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Any users of easyDNS registrar service? Question about transferring domain AWAY
Question for easyDNS registrar users...
I have not used them yet, but they apparently have a decent reputation for freedom of speech, so I'm thinking of trying them out while waiting for @Francisco's NameCrane registrar service to launch some time this decade (j/k, he says it will launch this year). (BTW see this thread for more freedom of speech friendly registrars: https://lowendtalk.com/discussion/186621/best-registrars-with-a-great-reputation-for-freedom-of-speech )
So I can't figure out if easyDNS requires you to disable WHOIS privacy protection before you transfer AWAY from them, if I ever want to do that in the future. (Which I probably would, since I'd want to transfer into NameCrane, for example.)
easyDNS's KB page on transferring away is not clear to me about this: https://kb.easydns.com/knowledge/transferring-a-domain-away/
And yes, I have reached out to them about this, and I'm waiting for an answer, BUT you know how inaccurate sales/support people can be sometimes, and I was hoping someone here would already have personal experience transferring a domain AWAY from easyDNS and would know first hand if you had to disable WHOIS privacy protection.
If easyDNS is going to force disabling WHOIS privacy protection to transfer away, that is a deal breaker for me and I won't use them.
Comments
No, they won't disable WHOIS privacy, but they are useless for most things, and ban happy.
Owner is friends with Fredrik and is the only reason why TPB.org is there, not because they are piracy-friendly.
Go for NameCheap, they REQUIRE a subpoena or a court order.
Thanks, @Altes! In my case, I already use NameCheap and others, but I'm spreading things around and testing different registrars that I haven't used before. Don't want to put all my eggs in one basket.
Also in my case, freedom of speech does not mean piracy or DMCA ignore or spam, etc.., it means First Amendment. Different purpose, but I understand why many people overlap.
And thanks for letting me know they won't disable WHOIS privacy. Very good to know.
When you say they are useless and ban happy, can you elaborate a little? Are there some examples you know of?
Not true at all.. Namecheap? You can go to torrentfreaks and count how many domains got down without subpoena and court order.
Never heard anything about EasyDNS issues with freedom of speech. There are many people here who can tell you that EasyDNS is decent.
Are you sure what you are saying?
When I mentioned NameCheap's court order and subpoena policy I didn't imply it was in regards to their DMCA policies (they have none regardless) it was more to do with what would a domain registrar do if your domain name received a subpoena, or even worse, a court order? (Hint: most would suspend you by default even if the subpoena was just for your information, as they are scared of any legal process)
In case of easyDNS, which is owned and operated by a single person who is TECHNICALLY a libertarian but threatens to charge you for "excessive" inquiries about your domain names, and quite simply, doesn't want the hassle. There won't be any issues in moving the domains out, but it's best to avoid it.
Go instead for ccTLD's like Albania, Pakistan and Russia, often 301 one to the other, and mix them with gTLD's registered on ICANN accredited registrars in the US, China, Russia, and even some EU registrars will be ok as long as you are only using them for 301 redirects.
If your site is political, then of course, the US will be the best jurisdiction by far, but you still can't go wrong getting domain names from crappy jurisdictions with very little oversight.
Positive, I don't need to read the news.
The only reason why NameCheap will suspend WITHOUT a court order is if you used false information, and refuse to identify yourself.
They don't have a KYC policy in order to register a domain name, but should someone convince support that you've registered the domain under a false identity, then no, you don't need a court order to get someone suspended. You just need to prove how they are using a false identity, which will be very difficult to do.
Do registrars in general suspend or create a hard time for you in case of some lawyer sending a copy of a civil case again you?
Yeah go with .al ccTLD Albania, and for a single dmca abuse akep.al will suspend you, i really don't recommend Albania for such services since they comply with EU, USA law.
Interesting ideas, thanks for sharing! I do like the idea of getting some ccTLDs to mix things up, but want to avoid Albania, Pakistan, Russia, China. The 301 redirect idea is very interesting though for some projects, will think about that.
In my case, I'm looking for freedom of speech registrars in the sense of "First Amendment - freedom of speech - freedom of press" and yes, politics is part of that. And I agree, US jurisdiction is theoretically the best for that, except when it comes to privacy. However, in my case, all my sites easily lead back to me, so while privacy is an issue (WHOIS privacy is a must for my personal contact info), I don't need anonymity for these domains that I'm trying to find a good registrar for.
So that's what I need for a registrar. I do NOT need the Njalla-type services or the heavily DMCA-ignore kinds of services or the extreme left/right anonymity kinds of services or the Russia/China kinds of services.
