Germany does not like anything non-profit security related.<p>A few years back they raided a German host of the Riseup email service due to some alleged online threat [0]<p>They didn't just stop there, they also moved on to the nearby CCC maker space, for which they didn't even have a permit, and also raided that.<p>Among the things they found there was 3D printers, chemicals to feed said 3D printer, and a small 3D printed model of the Hiroshima nuclear bomb.<p>They confiscated all of that under the suspected offense of "trying to create an explosive device" [1]<p>Can't make this stuff up, reality <i>is</i> stranger than fiction.<p>[0] <a href="https://www.golem.de/news/zwiebelfreunde-polizei-durchsucht-raeume-von-tor-aktivisten-1807-135310.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.golem.de/news/zwiebelfreunde-polizei-durchsucht-...</a><p>[1] <a href="https://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/web/hausdurchsuchungen-bei-netzaktivisten-chaos-computer-club-kritisiert-polizeivorgehen-a-1216463.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/web/hausdurchsuchungen-bei-n...</a>
> There is no component of the claimed copyright infringement that Quad9 participates indirectly, nor is there any infringing data on Quad9’s servers, nor does Quad9 have any business relationship with the site in question.<p>We're approaching a situation where even electricity providers, not to mention OS and browser providers, can be forced to do the bidding copyright holders, to the detriment of everyone else.
Germany is truly backwater when it comes to internet and the new economy. I doubt the court can even comprehend the role of DNS providers. All they have are age-old cases and and a relict understanding of things in the past.
Perhaps Quad9 lawyers should try to compare DNS service with a telephone book (die Gelbe Seite). It’s unimaginable that the Bundespost should revise their phone books or applying some redaction due to the disputes of some businesses. Even when a business deemed illegal in the past, die Bundespost was never demanded to remove their listings.<p>Perhaps then will these verehrende Richter be able to grasp the matter.
The Hamburg Courts are notorious for their bad judgments regarding the Internet. That's why content providers like to file lawsuits there, but because of that, the rulings are often overturned in the next instance.<p>The regional court were the ones according to which the operator of a commercially operated website is liable for copyright infringing content that he links to, even without knowledge.<p>The local court is even worse regarding copyright infringement.
I am so incredibly tired of Germany being a legal and technical internet backwater. It's exhausting and depressing and I hate it so much. I wish the old people would fuck the hell off, because they simply don't belong in positions that represent our society in a modern world.
This has been another INSANE ruling by the courts in Hamburg. They are well known to be little more than industry stooges and I can't count how many insane of their insane rulings have been overruled by higher courts.
So, if I'm reading this right, Quad9 is just a recursive dns resolver here. Why are they being enjoined rather than whoever runs the authoritative server?
I am eager to read the Urteil.
Especially considering that this kind of liability was the norm in germany, at least always questioned.
Then, in 2017 there was a law to „fix“ that.
And now there is a ruling contradicting the idea of the law (§ 8 Telemediengesetz) as it seems.<p>Main problem with german law is that the courts have too much freedom because they know, the lawmakers produce low quality laws nowadays.<p>Just compare any old law with any of the newer ones…
Germany is losing it, sadly.
so does this mean that (for example) the olympics can require quad9 to stop resolving youtube because someone uploads a video to youtube that is a copyright infringement? what stops a malicious actor from claiming copyright infringement and causing sites like youtube, netflix, and hulu to be taken offline entirely while it's worked out?
Coming from Germany I strongly believe that this ruling is based on the mere fact that those ruling over the topic, simply do not understand the topic. I imagine explaining DNS and internet to my grandparents which never had anything to do with computers or computer technology. Its simply impossible.<p>Needless to say that there is billions of recursive DNS around the world. Their own FritzBox runs a damn recursive DNS server that is able to resolve whatever they request. What - will they now sue themselfes to make that right? The spooky internet made me do it!!
Is Quad9 being targeted because they are headquartered in Germany? Or is sony also suing every other DNS provider that has records for sites that may contain illegal copies of copyrighted material?
They should at least force Amazon (AWS), Facebook, Google Search, YouTube, Twitter and Pinterest's DNS offline too as all those sites host or link to masses of illegal content. It's only fair.
The onus is on Sony to engage in legal battle with the website hosting the infringing content. Nobody else should be coerced to help them. This is ridiculous.
Ex-pat living in Germany: The only thing I don't care for other than the terrible customer service at restaurants and other places is Germany's stance on copyright and how militant they are about things. It's ridiculous. It's like the MPAA's wet dream.
More energy should be spent taking down the actual server used to host pirated works. Otherwise this is just shooting the messenger. Imagine if after hearing a certain person committed a crime, and then trying to remove them from a phonebook? Piracy has its uses, but becomes problematic when people are selling pirated works for money, or are profiting substantially off it. That's my stance. By all means, keep the torrent sites up, but as for streaming sites that charge a fee and are profiting off piracy: that's where I draw the line.
After reading the comments I feel I will go against a strong current here: I think DNS blocks are the right approach and the judges do understand DNS sufficiently.<p>When it comes to laws and their enforcement, I often wonder what HN users think would be a good approach. Most often my impression is that the favored approach seems to be of the form "the internet does not need any laws" paired with a condescending tone that everyone else doesn't understand the internet.<p>Explanation:<p>DNS blocks are the easiest hurdle to put up to deterrent most people. Sure DNS blocks can be easily circumnavigated, but so can locks. (It being easily avoided by more informed users might actually be a plus, preventing overzealous censorship being too effective.)<p>Actual enforcement of domestic law on providers based in other countrs (of the deemed illegal content) is not realistically possible/not a good tradeoff of using resources and most importantly: Not their business. But that does not mean that a country has to accept everything that is legal somewhere (or at least not persecuted in that jurisdiction).<p>Similar reasons prohibit enforcement on foreign DNS zones. Therefore, local DNS resolvers, even if just relaying to those foreign ones, would be the target of enforcement.
> Quad9 is a free service that replaces your default ISP or enterprise Domain Name Server (DNS) configuration.<p>Who or what pays their bills, though? Servers burn up electricity, consume bandwidth and require maintenance. None of that is free.
> Quad9 will continue to implement DNS blocking for the domain name named in the injunction which resolves to a website that is claimed to be offering links to copyrighted material.<p>Huh? So what does Quad9 do? Block or not block?
This is why i don't buy the "germany is big on privacy" rhetoric.Not having google street view doesn't mean you have "privacy". Not to mention known links between BND and US agencies, de facto acting as a proxy for them in Europe.<p>Some of the people may be more sympathetic towards privacy-first tools than the european average, but that doesn't mean the government/leadership is.<p>Quad9 was the most interesting free DNS service out there, better than google/CF imo.And i'm not saying this as an "anti-german" talking-point,but there are actually very few countries were privacy was pushed as a principle in institutions, see Nordic countries or even to an extreme: CH(where if i recall correctly you cannot record someone even in public w/o their permission). However this smells like something that is not germany-specific but colluded across countries & big corporations: keep cracking down on piracy(even though it's basically a fact that these P2P methods of sharing copyrighted content actually made Sony/Hollywood/etc more money than not)