An Emerging Trend?
It is possible that BlueHost may be on the leading edge of a new trend. Social networking site LinkedIn.com began blocking Syrian users from connecting to their site in
April 2009. Anas Marrawi reported that LinkedIn began blocking Syrian users based
on their IP in late March, but that Syrian users continued to use the site through filtering-circumvention software. On April 19, Marrawi reported that the site delivered a
message to any users who had listed their home country as Syria when they logged
on: ‘‘Access to this account has been suspended. Please contact Customer Service to resolve this problem.’’ He contacted customer service and was told that LinkedIn could
no longer provide services to Syrian users. 21
Like Kubatana targeting BlueHost, Syrian LinkedIn users and their supporters began
an online campaign to convince LinkedIn to reevaluate their policies. Jillian York, 22 a
U.S.-based blogger with strong ties to the Syrian online community, helped coordinate
the effort, writing about the block on the Huffington Post 23 and promoting the cause
on Twitter. Through Twitter, she got in touch with LinkedIn’s senior director of corporate communications, who quickly issued a mea culpa and promised a swift reversal of
the decision. 24 Shortly after, LinkedIn issued the following statement: ‘‘Some changes
made to our site recently resulted in Syrian users being unable to access LinkedIn. In
looking into this matter, it has come to our attention that human error led to over
compliance with respect to export controls. This issue is being addressed tonight and
service to our Syrian users should be restored shortly.’’ 25
It is unclear what has motivated U.S. Web hosting and social media companies to
ensure they are in compliance with Treasury restrictions and export controls. Like BlueHost, LinkedIn has recently changed their terms of service. The current terms of service
references export controls in its opening section: ‘‘Your use of LinkedIn services,
including its software, is subject to export and reexport control laws and regulations,
including the the Export Administration Regulations (‘EAR’) maintained by the United
States Department of Commerce and sanctions programs maintained by the Treasury
Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control.’’ 26 An archived version of their terms
of service, 27 from January 3, 2008, makes no reference to export controls or sanctioned
countries. Users of hosting and social media tools who live in nations subject to U.S.
export controls or sanctions face an extremely confusing situation. LinkedIn, MySpace,
and Blogger make reference to U.S. export laws, while YouTube, Facebook, Wikipedia,
Rapidshare, and Wordpress do not. 28
Web hosting companies are similarly divided—of the 22 top hosting sites, as tracked
by Webhosting.info, 29 BlueHost, sister company Hostmonster, and hosting company
One and One require users to certify that they are not from a list of specified countries.
Network Solutions and BCentral offer a general caution that users must comply with
U.S. export laws, and the other hosts do not mention export controls or sanctions in
Intermediary Censorship
77
It is possible that BlueHost may be on the leading edge of a new trend. Social networking site LinkedIn.com began blocking Syrian users from connecting to their site in
April 2009. Anas Marrawi reported that LinkedIn began blocking Syrian users based
on their IP in late March, but that Syrian users continued to use the site through filtering-circumvention software. On April 19, Marrawi reported that the site delivered a
message to any users who had listed their home country as Syria when they logged
on: ‘‘Access to this account has been suspended. Please contact Customer Service to resolve this problem.’’ He contacted customer service and was told that LinkedIn could
no longer provide services to Syrian users. 21
Like Kubatana targeting BlueHost, Syrian LinkedIn users and their supporters began
an online campaign to convince LinkedIn to reevaluate their policies. Jillian York, 22 a
U.S.-based blogger with strong ties to the Syrian online community, helped coordinate
the effort, writing about the block on the Huffington Post 23 and promoting the cause
on Twitter. Through Twitter, she got in touch with LinkedIn’s senior director of corporate communications, who quickly issued a mea culpa and promised a swift reversal of
the decision. 24 Shortly after, LinkedIn issued the following statement: ‘‘Some changes
made to our site recently resulted in Syrian users being unable to access LinkedIn. In
looking into this matter, it has come to our attention that human error led to over
compliance with respect to export controls. This issue is being addressed tonight and
service to our Syrian users should be restored shortly.’’ 25
It is unclear what has motivated U.S. Web hosting and social media companies to
ensure they are in compliance with Treasury restrictions and export controls. Like BlueHost, LinkedIn has recently changed their terms of service. The current terms of service
references export controls in its opening section: ‘‘Your use of LinkedIn services,
including its software, is subject to export and reexport control laws and regulations,
including the the Export Administration Regulations (‘EAR’) maintained by the United
States Department of Commerce and sanctions programs maintained by the Treasury
Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control.’’ 26 An archived version of their terms
of service, 27 from January 3, 2008, makes no reference to export controls or sanctioned
countries. Users of hosting and social media tools who live in nations subject to U.S.
export controls or sanctions face an extremely confusing situation. LinkedIn, MySpace,
and Blogger make reference to U.S. export laws, while YouTube, Facebook, Wikipedia,
Rapidshare, and Wordpress do not. 28
Web hosting companies are similarly divided—of the 22 top hosting sites, as tracked
by Webhosting.info, 29 BlueHost, sister company Hostmonster, and hosting company
One and One require users to certify that they are not from a list of specified countries.
Network Solutions and BCentral offer a general caution that users must comply with
U.S. export laws, and the other hosts do not mention export controls or sanctions in
Intermediary Censorship
77