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Domains Blocked By US Treasury 'Blacklist'

Posted by Zonk on Tue Mar 04, 2008 06:41 PM
from the us-law-is-international-law-now dept.
Censorship Government The Internet United States Politics
yuna49 writes "Adam Liptak of the New York Times reports today about the plight of a Spanish tour operator whose domain names have been embargoed by his domain name registrar (eNom). They pulled his domains after they discovered the tour operator's name on a US Treasury blacklist. It turns out he packages tours to Cuba largely for European tourists who can legally travel there, unlike Americans. The article cites 'a press release issued in December 2004, almost three years before eNom acted. It said Mr. Marshall's company had helped Americans evade restrictions on travel to Cuba and was "a generator of resources that the Cuban regime uses to oppress its people." It added that American companies must not only stop doing business with the company but also freeze its assets, meaning that eNom did exactly what it was legally required to do.' The only part of the operator's business in the United States is his domain name registration; all other aspects of his business lie outside the United States."
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Submission: Domains blocked by US Treasury "blacklist" by yuna49 (905461)
[+] Your Rights Online: Wikileaks Calls For Global Boycott Against eNom 137 comments
souls writes "The folks at Wikileaks are calling for a boycott against eNom, Inc., one of the top internet domain registrars, which WikiLeaks claims is involved in systematic domain censoring. On Feb 28th eNom shut down wikileaks.info, one of the many Wikileaks mirrors held by a volunteer as a side-effect of the court proceedings around wikileaks.org. In addition, eNom was the registrar that shut off access to a Spanish travel agent who showed up on a US Treasury watch list. Wikileaks calls for a 'global boycott of eNom and its parent Demand Media, its owners, executives and their affiliated companies, interests and holdings, to make clear such behavior can and will not be tolerated within the boundaries of the Internet and its global community.'"
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  • ... are breaking the law if they go there?

    *gets out his eraser and starts removing that "Land Of The Free" line from all the songbooks...*
    • *gets out his eraser and starts removing that "Land Of The Free" line from all the songbooks...*

      Sorry, that's also illegal.

      j/k ;)
      • Damn you, PATRIOT ACT! Got me every way I turn!
          • Nope... you're being genuinely, unambiguously uneducated. But not sarcastic.

            Cuba trades with Canada, Europe, Cuba, Venezuela, Brazil... but an AMERICAN embargo will force them to change. Yeah. That's working well, after four decades of communism, tourism, cheap gas, and free technology.

            • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Insightful)

              by CharlieG (34950) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @08:06PM (#22644814) Homepage
              The whole Cuban embargo thing has totally to do with Florida being a swing state. Been that way since the 1970s.

                • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Insightful)

                  by Ardeaem (625311) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:55PM (#22644724)
                  Give one example of an embargo working. You can't - they only end up hurting innocent people and isolating countries so change is slower.

                  • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Insightful)

                    by Zeinfeld (263942) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @10:30PM (#22645804) Homepage
                    Give one example of an embargo working. You can't - they only end up hurting innocent people and isolating countries so change is slower.

                    The South African Apartheid regime collapsed due to pressure from sanctions. But the reasons were psychological, not economic. The regime saw itself as an unacknowledged part of the West, the rejection had real and visible effect. Once it became clear that the US was also on the brink of rejecting it, the regime crumbled.

                    The Cuban situation is exactly the reverse, the only thing keeping Castro in power was the fact that he had successfully stood up to the US when it had acted as a big bully.

                    The human rights issue is not likely to be very effective when the US is running the best known gulag and torture house on the island.

                    This is a case where trade can have a positive effect and every policy maker in DC knows it, even the Republicans. The only reason that the embargo is kept in place is to pander to the Cuban vote in Florida.

                    Thats the way ethnic politics are played in the US. While mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani would attack terrorism over lunch in Brooklyn, then head off for dinner to give a 'humanitarian award' to the leader of the terrorist group that has caused by far the most deaths in Europe. Different constituencies, different positions. I don't think he was pro-Israel or pro-IRA, he just wanted the votes and would do anything it took to get them.

                    The people the politicians pander to are your usual expatriate irredentists, they can afford to refuse all compromise, they don't live with the consequences.

                  • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Insightful)

                    by LilGuy (150110) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @08:49PM (#22645186)
                    It's a bit ironic to say that Americans are the only bit of the free world when they're restricted from even traveling to Cuba. Yet Europeans are free to travel as they please.