I just don't want the registrar and hosting providers to bow down under the first sign of pressure and cave in to cancel culture mob attacks. I realize there's overlap though.
So in the approach I'm trying to take, my understanding is that both NameCheap and easyDNS are good for that, as well as Hover/Tucows, IBS, PDR, Netim, Gandi (at least in the past), possibly EuroDNS, and some people still think Cloudflare is okay (although they've bowed to the mob before). When NameCrane launches, that should rise to the top of that list, in theory.
If you have other suggestions, let me know. But I'm definitely not looking for any services from Russia and China for political freedom of the press alone, although I know they are very lax in some topics.
Also, if you have any other suggestions for good ccTLDs (other than Russia, etc...), I'm all ears.
EDIT: clarity, damn typos
Ban happy?
My guess is this is the same guy we recently did ban, who has been complaining all over the internet about it.
Suffice it to say, he was violating our ToS - he openly stated he was violating our ToS, his websites are subject to various legal actions, and the entire business was built on selling bootlegged copies of other people's ebooks.
If you're not that guy - happy to discuss why you were banned (most others are obvious phishing sites).
But in general, that is the type of stuff that does get you banned, we won't apologize for it.
To the OP - no we don't force that. The main thing for transferring out is that you have the auth code and the domain unlocked. You can do everything else from the gaining registrar side.
We're not like some registrars who force you to turn off whois privacy, and then count that as a change of registrant and lock your domain up for another 60 days.
Oh I get it, you're one of the guys who wants us to be your unpaid abuse desk interns, for $15/year ($3 of which are our gross margins), so we can spend our time fielding unlimited takedown requests for content you are pirating.
Yeah, we're total pricks that way.
@easydns ever heard of kiwifarms?
do you think you would be able to maintain their domains?
it would be a free speech test with pure fire.
"abuse" requests only have to be forwarded, owner will take care of em.
@easydns Are you fine with legal but questionable stuff and do you have whois privacy on .re (All .re domains are not available according to your website)
EasyDNS glad to see you here. Who you deal with privacy of clients? Do you require always court order from Canada to some domains to be takedown like .org?
Do you allow and support freedom of speech? (Both sides left and right)?
Do you shutdown easily or provide info easily if someone is onlt.hyperlinking?
I know some answers, but if you can confirm should be great.
I think you are a good domain provider. I hope you didn't change about freedom of speech (old image of spy etc)
Glad to see you here.
Lol... you're talking nonsense, as usual... just because I am aware of a certain situation doesn't make me that person, nor does it mean that I have anything to do with what you're insinuating.
My point was simple: you're safeguarding TPB's domain because you know the owner, and because you see it as an ego booster. If you were an honest person you wouldn't be making exceptions, you would treat every customer the same, i.e. perform your duties as a registrar and forward emails, not ask for money if someone's website is targeted by an unusual amount of support requests. But, I bet you don't ask him to pay you and your employees for the tickets? It's selective, and that's my issue with it.
If you're a prick, be a prick, but be consistent.
Stay salty, though.
@easydns Thanks for making an appearance in the thread. And good to hear you don't force removal of WHOIS privacy when transferring domains away.
As for some of the other responses posted, I am also very interested in a clarification about your position about freedom of speech. It's becoming a very important issue to some people, for different reasons, but since reading your TOS, I realized some people might be very confused by your actual stance on the subject.
This a long response, I hope you take the time to read it. It's a serious post, after reflecting on your TOS today, which is one of the most unusual TOSes I've ever read.
Obviously the meaning of freedom of speech is interpreted differently by different people, and LET probably has more interpretations than I've seen in most other forums -- there's a wide diversity of viewpoints (from very left to very right and everything in between), nationalities (countries with explicit First Amendment-type rights to countries with no protection of freedom of speech), and cultures (huge number of backgrounds, religions, economic situations, languages, etc., including translation gaps on top of that).
So some clarification would be helpful. Especially considering the "style" in which the TOS is written.
I do see that your TOS discusses freedom of speech, and any potential customer of your services should of course read your TOS. It might already have enough info for many people.
But after reading your TOS, I've been surprised by the tone and wording, enough to think about it today and take the time to respond here in this forum. Please feel free to forward this to easyDNS's owner as well, I'm very curious what he actually thinks, and when was the last time he read the TOS himself, given everything that has happened in recent years with freedom of speech issues around the world.
The TOS even includes sections about "guilt-by-association" and a "department of pre-crime and de-risk," which I've never seen before in a TOS. I'm assuming an attempt at humor to lighten the seriousness of the topics. But the wording, as I'll mention a little more below, can be concerning to people who are familiar with the history and suppression of freedom of speech around the world.
