Clash, a tool to break China's Great Fire Wall, is Deleted in GitHub | HN Mirror

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	Clash, a tool to break China's Great Fire Wall, is Deleted in GitHub (github.com)
	78 points by basic_banana 965 days ago

11 comments

_lvbh 965 days ago

This is not uncommon. I know of many other repositories serving a similar purpose that disappears from GitHub. Author probably got caught (e.g. leaking their email in a git commit). Many Chinese people have QQ email addresses which are linked directly to their real identity.

wingtw 965 days ago

https://github.com/Ieooo/clash

FugeDaws 965 days ago

wouldnt surprise me if github got a scary letter from the CCP and played it safe

richbell 965 days ago

Or the author.

sonicanatidae 965 days ago

This is my guess. Most individuals are easier to push, with less drama.

throwaway1103 965 days ago

afaik, Fndroid, the author of Clash For Windows, the most popular distribution of Clash, was warned by the CCP in some kind of way.

On the other hand, Dreamacro, the author of Clash itself, wanted to play safe due to an increased risk of being detained in mainland China.

throwaway1103 964 days ago

being one of the developers of the Clash core (https://github.com/Dreamacro/clash) and its closed-source (free of charge) premium version (clash-premium), i'm really heartbroken seeing this - everything is tearing down.

even without the context of being in China or Iran, Clash is still an awesome piece of software that can be used everywhere, with proper understanding of computer networking.

i ain't sure if both Dreamacro and Fndroid are physically safe now, but i'm sure they are both physically in mainland China.

here's one thread on github of this entire event: https://github.com/net4people/bbs/issues/303

plebecus 965 days ago

This GUI for Clash by another author was also "removed" and archived (it seems the "main" branch is still there if you browse branches) https://github.com/zzzgydi/clash-verge

Doe-_ 965 days ago

So has another adjacent project by yet another author, using the same technique: https://github.com/MetaCubeX/Clash.Meta

Which would suggest it's not anodin.

0dayz 965 days ago

Is there any evidence that its foul play?

Could potentially be that the author got burnt out after all.

prepend 965 days ago

It’s really unusual for an author to delete their repo. Especially without a blogpost or something.

Doe-_ 965 days ago

Or for two other adjacent projects to also do the same, on the same day.

https://github.com/MetaCubeX/Clash.Meta https://github.com/zzzgydi/clash-verge

throwaway1103 964 days ago

There are actually a lot more than you think..

https://github.com/Fndroid/clash_for_windows_pkg

https://github.com/Dreamacro/clash

https://github.com/MetaCubeX/Clash.Meta (archived and changed branch name)

https://github.com/EAimTY/tuic (deleted its master branch)

https://github.com/fw876/helloworld

https://github.com/juewuy/ShellCrash (former ShellClash, changed repo name and branch name)

https://github.com/Kr328/ClashForAndroid (also disappeared from Google Play)

Clash Multiplatform Alpha Android (was in closed alpha, developed by Kr328, testing group deleted on Telegram)

https://github.com/ModuleList/ClashF (archived and changed branch name)

https://github.com/CHIZI-0618/box4magisk (archived and changed branch name)

https://github.com/lotusnetwork/lotusboard (archived and changed branch name)

https://github.com/zzzgydi/clash-verge (archived and changed branch name)

https://github.com/MetaCubeX/ClashMetaForAndroid (archived and changed branch name)

https://github.com/immortalwrt/homebridger

https://github.com/Fclash/Fclash (archived)

https://github.com/openrhc/GUI.for.Clash

https://github.com/Dreamacro/clash-dashboard (a web based interface for Clash using its RESTful API, its public hosted version is now 404 as well)

https://github.com/Z-Siqi/Clash-for-Windows_Chinese (archived)

https://github.com/BoyceLig/Clash_Chinese_Patch

https://github.com/mritd/tpclash

https://github.com/yichengchen/clashX (most popular Clash GUI distribution on macOS)

nicognaw 965 days ago

As learned by the community, they leaked their personal information from emails used in git commits

Namidairo 965 days ago

From what I can see, this tool also had it's docs hosted on GitHub Pages, but I don't seem to see any evidence of it existing in the repository.

Did the author force-push to delete the documentation too?

throwaway1103 965 days ago

It was deployed with GitHub Actions, you can check that in .github/workflows/deploy-docs.yml

tellarin 965 days ago

https://github.com/fossabot/clash ?

waterplayer 964 days ago

He's been inactive since long, so he would face no problem at all.

Moldoteck 964 days ago

Ppl should maintain forks in other platforms, like bitbucket or even the eu repository launched few years ago

waterplayer 964 days ago

It's the people.

They won't face any jailtime (this is for sure), but they might get controlled (e.g. more surveillance, limited internet, cannot buy new devices, rigorous checking of their bank account, etc.).

mandeepj 965 days ago

it can still be retrieved.....once on internet, archived (almost) forever.

dingi 965 days ago

I hope this was not due to MS kissing CCPs butt.

waterplayer 964 days ago

In this case, it's much better because they can just move to bitbucket or so.

fyi, github has been blocked in China since 2020 (at least partially blocked).