com, where First Amendment defenses prevailed], but that debate should happen before breach of the site-owner's anonymity.

On April 10th, Re-Code was informed that their anonymity service agreement had been terminated by Domains by Proxy -- on the mere allegation of unlawful activity. Unfortunately, that means the anonymizing service fails just when it's needed most. It fails to protect unpopular speakers from the chilling effect of threats. We still need anonymous domain name registration for those cases.

Posted by Wendy at 11:37 AM