Item 19 in your TOS mentions the NAP (non-aggression principle) as a reason to cancel a customer and you list certain content that you will shut down. But even the wikipedia article you link to ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-aggression_principle ) indicates "There is no single or universal interpretation or definition of the NAP..." so your approach to this seems arbitrary at best.
For example, in #19, while I appreciate the approach (or attempt?) of humor (again, perhaps to lighten the seriousness of things you won't host), including "...anything else that makes normal, sane people puke in their own mouths..." you actually don't clarify the issue for serious, decent people who still have widely differing opinions about things that might make them "puke in their own mouths."
There is a lot of perfectly legitimate and legal free speech that makes many different groups feel very uncomfortable and might make some people want to "puke in their own mouths."
So one question is, who are you defining as "normal people?" If you're on the left, a lot of content from the right makes people on the left "puke in their own mouths," and if you're on the right, a lot of content from the left makes people on the right "puke in their own mouths." So what is the standard of "normal people" and what is the standard that you use at easyDNS to determine what makes people "puke in their own mouths?"
And to be clear, I'm not being facetious with those questions by the way. I get that you don't accept certain things on your platform, and you certainly have a right not accept content that you don't want on your platform, especially clearly illegal content. But "puking" is not a legal term. And there is no legal definition for what a "normal" person is. What does "normal" really even mean? Whose "normal?" Someone in Ontario?
Even #20 in your TOS is unclear -- you state: "Following on the above point, free speech means the freedom to tell the truth, not spew nonsensical filth. We will put our asses on the line to defend the former, we will not lift a finger for the latter. Yes, we can pick and choose because the latter always violates the NAP and the former doesn’t."
That entire statement is completely arbitrary and doesn't clear up what your actual lines are, except that "free speech means the freedom to tell the truth, not spew nonsensical filth." -- BUT how do you determine "truth" at easyDNS? And how do you determine what is "nonsensical' or "filth?"
I think a lot of serious defenders of freedom of speech learned during the pandemic that there were many people who were silenced because the other side said they were spewing nonsensical lies and misinformation, but some of it turned out to actually be true, and a lot of "freedom to tell the truth" was actually crushed during the pandemic. On which side did you fall? And did you make any mistakes?
And when you say you "put your asses on the line" to defend "freedom to tell the truth," what "truth" did you defend? And when you say you will "not lift a finger" to protect "nonsensical filth," what nonsensical filth did you cancel? And again, did you make any mistakes?
Did you wait for a court order? Did a "normal" person in your "pre-crime" department puke in their mouth? Did you keep an open mind when credible sources had alternative points of view, even if they were unpopular? Did you cancel sites because there were too many complaints coming in to the abuse desk, without reading the complaints to see if they were actually legitimate and had a legal basis?
So honestly, you might see why some people might think the TOS is very poorly written, arbitrary, in some cases contradictory, and unclear, especially the parts about freedom of speech, even though I can assume that whoever wrote it was trying for a certain humorous tone.
Even the "pre-crime" line is highly concerning to people who understand the origin of "pre-crime" narratives in literature and philosophy, and that is literally the opposite of freedom of speech. And considering all the "truth" that has been squashed in the last few years, and the amount of actual disinformation that has been promoted in the last few years, the humor in the TOS is very much out of date.
So as a side note, may I suggest you rewrite or clarify what you really mean in your TOS? Even the NAP is arbitrary and not widely agreed upon, so maybe your TOS could use a good revision by a lawyer that has no sense of humor.
But to return to the request for clarification at the top of this very long post, what, actually do you protect with regard to freedom of speech and freedom of the press?
I mean all that respectfully. I wouldn't have bothered writing all this if it wasn't an important topic to me, personally.
If you don't have time to answer, I understand, most people and business don't have time to seriously answer this. I've had discussions with a number of very nice providers who would rather not deal with customers that "attract attention" or that might bring any kind of "trouble" when it comes to freedom of speech. I get it. Perhaps you are one of those, and it's fine of course, you have every right to run your business however you want to.
But maybe you are one of the very rare providers which actually cares about what freedom of speech really is and how important it is, will defend a site even if it means dealing with some content that you personally disagree with or find uncomfortable, especially when the "truth" is not fully clear and certain. I'm not talking about clearly illegal content, which can be defined by actual statute and applicable jurisdiction(s). But freedom of speech doesn't have a "pre-crime" division and also doesn't have a vague arbitrary notion of what is "normal" or "puke"-worthy.
