How Microsoft Appointed Itself Sheriff of the Internet

Re:How Microsoft Appointed Itself Sheriff of the Internet by peterwwillis on Thursday October 16, 2014 @10:02AM (#8464900)

"The irony is that No-IP had worked with Microsoft in the past. The company had collaborated with Microsoft’s anti-piracy group, and it also worked on the takedown of the Mariposa botnet, which was dismantled in 2010. Especially give their prior relationship, No-IP’s Zigenis wishes Microsoft had reached out for help with the takedown instead of going to the courts. “All this action, all the work that Microsoft did,” he says. “Whatever they spent on their lawsuit could have been saved by a phone call.”

"His point is that, with the No-IP takedown, Microsoft didn’t work with others. It didn’t even work with No-IP. It served the company papers without asking the No-IP to shutdown bad actors or even telling the company what it planned to do."

Fuck. Microsoft.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How Microsoft Appointed Itself Sheriff of the Internet by TheRealDunkirk on Thursday October 16, 2014 @10:16AM (#8464963)

Yeah, there's really no excuse for not talking to the people at the company first. The only reason I can fathom would be that if Microsoft suspected the owner of No-IP to be actually involved with the botnet operators. (Especially given that they had a previous relationship, this is inexcusable, but it shouldn't have mattered anyway.) If Microsoft had contacted them first, and No-IP had given them some reason to suspect that they were culpable, then, by all means, work through the legal system. The whole notion of sealed legal precedings, as with the FISA court, gives me the willies. It's almost like the exact opposite of what the Bill of Rights was supposed to ensure for protections of the populace against their government. How much more offensive is it that this type of action was used against a individual running a commercial company, not involved in any way with "national defense" issues?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How Microsoft Appointed Itself Sheriff of the Internet by tzs on Thursday October 16, 2014 @02:41PM (#8466587)

> Yeah, there's really no excuse for not talking to the people at the company first. The only reason I can fathom would be that if Microsoft suspected the owner of No-IP to be actually involved with the botnet operators.

Or they knew that No-IP had long been aware of the abusive domains and had not done anything about them.

OpenDNS published a report on malware support domains in April 2013, identifying No-IP as the top provider of them [1]. No-IP posted a comment responding to that so we know they saw it.

Cisco published a report in February 2014 on dynamic DNS abuse [2], naming No-IP as a major provider for malware domains. No-IP posted a comment linking to a formal response on their blog [3].

The gist of their response is that they don't tolerate abuse, they actively work to find it and stomp it out, and they responsd quickly to reports sent to their abuse address, and they invite Cisco to send a report to their abuse address.

Ignoring well documented reports of abuse because they no not arrive via the right bureaucratic channel does not project the right image if you want to be seen as a white hat company.

[1] http://labs.opendns.com/2013/04/15/on-the-trail-of-malicious...

[2] http://blogs.cisco.com/security/dynamic-detection-of-malicio...

[3] http://www.noip.com/blog/2014/02/12/cisco-malware-report/

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How Microsoft Appointed Itself Sheriff of the Internet by anonbanker on Thursday October 16, 2014 @12:44PM (#8465879)

This was an international case. The Bill of Rights of the United States of America does not apply. To impose the BoR on a non party would be a violation of their human rights, guaranteed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How Microsoft Appointed Itself Sheriff of the Internet by TheRealDunkirk on Thursday October 16, 2014 @06:01PM (#8468068)

The US Constitution's Bill of Rights DO NOT IMPOSE ANYTHING ON PEOPLE. They are expressly written to IMPOSE ON THE GOVERNMENT. They DO NOT CONFER RIGHTS. They state certain unalienable rights of men, and RESTRICT WHAT CAN BE PASSED AS LAWS in relation to those rights. Or, they're supposed to, anyway. I don't blame you for getting it wrong. Most of the citizens of the US miss this as well. They're not a bargaining chip for "more rights." They were supposed to set hard limits against government abuse. Oh well. The NSA has made a laughingstock of the 4th Amendment in particular, and that's just an easy example.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How Microsoft Appointed Itself Sheriff of the Internet by TheCoelacanth on Thursday October 16, 2014 @01:12PM (#8466041)

The court was in Las Vegas, and Microsoft, No-IP and the company that was ordered to redirect the domains are all based in the US. In what sense is this an international case?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How Microsoft Appointed Itself Sheriff of the Internet by anonbanker on Thursday October 16, 2014 @01:58PM (#8466283)

The documents were served to no-ip in Nevada, but the other parties were in an arabic-speaking country. The case was filed in multiple jurisdictions if you read the court documents. I invite you to read noticeoflawsuit.com and see what actually happened.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How Microsoft Appointed Itself Sheriff of the Internet by TheCoelacanth on Thursday October 16, 2014 @06:21PM (#8468175)

I don't see anything on that site that gives evidence of cases filed in other jurisdictions. Which documents are you referring to?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How Microsoft Appointed Itself Sheriff of the Internet by gear54rus on Thursday October 16, 2014 @12:44PM (#8465883)

Microsoft was willing to hand over No-IP’s domains, but only if the company met certain terms.

Unbelievable. Microsoft was willing to hand over someone else's domains to their owner only if they play the ball. I hope they get targeted by malware even more after that.

On a side note, I wonder what's to stop theoretical malicious code from switching to bare IPs instead of domains? Were those exposed to the user somehow (to make it more user-friendly?)? Or is it because using domains grants the ability to actually switch remote IPs without altering malicious code?

[ Parent | on HN ]