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Epik will sponsor 8chan’s domain, but will not host its site

Kevin Murphy, August 7, 2019, 13:32:24 (UTC), Domain Registrars

Controversial free-speech registrar Epik has said it will take 8chan’s domain name business, but will not provide content delivery services for the site.
In a post entitled “Epik draws line on Acceptable Use”, CEO Rob Monster wrote:

Upon careful consideration of the recent operating history of 8Chan, and in the wake of tragic news in El Paso and Dayton over the weekend, Epik has elected to not provide content delivery services to 8Chan. This is largely due to the concern of inadequate enforcement and the elevated possibility of violent radicalization on the platform.

He wrote that a “principal” of 8chan approached the company about transferring its domain to Epik on Monday.
The domain was in fact transferred, as DI reported shortly after it happened. Monster told DI that he had not actively solicited the site’s business.
While there’s no evidence its previous registrar, Tucows, had any intention of suspending the domain, its denial-of-service protection provider, CloudFlare, has publicly ditched 8chan and accused it of being responsible for the hate that lead to the El Paso shooting on Saturday.
8chan is a wild-west message board largely frequented by people with far-right views on race. It came in for extra scrutiny when it was reported that the El Paso terrorist posted a racist, anti-immigrant manifesto to the site shortly before the attack.
The site’s current owner, Jim Watkins, posted a surreal video to Twitter yesterday claiming, among other things, that the manifesto had in fact been posted by a third party.
Monster wrote that Epik was “reticent” about allowing 8chan to use its BitMitigate service to replace CloudFlare.
Its decision was moot anyway, as during the course of Monday speculation that 8chan would move to BitMitigate caused Epik’s service provider, Voxility, to sever ties with the company.
This caused BitMitigate to “temporarily” stop working for all of its customers, though regular domain registrants were not affected, Epik said.
Monster wrote that Epik will continue to provide services to all customers that publish legal content, but that it reserves the right to deny service in cases where the site’s owner has shown itself incapable of properly moderating user-generated content.
At time of writing, 8ch.net is not resolving at all for me.

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Comments (2)

  1. undaunt says:
    August 7, 2019 at 2:52 pm

    Rob of Epik has no shame.He is a hypocrite.This is why i wont do any business with Epik.

    Reply
    • Ruben S says:
      August 7, 2019 at 4:25 pm

      I disagree. Society should work through rules and regulations. I think its ridiculous that American tech companies constantly take matters into their own hands and deplatform people who they dislike. If Americans believe something goes too far or someone should be banned from the internet, then why dont you just make some laws for it?

      Reply

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