Best wishes to all in this thread and whoever stumbles across this post in the future!
EDIT: some typos
the new laws in Canada that are on the way to be legalized regarding privacy, takedown, freedom of speech, ISP, telecommunications, social media, etc. etc. are sure gonna make Canada a unsafe country to do internet business for both big tech companies as well as shady online businesses or have domains registered with as there will be no safe haven like requirement of Canadian court order to act on domains, hosting, servers, etc. People are hoping those laws don't come into force.
it already is unsafe for freedom of speech.
know people that got forcefully kicked off datacenters and threatened with funny "legal letters" from "people of gender" that do not even live in canada.
stay away from canada for hosting of that type of content, do not how situation looks like for domains as they are considered a "personal property"(similar to houses) in Canada.
If you have a moment, I'd definitely appreciate if you have some specific examples of the new laws in question in Canada. I know in Australia, for example, they've passed anti-encryption legislation in recent years, which is unprecedented, and more bad ideas are in the pipeline. Curious about examples of Canada if you have them handy.
Would appreciate some specific examples of the content that got kicked off, and context of the situation. If it's doxing anyone (doesn't matter the background, religion, identity, or sexual orientation), or incitement to violence against groups or individuals, or even more specifically related to slander/libel, then that's expected that they'd get kicked off.
Most providers in most countries (not just Canadian providers) would kick them off for that. There's a huge amount of established precedent, legal theory, and statutes already on the books in the US, Canada, and most Western countries in general, that don't include doxing, incitement to violence, and defamation, for example, as "free speech." But if it was legitimate legal free speech, I'd be interested to know examples that got kicked off.
And just because someone doesn't live in Canada, doesn't mean they can't sue someone in a Canadian court, to my knowledge. I believe it's called an out-of-province judgment, but I'm not a lawyer. But I believe the legal mechanism is similar to the US. So whatever legal letters the provider was getting, could still eventually wind up in a Canadian court, if the person who filed the complaint decided to take it that far legally. The question IMO is if the provider folded at the first sign of trouble, without investigating the content in question, and canceled the content's owner without a reasonable assessment of the legitimacy and legal basis of the complaint.
Also interested in the context of the situations you are referring to, if you have a minute to elaborate on them. Sometimes people get kicked off a platform for other reasons than the content itself. Failure to pay a bill. Failure to respond to abuse reports. Failure to provide correct contact information. Failure to provide accurate ownership information. Failure to remove content on a forum that doxes people or incites violence, etc..
Also, some people confuse freedom of speech with freedom to say and publish anything. But even the US founding fathers wrote about slander, libel, defamation, and threats to a person's safety or property. I'm not saying you are confusing those issues. I'm just saying that there are a lot of people who do confuse those issues. And when something bad happens and they get their site or domain canceled, they blame it on censorship and oppression of free speech, for example, when it's actually NOT a freedom of speech issue to begin with.
Now of course, sadly, there are plenty of examples where there is actual censorship and oppression of free speech going on, so maybe your example situation falls in that category, and I'm genuinely interested in more details about the context and kind of content you're talking about that got kicked off, and if it's specific only to Canada, and on what basis they canceled the content.
Transit provider for Kiwifarms.
All they did was tunnel traffic.
Transit provider was not responsible for "any doxxing", and collecting publicly accessible information is not illegal anywhere.
There was never a proven violence incident related to KF, no swatting, no anything.
Data center(Vantage dc's) kicked said transit provider after receiving one(1) complaint from a person who wants admission to rape taken off the internet. The same individual threatened archive.today for archiving their Tweets where he admitted to rape.
@treesmokah Thank you for sharing that info. Having not seen the actual complaint or content you are referring to (and I don't visit KF), but for the sake of argument and this discussion, I'll take your word that's all that actually happened, and therefore one could argue that there is an intellectual discussion to be had about the nature of freedom of speech and how it intersects with privacy, defamation, and the potential to damage, harm, or cause fear in someone, whether or not the intention is to do so.
BUT it's not just this incident, there's a whole history of controversies. And technically, ALL the info that I've read about KF, including your take on this incident right here, is technically second hand or hearsay or from articles I've read, so to be completely fair to all parties, one would have to look at ALL the exact original content and complaints, the full transparent historical record, responses, legal filings (if any) and circumstances of all the incidents, etc. That's a tall order to properly research and get first hand accurate information. That could take months and months of research and access to the source materials to make a fair assessment of the situation. Therefore that's impossible for anyone here to realistically achieve, and therefore we're just operating in theoretical or hypothetical territory.
