[celsoazevedo]

I don't see the point in doxing anyone, especially those providing a useful service for the average internet user. Just because you can put some info together, it doesn't mean you should.

With this said, I also disagree with turning everyone that uses archive[.]today into a botnet that DDoS sites. Changing the content of archived pages also raises questions about the authenticity of what we're reading.

The site behaves as if it was infected by some malware and the archived pages can't be trusted. I can see why Wikipedia made this decision.

[fluoridation]

For a very brief time, "doxing" (that is, dropping dox, that is, dropping docs, or documents) used to mean something useful. You gathered information that was not out in public, for example by talking to people or by stealing it, and put it out in the open.

It's very silly to talk about doxing when all someone has done is gather information anyone else can equally easily obtain, just given enough patience and time, especially when it's information the person in question put out there themselves. If it doesn't take any special skills or connections to obtain the information, but only the inclination to actually perform the research on publicly available data, I don't see what has been done that is unethical.

[bawolff]

Call it stalking or harrasment if you prefer. Regardless its rude (sometimes illegal) behaviour.

That's no justification for using visitors to your site to do a DDOS.

In the slang of reddit: ESH

[noobermin]

Did you read the article? They dug deep, they didn't just do a google search and leave it at that. They drew links between deleted posts and defunct accounts, they compared profile pictures of anonymous profiles.

I'm not defending the archive.today webmaster but it's unfortunately understandable they are angry. Saying what the blogger did was merely point out public information is a gross oversimplification.

[lelandbatey]

Eh, you can find in public data things like "what is someone's address" based only on their name by looking up public records of mortgage records. That however is quite bad form, and if you did do that, I think it would be pretty unethical.

[jsheard]

It's also kind of ironic that a site whose whole premise is to preserve pages forever, whether the people involved like it or not, is seeking to take down another site because they are involved and don't like it. Live by the sword, etc.

[palmotea]

> It's also kind of ironic that a site whose whole premise is to preserve pages forever, whether the people involved like it or not

Oddly, I think archive.today has explicitly said that's not what they're there for, and the people shouldn't rely on their links as a long-term archive.

[jMyles]

> Changing the content of archived pages also raises questions about the authenticity of what we're reading.

This is absolutely the buried lede of this whole saga, and needs to be the focus of conversation in the coming age.

[Sophira]

Sites that exist to archive other websites will almost always need to dynamically change the content of the HTML that they're serving in some way or another. (For example, a link that points to the root of the website may need changed in order to point to the right location.)

So it doesn't necessarily raise questions about whether the content has been changed or not. The difference is in whether that change is there to make the archive usable - and of course, for archive.today, that's not the case.

[ddtaylor]

Did they actually run the DDoS via a script or was this a case of inserting a link and many users clicked it? They are substantially different IMO

[dunder_cat]

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46624740 has the earliest writeup that I know of. It was running it via a script and intentionally using cache busting techniques to try to increase load on the hosted wordpress infrastructure.

[hexagonwin]

they silently ran the DDoS script on their captcha page (which is frequently shown to visitors, even when simply viewing and not archiving a new page)

[cardanome]

As far as I understand the person behind archive.today might face jail time if they are found out. You shouldn't be surprised that people lash out when you threaten their life.

I don't think the DDOSing is a very good method for fighting back but I can't blame anyone for trying to survive. They are definitely the victim here.

If that blog really doxxed them out of idle curiosity they are an absolute piece of shit. Though I think this is more of a targeted campaign.

[pibaker]

One thing they always teach you in Crime University is "don't break two laws at the same time." If you have contrabands in your car, don't speed or run red lights, because it brings attention and attentions means jail.

In this case, I didn't know that the archive.today people were doxxed until they started the ddos campaign and caught attention. I doubt anyone in this thread knew or cared about the blogger until he was attacked. And now this entire thing is a matter of permanent record on Wikipedia and in the news. archive.today's attempt at silencing the blogger is only bringing them more trouble, not less.

Barbara_Streisand_Mansion.jpg

[protimewaster]

> As far as I understand the person behind archive.today might face jail time if they are found out. You shouldn't be surprised that people lash out when you threaten their life.

One of the really strange things about all of this is that there is a public forum post in which a guy claims to be the site owner. So this whole debacle is this weird mix of people who are angry and saying "clearly the owner doesn't want to be associated with the site" on the one hand, but then on the other hand there's literally a guy who says he's the one that owns the site, so it doesn't seem like that guy is very worried about being associated with it?

It also seems weird to me that it's viewed as inappropriate to report on the results of Googling the guy who said he owns the site, but maybe I'm just out of touch on that topic.

[luckylion]

Somebody who a) directs DDOS attacks and b) abuses random visitors' browser for those DDOS attacks is never the victim.

You don't know their motives for running their site, but you do get a clear message about their character by observing their actions, and you'd do well to listen to that message.

[luxuryballs]

this seems like type of thing that should be on blockchain and decentralized nodes validate authenticity, it could support revisions but not lose originals