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Comment by mooism2 | Hacker News Reader

Has anybody tried asking Facebook why they've done this?

Possible reasons:

1. One or more governments (which ones?) have told Facebook to block Tor or else. (Or else what?)

2. A manual security review revealed more hacking attempts via Tor than legitimate use, so Facebook decided to block Tor.

3. After a sustained hacking attack via Tor, an automated Facebook security system automatically blocked Facebook access from Tor.

Further questions: When did Facebook start blocking Tor? Any idea when they might stop?

It's a pitifully poor article.

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The article simply states the issue. Its not up to the writer to come up with excuses for facebook, which if you are really hot on bad journalists you would rightly write off a mere speculation. Its up to facebook to explain their position. If their excuse turns out to be a reasonable reason, then lets hear it.

"Its up to facebook to explain their position."

Uh, yeah. That's why the parent comment suggests asking Facebook what's going on NOT guessing about it!

It's up to the journalist to investigate and find out why Facebook is doing this so he can write a more complete story.

Not necessarily - if their goal is to get Facebook to reverse the change (which I imagine it is based on the fact that the website is based in an area with a lot of civil unrest), then providing reasonable rationalization in the article isn't what you want to do.

In that case this isn't journalism but propaganda (even if its the good kind). Lobbyists do the same thing yet we all hate them for it, these guys shouldn't get a free pass and get to call it journalism if they aren't portraying both sides.

Edit: fixed mobile typos

I've now been able to reach the page to read is myself. How is this propaganda? What's the other side to exposing activists to observation by oppressive regimes?

That term "more complete" is your own standard, and not one of journalism. "More complete" can go on for ever.

I don't think Facebook is really obligated to explain especially if its for some security reason or automatic. What's bad about the article is that it leads you down a certain way of thinking without really saying so.

Not in detail, no. But it can give a general, reasonable sounding statement to counter the article.

Option 2 or 3 seem pretty likely. I'm pretty sure wikipedia blocks edits from Tor IPs because a huge number of them are malicious.

A lot of IRC networks block Tor exit nodes too. Since exit nodes are in short supply, it seems reasonable that there's a high likelihood each one has been used to launch attacks/spam Facebook and was consequently blacklisted.

Google takes a similar approach - if you use Tor there's a high chance it'll accuse you of being a bot and require a CAPTCHA.

A CAPTCHA makes sense, it wouldn't be difficult for Facebook to implement that, force a log in if people are from visiting through TOR (people really probably shouldn't check "remember me" anyway in this case).

Yes, and we block tor as well for this reason. It's mainly used by spammers and trolls on our site. Unfortunately tor doesn't/can't do anything about its spam problem (unlike hidemyass who will kick off trolls). This means it's pretty much useless for anyone wanting to use it legitimately because eventually some asshole will get you blocked.

Yes. And because regular blocks are useless if people can use Tor to circumvent them. Legitimate users can get a block exemption to edit from a Tor IP, though.

It doesn't matter why.

In an immediate sense, no, it doesn't matter why.

But in a broader sense, it does. If it's a temporary automatic block, that has different implications for who you protest against than if it is a manual block put in at the behest of the House of Saud, say, or at the request of America's NSA.

Of course it does. It might be a short-term block to prevent a spam attack, for example.

Writing on FB using Tor kind of defeats the purpose, no?

Maybe you are trying to hide your physical location.

This. And perhaps even your whole identity.

The world is so different place in unsafe countries, people might be playing with their lives(and lives of their close ones) for doing this stuff. It's not unlikely for a totalitarian government to assassinate opposition, to physically kill activists. You say that's wrong, but I ask whatcha gonna do about it?

Lets let them use TOR.

If you're on facebook under a false identity you can and will be kicked off more-or-less at random whenever you happen to trip the right flags.

Sure, and this is most probably an expected possibility, but also the only way to operate safely. Exposing your name and your political stance along with activism can get you killed.

Of course the reliance on US based(of all Western countries) company through which all the stuff gets organized and through which the communications happen might have to be questioned -- but the status quo is that there are no viable alternatives and it's very unlikely to change due to the nature of the market.

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