                    • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Insightful)

                      by sg_oneill (159032) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @10:14PM (#22645686)
                      America appears to be the only country that seems to think its the only free country. It really isn't. Its not even in the top 10 or 20% of free countries, civil rights wise. With a higher percentage of its poplation imprisoned than anywhere else in the world, and one of the last 'free' countries left with a Death sentence, the USA is a human rights dinosaur.

                      But it still attempts to tell the world how we should follow [i]their[/i] example. No thanks, I actually like my freedoms.

                  • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Insightful)

                    by rtb61 (674572) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @10:30PM (#22645802) Homepage
                    Yes, but the reality is the Cuban embargo has nothing to do with politics, but has everything to do with Americans and American companies recovering the assets that they lost when the assets were nationalised. So the embargo will remain until the American organised crime families can get back the casinos that the Cubans people nationalised.

                    So Cuban will not be accepted as a democracy by the US until, they turn themselves back into the working poor for American corporations. Of course whether the Cubans actually elect a leader or a military coup takes place establishing an autocracies, makes absolutely not the slightest bit of difference to the end of the embargo.

                    All this does is highlight why other countries do not trust the current US administration with the central domain register, because as far as the current US administration is concerned, US corporate law is international law.

                  • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Interesting)

                    by davidsyes (765062) * on Tuesday March 04 2008, @10:41PM (#22645878) Homepage Journal
                    Well, I'm going to chime in on Corea/Korea, since it's been brought up...

                    The US is just in a near-conniption fit that the North has not collapsed, imploded, or exploded. It's a major embarrassment that multiple US administrations just ineptly cannot figure out how to have state-to-state talks with the North and get out of the way of confederation leading to reunification. Don't like MY perception? Read...on

                    Check out "Korean Endgame" by Selig S. Harrison...

                    The first two chapters show how ignorant the US can be when it comes to taking sides and coercing what it thinks are its client states (and is instead manipulated by the South, as was Russia by the North), yet (the US) ends up delaying reunification because if later finds it NEEDS and DESIRES a 'clear and present danger' of sorts in order to justify $42B a year in deployed US military assets around Asia, and $2B a year going directly to the South.

                    The South recently offered citizenship to people of the North. The YOUTH of the South probably care less about politics, but wealthy in the loop with military and economic assets at risk don't want to be besieged nor bothered by a massive influx of poor Northerners. In general, though, many if not most Koreans (North and South are torn by the division instigated by by Kim Song Il, after duping Stalin and getting assent from China.

                    The US *claims* it wants to aid Korea Unify, but so far it mostly has obstructed or ineptly carried out talks, bullied the North, and placated the South, enable the South to experience as little pain as possible in the march toward confederation. The North expected (rightfully) confederation and a formal declaration of cessation of hostilities, but the US botched things imposing its OWN view on BOTH Koreas. However, Seoul, for its part, never signed the armistice...

                    Now, what is going on is the Russians no longer sell much of anything military to the North, but is instead selling to the South and to others. The upshot is that the NK "regime"/government/Workers' Party isn't likely to go out with a bang. It'll just muddle along, and reunification (50% thanks to the US) will happen DECADES later than it could have or should have.

                    For what it's worth, i feel sorry for BOTH halves of Korea and i hope history takes in hand all those who did their bit to undermine and humiliate a great people, and wrought them great humiliation.

                    i hope the Coreas reunify SOON (less than 10 years). I hope they shift to indigenous local partners of the regional defense, and I hope they PROVE to Japan that a unified Corea purged of US occupation is NOT a threat to the Japanese peoples. i don't think there will be any wars unless puppeteers from afar instigate things.
          • Yes, I see how the US is putting pressure on all the African countries with which they trade weapons, diamonds and oil...

              • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Informative)

                by Antique Geekmeister (740220) on Wednesday March 05 2008, @03:22AM (#22647096)
                I'm afraid you're too young to remember. Cuba could have gone either way, to US support (as its nearest and wealthiest neighbor) or Soviet support (as the other world superpower, and only other possible counter). But Castro successfully led a revolution against Batista (a US supported and amaziingly corrupt dictator, as bad as the Shah of Iran or Manuel Noriega, who both also had been close friends to the USA).

                Cuba could have been an ally after that revolution, but Castro nationalized the major factories and plantations. With cause: the Americans running them had been very involved in Batista's corruption, and the many poor in Cuba were starving and under threats from the corrupt government every day. They needed the money, and they needed control over their own economy. And then that amazingly incompetent Bay of Pigs assault was tried, and it was clear to many, not just Castro, that he had no chance of cooperation with the USA. So he cooperated with the Soviets, who helped provide foreign currency and trade as a showpiece of Communism in the Western hemisphere, and as a critical military base.