Maybe you've seen it all first hand though, I don't know who you are, but maybe you've had a front row seat to the whole story from beginning to end. I haven't. But based on the long series of alleged incidents -- not just this one incident -- how could this still be an open and shut case in favor of KF with the provider that shut them down in your example? Due to the nature of the whole multi-year series of controversies, KF is radioactive for just about any provider out there now, so of course some provider will be trigger happy to cancel them at the slightest whiff of another controversy, whether or not it's a legitimate problem in that instance. Talk about pushing the envelope of what people's definition of freedom of speech is. There's no easy analysis here, since if someone burns enough bridges over all these years, no one will bother to build another bridge in the future to support what they believe is their moral, legal, or intellectual arguments on this issue. So it's possible the entire hosting industry has hit a KF fatigue.
As for KF's intellectual argument for free speech, if they want to truly battle it out on the free speech issue, they'd need to find the right circumstances and providers to fight this out with them in a court of law with a jury of their peers. Chances are very low that it would make it that far at this point due to the lack of providers that would stand with them that long, so we fall back into theoretical or hypothetical territory.
BTW, not trying to be argumentative, but collecting publicly accessible information may not be illegal, but publishing it in a context that can be construed to imply harm -- whether or not intended to do so (and very hard to prove motivations) -- is riding the edge, and it doesn't benefit anyone, but it does cause fear to some (or most) of those people who are publicly outed and ultimately harassed at KF. And KF may not think it's doxxing, but the people who are listed do, and experience "harm" from their point of view. So again, we're back to a court of law if it could ever get there. And BTW, if the intention to reveal people's info is to cause them fear, how is that possibly a good thing? Purposely causing fear in another person is threatening, intimidation, and coercion, and it leads to more than that in some alleged cases, and there are plenty of statutes against all of that. In some states you could probably get that elevated to more serious charges if the person has a reasonable fear of immediate harm or contact, depending on the circumstances and wording. And as you know, there are numerous reported/alleged incidents in the past that go beyond just listing public information about someone.
Anyway, thanks for sharing that info. That's really a super complex case IMO with a ton of history and context, swirling with controversy and years of allegations, and thus highly unlikely to get a truly fair and transparent analysis anytime soon, especially in a public forum like this one by random forum members.
BTW, with regard to hosting providers that do stand behind their customers in certain circumstances, if you haven't checked out the 1984-ADL case - https://litigation.1984.hosting/ - it might be of interest to you. In that case, the ADL took issue with a website that they accused of doxxing various groups and individuals, and 1984 refused to take down the website. The case went to a judge in Iceland and 1984 won. However, there are some significant differences between the ADL case and what KF is alleged to have done. But it's instructive of how a case can be approached and the legal framework and circumstances needed to win something like that. But KF would need a hosting provider to be willing to go to court for them and battle it out. Again, a very tall order.
Lastly, I'm not a lawyer so it would be best for people seeking providers in the KF-level kind of situation, to seek out a good lawyer and get appropriate counsel based on their circumstances. These are just my own opinions in this post, as someone who cares about legal freedom of speech as a crucial foundation for a democratic society.
Bad legal take
There is a difference between reported and facts.
There is no evidence that any KF user did any harm to any person physically(directly or indirectly). None of alleged suicides been linked back to KF, not one. The person that is thrown the most aka "Byuu" - there is no evidence he is dead in the first place, and entire conversation he had with KF admin was posted publicly for evaluation.
Generally your post is very well constructed, and I appreciate the use of word "alleged" when talking about thing reported by bias media.
I have spent a significant time researching KF and its "controversies'.
Go after Search Engines. Google will surely love your legal takes.
Whatever goes on the web never leaves it, and anyone saying otherwise is a liar.
Whatever goes on the web never leaves it, and anyone saying otherwise is a liar.
Why is whitepages still up if its such a bad legal take, common emgh L
comment was:
”collecting publicly accessible information is not illegal anywhere”
For Whitepages to cover that definition, they’d have to be an entity everywhere
And also provide every piece of public information on the whole internet
Common high iq smart comment by kait
If Whitepages is proof that ”collecting publicly accessible information is not illegal anywhere” to you, that’s yet another bad legal take
I didn’t have a legal take, I commented that your legal take was bad
[...]
the word fascist appears in the tos!
yeah, this is a no-go for free speech then.
fascist is thrown recklessly nowadays, 99% people who use this word don't even know the meaning of it.
@easydns Can You answer some of that questions? I still consider You as freedom of speech but you need to clarify about that.