While the “visible” part of the internet dominated by Big Tech is what most people think of when the topic of censorship is brought up, the problem reaches much deeper – all the way to internet backbone providers.
One of these, Hurricane Electric, has reportedly decided to participate in a somewhat roundabout way: in order to get to Kiwi Farms, this Tier 1 ISP is partially denying service to Crunchbits, a server provider.
The case is a good example of the power that such ISPs, despite their “detached” from internet users mode of operation, have in deciding what those users can and cannot do online. This is because a great number of services – that are closer to the user, depend on them.
Infrastructure providers who take it upon themselves to police online speech are additionally dangerous as purveyors of censorship because of their essential importance for the very functioning of the internet, and the fact that there is little alternative to speak of, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) noted, while reporting about the Kiwi Farms case.
The digital rights group’s verdict on this controversial activity of ISPs is clear: regardless of what kind of speech it is, they should not be the ones to suppress it.
However, it seems that Hurricane Electric has decided to do just that, even if the details are sketchy since the company does not want to respond to any questions related to the issue. However, EFF seems to believe that Crunchbits – which is the ISP’s direct customer – is indeed experiencing partial service denial, targeting Kiwi Farms.
And this is happening despite the fact that the site in question is, as EFF pointed out, “several steps away in the stack.” It has been reported that Hurricane’s justification for playing the role of a “censorship enabler” of sorts is Kiwi Farm’s violation of what it calls its acceptable use policy.
EFF remarked that if its own site, or that of some mainstream social media platform or progressive group was treated this way, there would be outrage. But Kiwi Farms is described as “an almost universally despised forum for hateful speech and planning vicious attacks on vulnerable people.”
And while EFF shares this sentiment, it does not agree with Hurricane’s behavior.
“Once an ISP indicates it’s willing to police content by blocking traffic, more pressure from other quarters will follow, and they won’t all share your views or values,” the group is warning.
Article cross-posted from Reclaim The Net.
Independent Journalism Is Dying
Ever since President Trump’s miraculous victory, we’ve heard an incessant drumbeat about how legacy media is dying. This is true. The people have awakened to the reality that they’re being lied to by the self-proclaimed “Arbiters of Truth” for the sake of political expediency, corporate self-protection, and globalist ambitions.
But even as independent journalism rises to fill the void left by legacy media, there is still a huge challenge. Those at the top of independent media like Joe Rogan, Dan Bongino, and Tucker Carlson are thriving and rightly so. They have earned their audience and the financial rewards that come from it. They’ve taken risks and worked hard to get to where they are.
For “the rest of us,” legacy media and their proxies are making it exceptionally difficult to survive, let alone thrive. They still have a stranglehold over the “fact checkers” who have a dramatic impact on readership and viewership. YouTube, Facebook, and Google still stifle us. The freer speech platforms like Rumble and 𝕏 can only reward so many of their popular content creators. For independent journalists on the outside looking in, our only recourse is to rely on affiliates and sponsors.
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Independent media is the future. In many ways, that future is already here. While the phrase, “the more the merrier,” does not apply to this business because there are still some bad actors in the independent media field, there are many great ones that do not get nearly enough attention. We hope to change that one content creator at a time.
Thank you and God Bless,
JD Rucker
