Comment by otterley
14 hours ago
Google’s allowed to have an opinion. But that doesn’t mean that the registrar should be suspending the domain immediately in response. These two mechanisms should be decoupled.
14 hours ago
Google’s allowed to have an opinion. But that doesn’t mean that the registrar should be suspending the domain immediately in response. These two mechanisms should be decoupled.
Google should not be allowed to make libelous statements without consequences.
How is any kind of antivirus or threat detection software supposed to operate on this standard?
Libel suits can be financially catastrophic, so even a tiny false positive rate could present risk that disincentivizes producing such software at all.
And a threat detection mechanism that has a 0.0% false positive rate is conservative to the point of being nearly useless.
I think that is the idea. They shouldn't exist without a prompt mitigation path.
In other words, if you can't deal with the false positives in a timely manner. You SHOULD be liable for the damages.
I can't build a budget car put together in an unsafe manner. Then complain I can't compete due to all the peoples cars crashing and blowing up and suing me.
You document your claims with concrete evidence of fraud. That will be your libel defense. No evidence means you bear the full responsibility of a fuckup.
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(IAAL but this is not legal advice.)
It’s not libel. Defamation requires a false statement of fact. Marking a website as “unsafe” is an opinion.
> Marking a website as “unsafe” is an opinion.
No, it's not.
You're welcome to cite case law if you want to insist. Otherwise, unsafe (in the context of infosec) has a definition of likely or able to cause harm or malfunction. Something that is provable or falsifiable with evidence.
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Google is stating in a position of authority. It's therefore being stated as at least a professional opinion with the equivalent weight of fact, or representing facts.
If the opinion is meant to be just another opinion, then it shouldn't cause any blacklisting of any sorts anywhere.
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How is it any more of an opinion to "mark" a website as "unsafe" than say, "contains CSAM"?
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Maybe libel is the wrong term, but erroneously marking a website as unsafe can lead to damages.
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Depends on jurisdiction. In the UK it's not an absolute defence, you still have to prove it's an opinion a "reasonable person" could come to based on facts.
As someone who has also been bit by this, and with the only possible resolution being that I sign up for google services and register my site with them in the google search dashboard...
Fuck Google.
This is absolutely libel. They put a big fucking red banner on top of my site, telling the world that it's unsafe, using all the authority they have as one of the largest tech companies in the world.
In my case - it was a jellyfin instance I'd stood up to host family videos of my kids for my parents.
It was not compromised, and showed only a login page. I reported it as a false flag repeatedly, for weeks, with Google doing jack fucking shit.
Only after signing up in their search console and registering the site did the warning disappear.
They are abusively forcing people into their products. Fuck Google.
In case it wasn't entirely clear - Google can get fucked. Fuck Google.
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That depends on jurisdiction. E.g. in South Korea true statements can constitute defamation too
That sounds like a spurious distinction. Pretty sure you can’t say “Person X is a murderer” and then say “well I’m only expressing my opinion, and in my opinion if you do something that annoys me that qualifies as murder.”
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In my opinion, a .online domain is unsafe. 99% of people only visit ".com"s unless they clicked a scam link. Completely blocking the site is overkill, but the browser should warn you about it like it does with non-SSL sites.
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They should be held legally culpable for libellous claims they make.
I dont care if their pre-LLM ai says "thingy bad". They are responsible for the scripts or black boxes they control. I dont care if they dont give a reason.
Claiming bad/malicious/etc site is 100% libel. And doubly so, anybody who has been forced to agree to a ToS with binding arbitration should have it removed for libel.
> Claiming bad/malicious/etc site is 100% libel.
No it isn't. https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/defamation
Please, use words correctly.
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