                So, historically, the US priority is hardly one of "no threat". It's one of "Castro out" and "we want control back" as well.

              • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Insightful)

                by ultranova (717540) on Wednesday March 05 2008, @04:22AM (#22647264)

                Those that beckon to strengthen the Cuban economy are perceived by the US as ignorant dupes, serving to undermine the security of the United States. And it has been perceived that way for the last 40 years (so people don't think this is a Bush-ism). By in large, those that are in a hurry to open trade with Cuba are usually completely lost as to what it means to national security.

                Does the strenght of Cuban economy actually matter ? There is no way Cuba is going to launch a succesfull invasion on the US on its own, no matter how strong its economy; and if it is used as a stronghold by another power, it again doesn't matter.

                If anything, having ties of trade to the US would make Cuba less likely to allow another country to attack its trading partner through it...

          • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Insightful)

            by hondo77 (324058) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:53PM (#22644708) Homepage
            No, it's called bullying. We bully Cuba because we can (and it appeases people in a state with a lot of electoral votes). We let China get away with human rights abuses because they're too big to bully. Wake up.

          • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Insightful)

            by webmaster404 (1148909) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:54PM (#22644716)
            So which works better? Closing a country off from (what was once) the most free country in the world, or flooding the streets with American tourists who will tell the people about life in a free state. I think the latter would work much better, because it would be like if you grew up in say a prison cell you wouldn't know what life was like on the other side, however if you get thrown in prison its much worse and you want to get out of it. Believe it or not I am sure there are more Cubans who could change the government then government officials to keep it the way it is.

            • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Insightful)

              by Antique Geekmeister (740220) on Wednesday March 05 2008, @03:30AM (#22647112)
              The USA has *never* been the most free country in the world. Never. From our acceptance of slavery at the time of the Declaration of Independence, to our Civil War and unconstititional subjugation of the southern states when they legally attempted to secede, to our legalized segregation of blacks, to our imprisonment of the Japanese-Americans during World War II, to our drug wars on alcohol and marijuana, to our re-activated use of secret prisons and wiretaping without warrants and torture without trial, we have *never* been the most free.

              We do keep trying, and we're a big step up from most of the world. But we're not there yet, and this administration has certainly hurt us.

    • Re:So Americans Who Sympathize With Cuba... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Kingrames (858416) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:07PM (#22644272)
      If the country really were in that state, it would be illegal to point out the hypocrisy of the administration.

      or even to use all of those words in the same sentencAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaa

    • What do you expect from ENOM (Score:5, Interesting)

      by dindi (78034) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:43PM (#22644598) Homepage
      Enom are the people who took over registerfly's expired domains (expired because you had no means renewing them), and then tried to get a $200 extortion fee for your domain to give it back to you.

      So what do you expect from companies like that? I would personally open an international lawsuit against them, and there is absolutely no way Enom can win that.

  • And yet... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by gillbates (106458) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @06:45PM (#22644032) Homepage Journal

    How many here would decry the Chinese and assorted third world countries for censorship of the internet, and yet, here we (in the US) act no differently. It makes me wonder how many things we just don't see, because the DNS entry doesn't even show up.

    Are we truly free? Or is that just an illusion?

  • Looks like there's some merit (Score:5, Insightful)

    by KublaiKhan (522918) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @06:47PM (#22644050) Homepage Journal
    ...to the EU's argument that censorship restricts free trade. This looks to be a fairly clear example where censorship caused direct economic difficulties.

  • Bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Frosty Piss (770223) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @06:47PM (#22644052)
    Of course it's bullshit. But what is eNom to do? They are in the same spot as any other American company. What we should be doing electing politicians that have the sanity to ignore the screeching Cuban expats in Miami, and scrap the embargo, which if anything only keeps the Castro Brothers in power.

    But, this travel company has learned another lesson: Don't buy domains from eNom, they suck in so many ways....

    • Re:Bullshit (Score:4, Insightful)

      by couchslug (175151) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @06:54PM (#22644124)
      The "screeching Cuban expats" are American VOTERS. Democracy works this way.

      Want a different policy? Organize like-minded people to VOTE appropriately.

    • Re:Bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)

      by arivanov (12034) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @06:59PM (#22644190) Homepage
      Exactly. The only reason for the Castro brothers to outlive the fall of the iron curtain is the embargo. If the USA lifted the embargo in 1990 Cuba would have been a democracy by now. It would have taken a few million pounds transfers to "opposition" to make that happen like in Eastern Europe, but there would have been a result none the less. The embargo is the main reason why this has never happened and may never happen.

      IMO, we have missed the boat there. With people like Chavez waving suitcases of cash placing a few millions here and there is no longer effective. He can simply outbid the "West" and keep the Castro regime alive for a very long time.

