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Gab cries foul as Pennsylvania attorney general subpoenas DNS provider
Pennsylvania attorney general Josh Shapiro is probing Gab's relationship with its new domain name provider, Epik. A subpoena sent to Epik, dated Wednesday, seeks "any and all documents which are related in any way to Gab." In a statement to Ars, Gab described the investigation as a "baseless, political, and emotionally-driven witch hunt."
[...] Eric Goldman, a legal scholar at Santa Clara University, told us that the law is clear that Gab would not be liable for hosting content from the Pittsburgh shooter. Not only are the posts likely protected by the First Amendment, but a law called Section 230 gives service providers like Gab—not to mention upstream service providers like GoDaddy and Epik—an extra layer of protection against liability for user-submitted content.
So then what is Pennsylvania's attorney general investigating? Shapiro's office hasn't returned emails and a phone call asking about that. But two legal scholars I talked to for this story couldn't think of a legitimate reason for seeking these kinds of documents. "I struggle to see a legit basis for this," said Ken White, a First Amendment attorney and the proprietor of the popular Popehat blog. Seeking information about Gab's DNS provider "doesn't make any sense at all," legal scholar Eric Goldman told us. In another now-deleted tweet, Gab described the subpoena as a form of harassment. Could this be an attempt to punish Epik for doing business with Gab? Goldman described this as plausible and said that this kind of tactic could raise First Amendment issues. [...] Goldman doubted that an attorney general sending out subpoenas would be enough, on its own, to violate the First Amendment. But if it were part of a broader campaign to discourage providers from doing business with Gab, that could raise significant free speech concerns.
Previously: Social Media and the Pittsburgh Shooter: Gab.com Going Down
Gab's Plan To Use Blockchain To Make Itself Indestructible
Gab is Back
(Score: 4, Interesting) by takyon on Friday November 09 2018, @02:44AM (4 children)
Maybe the Penn AG expects to find back-and-forth emails detailing Epik's full support for a violent campaign of racial cleansing in the U.S.! After all, their staff is all-white [epik.com]! The CEO's name is Rob MONSTER, and the CFO is Clif BEER (alcoholic?!)!
Or they could just be a privacy-oriented domain name provider showing off their commitment to free speech [epik.com]. But we need an extralegal fishing expedition to make sure.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday November 09 2018, @05:45AM (1 child)
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday November 09 2018, @05:58AM
It's not natural, it's supernatural! 🎃👻👽
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by VLM on Friday November 09 2018, @12:29PM (1 child)
Josh Shapiro is Jewish according to votesmart.org so it could be as simple as the very common Jewish hatred of white people.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 09 2018, @06:36PM
Ahhh, there's the little chicken fucker racist.
Just to make sure I understood your context I searched, and what did I find? NOTHING! The only use of "white" is with "Ken White" the person.
I guess racism just can't keep itself hidden, shit bags need to share their *very insightful* realizations with the world /s