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by cubefox 163 days ago
If the German filters only apply to ISPs in Germany, they have no effect on users in foreign countries. Moreover, Cloudflare is obviously not an ISP.
3 comments

the filters the Italian authorities complain about also only apply in italy.

It's likely a process thing, Italy has had website bans since forever, but the new regulation applies _without going through a judge_. Some copyright holders can say "this website is infringing" and ISPs, CDNs etc.. are required to shut them down immediately.

A similar system was introduced in Spain, with the same problems, for the same reason (football $$$).

EDIT: to be clear, CF argues that they need to block the DNS globally, and that's unreasonable. The Italian authority argues that they have the skills to do a local block and are just being uncooperative.

> EDIT: to be clear, CF argues that they need to block the DNS globally, and that's unreasonable. The Italian authority argues that they have the skills to do a local block and are just being uncooperative.

Similar to the UK's attempt to try and get noncompliant sites like Imgur and 4chan to block themselves from serving content to UK locations, I think the responsibility for country-wide blocks lies with the country attempting to regulate the space, not CDNs or websites.

I don't doubt that Italy is correct that CF has the technical ability do a local block like they're asking for, but I also don't see how CF is in any way (legally) compelled to do so. Whether or not Italy (or any country) is capable of doing so, or paying contractors for an appropriate solution, isn't CF's problem either.

The difference is that Imgur/4chan have no presence in the UK but Cloudflare has servers and probably a sales office in Italy. Cloudflare does have to follow Italian law within Italy.

Either Cloudflare can block pirate sites or ISPs will completely block Cloudflare (as seen in Spain). Which way do you prefer?

As I understand it Cloudflare is being asked to block these sites globally, and what I said was that Italy doesn't have the legal authority to request that CF do so globally.

Locally, within Italy I can see the argument that CF can be compelled to adhere to blocking sites for any requests originating from, or being routed to Italy - so long as Cloudflare maintains any kind of presence there. That goes for any other country, too.

Realistically maintaining this kind of work puts a financial and engineering overhead on Cloudflare (or any CDN) for running operations in that country, and that incentivizes Cloudflare to push back on this request from any country. The logical response from CF is to refuse and threaten to remove all operations from the country if the country tries to force the issue, to prevent CF from getting pulled into the same requirements for multiple other countries, which is exactly what CF did a couple days ago.

I'll reiterate my previous stance - if a country wants to block part of the internet, that country needs to do it themselves and for the space within which they have authority to do so (their borders). At that point it's up to the citizens of the country to push back if they disagree, and if they don't want to be compared to China and their Great Firewall they shouldn't try and regulate the internet.

> The Italian authority argues that they have the skills to do a local block

they certainly do, they have the source IP and their platform lets them geolocate an ip

Do you think the Italian bureaucrats really want to ban something in France or Germany?

The Cloudflare CEO is clearly misinterpreting something that was lost in translation, which is the bureaucrats stating "Cloudflare must prevent access to XY from everywhere". For bureaucrats "everywhere" means "in my jurisdiction". I cannot believe that the Cloudflare CEO is trying to nitpick around a single word that he so clearly misinterprets.

> Do you think the Italian bureaucrats really want to ban something in France or Germany?

Yes 100% they absolutely do.

I'm pretty sure Cloudflare is an ISP according to German law ("Diensteanbieter" according to DDG). You might confuse "ISP" with the terminology of "Access Provider" according to the (now defunct) ยง8 TMG.
If that were true, sci-hub.se would be blocked in Germany on 1.1.1.1 (1dot1dot1dot1.cloudflare-dns.com), it isn't blocked, therefore it's not true. (Modus tollens)
Your reasoning is impeccable, bravo. But it's wrong. Both your premise and your conclusion are based on completely wrong assumptions.
Not sure which premise you disagree with, but the conclusion follows from them.
I am a Service Provider ("Diensteanbieter") according to DDG and I don't block a single page, which makes your statement not only wrong, but rather so wrong that not even the complete opposite would make any sense.
Not necessarily. Perhaps small service providers are exempt from blocking sci-hub.se. But Cloudflare is certainly not small.