      • Re:Bullshit (Score:5, Interesting)

        by RenderSeven (938535) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:33PM (#22644500)

        Exactly. The only reason for the Castro brothers to outlive the fall of the iron curtain is the embargo.
        Maybe. An interesting thing I picked up traveling the Caribbean and talking to a lot of natives is how they want Cuba to stay on the embargo list. The last thing, say, Aruba wants is a huge island paradise thats almost within walking distance of Miami. Especially with airline fuel costing what it does. If Cuba were open again, tourism throughout the rest of the islands, and Mexico and Central America would take a huge hit. And that loss of income is politically destabilizing as well. There's more at work here than sheer stupidity.
  • ...uses to oppress its people?

    You mean things like providing a never ending stream of very real examples of how America wants to meddle in internal Cuban affairs, thereby providing an instant excuse to play the nationalist "they want to topple your government from Washington! Ignore the abuses you know about and rally together as a nation to resist them as a people!" card?

  • This is very disturbing (Score:5, Insightful)

    by spleen_blender (949762) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @06:48PM (#22644066)
    I mean, this has me chilled to the bone. Ignoring the ridiculousness that in a "free" country we have "travel restrictions", the fact that they can legally perform such blocking with little or no recourse alone has me shaking.

    I fear we are too trustworthy in the robustness of the internet and I'm even more afraid of the day if the powers at large decide the bring the hammer down. I don't think net neutrality legislation would be effective against a determined oppressor, it only takes a few dragging anchors for them to tear through a few laws.

  • irony (Score:5, Insightful)

    by wizardforce (1005805) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @06:50PM (#22644084) Journal

    It said Mr. Marshall's company had helped Americans evade restrictions on travel to Cuba and was 'a generator of resources that the Cuban regime uses to oppress its people.'
    I don't think they fully appreciate the irony of that statement. trying to stop funds from tourism being used to oppress cuba by restricting the travel of americans and censoring anyone remotely connected to the USA.

  • easy enough to fix (Score:4, Insightful)

    by petes_PoV (912422) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @06:53PM (#22644106)
    Just go with a non-american ISP/domain name reistrar. It's not as if the US rules the planet, there are plenty of ways to continue working without their say-so or approval. Just move to a free locationa and continue with your legitimate business.

    • Re:easy enough to fix (Score:4, Insightful)

      by corsec67 (627446) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:02PM (#22644228) Homepage Journal

      It's not as if the US rules the planet, there are plenty of ways to continue working without their say-so or approval. Just move to a free locationa and continue with your legitimate business.


      Bush and congress are trying to fix that. Welcome to Amerika; lets us make a copy of the data on your laptop, show us your papers, and watch what you say outside of a free-speech zone.

  • With great power.. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by RenHoek (101570) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:03PM (#22644234) Homepage
    Undoubtably I'll be modded down to flamebait, but as a non-US citizen I get pretty tired of the US trying to be the 'policeman of the world' and at the same time pull these underhanded tricks.

    Another example [guardian.co.uk] I came upon today is how the White House was planning to overthrow the democratically chosen Hamas party, because it didn't stroke with their plans.

    What happened with "With great power comes great responsibility"? The US is just acting as the schoolyard bully.

    Note that I understand that "The US" != "all US citizens", but please, you're the only ones that can do something about this. So please do so.

  • You have to love our freedoms (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Cracked Pottery (947450) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:03PM (#22644240)
    We can trade out the ass with Red China, and cozy up to Uzbekistan, but Cuba, no es posible. Why? Because Cubans who fled Cuba after the revolution because they wanted their comfort and money more than they wanted to stay and fight, now control a lot more political power in America than they should. We can ask if Cuba really has it that bad. Its major export is educated people. Doctors, mostly. Can we acknowledge that maybe individual greed doesn't steer everything in the right direction all the time? Sure Cuba has poor folks. Do we care about poor folks in Cuba more than we care about the Americans that were left stranded in New Orleans after Katrina for political reasons? Not this year. The US has more people in prison than any other country in the world. Yes, and that is not by percentage. Cut the bullshit, we need to get over our sense of exceptionalism.

      • Re:You have to love our freedoms (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Deadbolt (102078) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:54PM (#22644714)
        Another difference that you fail to mention is that we (the US) have been meddling in Cuba's affairs for damn near 100 years, including dozens of documented attempts to assassinate their head of state. For some reason, Cubans find this behavior objectionable, and the idea of seized assets dating before most of them were born being the justification for this conduct is laughable.

