alt Hacker NewsI don't disagree that copyright law is deeply flawed, but even with the current law, it seems like this situation could easily have been avoided. The issue is one malicious private company (Brandshield) taking advantage of the negligence of another private company (the registrar) by claiming that a site was being used for "fraud and phishing". If anything, the parent comment from the person running the site makes me think that the situation would have been _less_ messed up if Brandshield had correctly asked for the offending copyrighted content to be taken down rather than falsely alleging something more severe. I understand that Brandshield probably has been incentivized to act this way due to copyright law, but I'd argue that even reasonable laws will sometimes cause bad actors to try to take advantage of things, and the easiest way to fight back against this isn't to try to change laws to avoid this but for non-malicious entities like the registrar not to allow their customers to get exploited by this sort of behavior.
Unfortunately, domain registration is an industry with so many of its own problems that I'm not sure "vote with your wallet" would be an effective strategy for changing things here. I honestly wonder if domain registration might be the more fruitful target for legislation protecting customers if the goal is specifically to avoid situations like this one, but even as someone who's usually unabashedly in favor of consumer protection regulations, I can't say I have a high degree of confidence that any changes here would be done effectively.
Replies
>the easiest way to fight back against this isn't to try to change laws to avoid this but for non-malicious entities like the registrar not to allow their customers to get exploited by this sort of behavior.
Easiest? Perhaps. Nothing around law is particularly easy (except breaking it, of course!) :) So, not altering existing laws, or not making new ones, would absolutely be the easiest method to that desired outcome. Many things would be easier to do if they were simply done how they were described, in a manner in which they were excepted, under the terms which they were agreed to. However, can we expect that a lack of laws/codes/statutes could ever result in effective or consistent behavior? Sadly, no. At least, not based upon historical experience. Perhaps the disposition of man will change one day - who knows what the future holds, but God!
Negligence is a thing that is bred in indifference and grown through a lack of consequence. Law and reform is the sole remedy.
Consider this: It would be far, far safer and more profitable for owners, employees, and customers of restaurants if the restaurant kept their cooking areas clean and tidy. Yet, even with unannounced and routine health inspections, various licensing requirements, annual training & education certifications, and massive fines...in spite of all of that, absurdly high numbers owners can't meet the bare minimum. People still somehow die from unsanitary food every year!
The best we can do then to combat the disposition of disconnected employees, and the blasé, checked-out business owners is to crush their skull. It is a judicial vengeance, a constant protector for all the people who had been abused unfairly; the ones who were discounted as "unimportant nobodies". Law is what gives the common man a temporary illusion of equal treatment. And when that illusion is chipped and broken from time-to-time, well, at least we can put another head up on the spike outside our walls.
It's certainly not quick, or easy, or even preventative(!), but it is the kind of response that is owed to the victims of incompetence and indolence.
A bad law is bad if it leads to injustice even beyond its original scope. We have seen numerous problems with DMCA abuse and copyright strikes in other forms. We have patent trolling and this abuse artificially feds a whole industry of dubious lawyers. I think this is not even a small problem and all these factors combined does make it a bad law, even if it would still protect innovation like it once was to meant to do, which is questionable as well.
Of course services like the registrar need protection here too. And certain false copyright claims probably need consequences as well. The legal industry servers no function here.
Also, it would be legally trivial to make the user accountable for the offense, not the whole of itch.io. Sure, there would be problems here as well, but there is not large barrier to not have a parasitic legal industry and have those responsible that actually commit the offense.
The problem of enforcement cannot be put on the back of the platform itself.