So, fun little story about #joindiaspora, and maybe #diaspora in general.
I get a lot of takedown requests from Russia's "Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media", aka Roskomnadzor. As it turns out, there's a lot of content hosted on Geraspora that.. they really don't like for some reason. Weird. My usual response to those emails (or sometimes even letters!!) is to ... laugh and delete them. Unless something is violating German law, I give exactly zero fucks about their requests. They've sent me fun messages about bloking my entire infrastructure multiple times, and I know they even did a couple of times (but then removed it again, for whatever weird reason).
Anyway.
Today, I (as the person currently technically hosting JoinDiaspora), got another one of those fun messages, but this time about an image on JoinDiaspora instead of Geraspora. I've pasted the full message below in case you're curios how that looks like. It's worth noting that clearly, some Russian Agent did this whole thing by hand: The post isn't even there anymore, and the email addresses they sent the message to were not easy to discover: They sent an email to my business address that is listed in the domain's SOA record, to my private email address that's only listed on my website, and to the joindiaspora-sunset@diasporafoundation.org alias. You don't find those addresses automatically, you have to dig for them.
Unfortunately, this time, I actually found that the image in question was also violating German federal law. As a "service provider", this puts me in a difficult legal position: I'm generally not liable for user-generated content, but I become liable if I become aware of illegal content and don't act on it. In this case, the potential consequence could be a prison sentence between six months and five years. So I had to delete the image and notify the user (who, unfortunately, doesn't know about this since their email address bounced).
But instead of just deleting the image file and/or the post, ... why not leave them a little message instead?
I'm sure Roskomnadzor will appreciate us saying hello when they eventually check back to see if the image is still up. :)
Направляется уведомление о внесении в «Единый реестр доменных имен, указателей страниц сайтов в сети «Интернет» и сетевых адресов, позволяющих идентифицировать сайты в сети «Интернет», содержащие информацию, распространение которой в Российской Федерации запрещено» следующего(их) указателя (указателей) страницы (страниц) сайта в сети «Интернет»: https://joindiaspora.com/uploads/images/cb25e644d34007f891a3.png .
В случае непринятия провайдером хостинга и (или) владельцем сайта мер по удалению запрещенной информации и (или) ограничению доступа к сайту в сети «Интернет», будет принято решение о включении в единый реестр сетевого адреса, позволяющего идентифицировать сайт в сети «Интернет», содержащий информацию, распространение которой в Российской Федерации запрещено, а доступ к нему будет ограничен.
Сведения о включении доменных имен, указателей страниц сайтов сети «Интернет» и сетевых адресов доступны круглосуточно в сети «Интернет» по адресу http://eais.rkn.gov.ru .
С уважением,
ФЕДЕРАЛЬНАЯ СЛУЖБА ПО НАДЗОРУ В СФЕРЕ СВЯЗИ, ИНФОРМАЦИОННЫХ ТЕХНОЛОГИЙ И МАССОВЫХ КОММУНИКАЦИЙ.-----------------------------------------------------------
Запущено официальное мобильное приложение РОСКОМНАДЗОРА.
Посредством мобильного приложения возможно:
1. Подать жалобу в «Единый реестр запрещенной информации» на обнаруженный в сети «Интернет» запрещенный контент;
2. Проверить ограничение доступа к интернет-ресурсам;
3. Получить оповещение о внесении в «Единый реестр запрещенной информации» интернет-ресурса в случае, если Вы являетесь его владельцем или провайдером хостинга.
Мобильное приложение можно скачать по следующим ссылкам:
https://apps.apple.com/ru/app/ркн/id1511970611
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.rkn.ermp
It is notice of making an entry into the "Unified register of domain names, Internet web-site page links and network addresses enabling to identify the Internet web-sites containing the information prohibited for public distribution in the Russian Federation” the Internet web-site page (s) link (s): https://joindiaspora.com/uploads/images/cb25e644d34007f891a3.png .
In case the hosting provider and (or) the Internet web-site owner fail to take these measures, the network address enabling to identify Internet web-sites containing the information prohibited for distribution in the Russian Federation will be decided to be entered into the Register and access will be limited.
The information about entering the domain names, Internet web-site page links and network addresses into the Register shall be available on a 24-hour basis at the following Internet address: http://eais.rkn.gov.ru/en/ .
Federal Service for Supervision in the Sphere of Telecom, Information Technologies and Mass Communications (ROSKOMNADZOR).
-----------------------------------------------------------
The official mobile application of ROSKOMNADZOR has been launched.
Through the mobile application, it is possible to:
1. Submit a complaint to the "Unified Register of Prohibited Information" about the prohibited content revealed on the Internet;
2. Check the restriction of access to Internet resources;
3. Get a notification on inclusion of an Internet resource into the" Unified Register of Prohibited Information " if you are its owner or hosting provider.
The mobile app can be downloaded at the following links:
https://apps.apple.com/ru/app/ркн/id1511970611
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.rkn.ermp