        God knows I'm not saying the Castros are happy little fuzzy angels who never did no wrong, but it's indisputable that they're a damn sight better than some of the thugs we happily deal with in the rest of the world. It's ridiculous and childish to blame everything on them, but it plays well in certain areas of south Florida which hold disproportionate power come election time.

  • There's a lesson in here somewhere (Score:5, Interesting)

    by toby (759) * on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:04PM (#22644242) Homepage Journal
    1. Don't have anything to do with the USA.

    Non-Americans already have to do ridiculous things like obtain visas to just to make a flight connection in the US. Soon we're not even allowed to overfly the US. That's fun if, like me, you live in Canada.

    To hell with them.

  • Before everyone starts going crazy... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Swift Kick (240510) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:17PM (#22644360)
    ... do you realize that these restrictions have been in place since 1962 [wikipedia.org] because the Cuban government expropriated the property of U.S. citizens and corporations in Cuba?

    Do you also realize that it was made law in 1992 under the title of Cuban Democracy Act [wikipedia.org] by U.S. Congressman Robert Torricelli (D) [wikipedia.org]?

    Once again, those who seem historically ignorant are quick to condemn the current administration for something that has (arguably) been in place for over 40 years...

  • How about blocking Saudi travel firms (Score:5, Informative)

    by MrSteveSD (801820) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:24PM (#22644418)
    The article says...

    ...a generator of resources that the Cuban regime uses to oppress its people


    Well what about the billions in military aid given to Saudi Arabia, one of the most oppressive regimes in the world?. Cuba is Disney Land compared to Saudi Arabia. What about all that money going towards oppressing the Saudi people? Imagine some big democracy movement started in Saudi Arabia and tried to overthrow the dictatorship. The Saudi government would no doubt use all the weapons we have been selling them against their own people.

    US policy toward Cuba is not about the dictatorship. The US has supported and created many dictatorships in that part of the world. The US policy towards Cuba is based on anger over losing control of the country. It's like Britain banning citizens from travelling to the US because the US had the cheek to declare independence.

    The fact there is a US base in an 'enemy' country is a little clue as to how Cuba has been treated in the past. Don't expect the mainstream media to talk about it though. The US occupied Cuba after independence from Spain and refused to leave unless the Cubans agreed to a list of items (the Platt Amendment). Among that rather imperialistic list of requirements was a permanent military base at Guantanamo bay.

    Of course if Castro had been a business friendly right-wing dictator, it could have been a smooth transition from Batista's rule. You wouldn't be hearing the US making big noises about the lack of democracy at all.

  • The underlying problem (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rossz (67331) <ogre@@@geekbiker...net> on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:44PM (#22644610) Homepage Journal
    This problem, like many others, can be fixed by one simple thing. FORCING OUR DAMN GOVERNMENT TO ABIDE BY THE CONSTITUTION.

    Our Constitution is quite possibly the greatest piece of law ever written in the history of mankind. Unfortunately, the politicians (both democrats and republicans) have decided it can be ignored at will. We need to change this. We need to force every aspect of the government to operate under the full strength of our Constitution.

    No more seizing property without due process.
    No more stifling free speech just because it might offend somebody.
    No more wiretaps of citizens and legal residents to fight terrorists without a court order signed by a REAL judge.
    No more government agencies that aren't sanctioned by the Constitution (list to long to put here).

    I am sicked by any politician who doesn't consider the Constitution the most sacred document in existence. Which means I'm sicked by ALL politicians.

    • Re:Sheesh, it's almost like... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by vux984 (928602) on Tuesday March 04 2008, @07:49PM (#22644672)
      It's almost like we're kind of pissed at the Castro family for encouraging the Soviet Union to launch those nuclear missiles he had on his island.

      Yes, its almost like we're immature children who spitefully cling to their hatred long after the conflict is over and everyone else has grown up and gotten over it.

      Hell, we've even made peace with the country that actually designed, built, and deployed the missles to cuba. You know, the country that actually owned them and put them their with the express purpose of creating a threat? The country that the 'cold war' was actually with? We made peace with them. But apparently our rage for a dying old man whose island they were on... for him... our hatred is boundless.

      Grow up aready.

      Yes, -1 Not conforming with majority opinion

      No. -1 for being an immature and childish country.

      You know, because of that whole trying to murder tens of millions of us and all.

      You might want to check your history. The Soviets put missiles in Cuba in response to the fact that the USA put missiles in Turkey. Not that it stops their of course, the cold war was a series of moves and responses, but the point remains... Castro was a PAWN in a much bigger game of chess [er... global thermonuclear war] and his role and personal relevance was laughably minor.

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