Verizon Blocks 4chan
According to 4chan's Twitter account and status update blog, they have been "explicitly blocked" by the Verizon wireless network.
If you're unfamiliar with 4chan and why an ISP/wireless company would block it, read more about it on Wikipedia. The high-traffic image board of mostly anonymous users was created by Christopher Poole in 2003 and has been the subject of a fair amount of negative media and legal attention over the past six years. But why would Verizon choose to block the site now? Does this put Verizon on par with foreign ISPs that block torrent sites and social networks? Or is there more to the story?
Poole wrote this afternoon, "Over the past 72 hours, we've been receiving reports from Verizon Wireless customers having difficulty accessing the image boards. After investigating, we found that Verizon is dropping traffic... only on port 80 (HTTP). No other subdomain/IP/port is affected, which leads us to believe this block is intentional."
However, a couple hours ago, Poole posted, "After an hour and a half on the phone, we've received confirmation from Verizon's Network Repair Bureau (NRB) that we are 'explicitly blocked.'"
In the past, we've held a generally negative view of ISP censorship and traffic shaping, regardless of site content. It'll be interesting to see how this battle shapes up, as Poole is calling for 4chan users to file complaints with Verizon's Network Repair Bureau.
We are contacting Poole and Verizon to figure out specifically why the site is being blocked and will update this post as more information becomes available.
While we've personally confirmed that the image boards are not accessible from the Verizon wireless network, we're not certain that Verizon as an ISP is blocking the site or whether they plan to in the near future. Again, a move of this magnitude would have to have some pretty compelling justifications, and we can't wait to find out Verizon's reasons.
This incident calls to mind AT&T's temporary blocking of the site in July 2009. Eventually, AT&T said the block was due to a DDoS originating from 4chan IP addresses, to which Poole responded, "We're glad to see this short-lived debacle has prompted renewed interest and debate over net neutrality and Internet censorship - two very important issues that don't get nearly enough attention - so perhaps this was all just a blessing in disguise."
UPDATE: A Verizon NRB rep said their center has been deluged with phone calls but was unable to relate the specific reason the site has been blocked. We are continuing to call other Verizon numbers at this time, but we've been alerted that Verizon has not yet set up any process for dealing with media calls on this issue as no other media outlets have yet contacted them.
UPDATE: Multiple Verizon FIOS/DSL customers have let us know that the boards are still accessible from other devices not on the Verizon wireless network. However, we're confused as to why Verizon wireless would block a website and still allow access on other parts of its network.
UPDATE: Poole, a.k.a. Moot, responded to our email this morning, confirming that only Verizon Wireless customers were effected by the block - not FIOS/DSL customers. As for the reason for the block, he wrote, "None of the techs could give us a definitive answer. It took them hours to even figure out/acknowledge the block was occurring on their end."
A major wireless and Internet provider can't tell a website owner why his site is blocked? It's interesting, but the day is young. We hope to receive word from Verizon soon. A Verizon PR exec has said he is looking into the matter, but hasn't yet been able to give us any definitive answer.
Share
Facebook
Comments
Subscribe to comments for this post OR Subscribe to comments for all ReadWriteWeb posts
I'm on Verizon's ISP in New York, 4chan works from here.
Mike - thanks! We've heard the same from a bunch of Twitter users.
Just tried on my Droid. boards.4chan.org/b/ does not load.
Surely Verizon knows the two big things you should never do on the internet:
1. Feed the troll.
2. Piss off 4chan.
Also Verizon and Verizon Wireless are technically two separate companies, though Verizon does own 55% and I would have expected that they share networks.
Heh, Jono... I think the first two rules go slightly differently than that. ;)
But Verizon has inadvertently broken those, as well, apparently. Hoping they (or moot) will get back to me soon and let us all know what 4chan did to piss *them* off.
"Multiple Verizon FIOS/DSL customers have let us know that the boards are still accessible from other devices not on the Verizon wireless network. However, we're confused as to why Verizon wireless would block a website and still allow access on other parts of its network."
Fios and Dsl is not apart of the Verizon Wireless network! Two separate companys under Verizon Communications!
Hi,
4chan is prone to have boards go down or be extremely slow.I heard that 4chan says that someone spoofed their IP and then launched a DDoS on someone else, making it look like it originated from 4chan...
Verizon has a fairly large network so you'd need to determine if there is an issue between carriers, routing, and then establish if there is an actual web protocol level issue.
Unfortunately, public looking glass access seems to be something Verizon business units do not favor. As a result, you'll see speculative reactions such as this article and elsewhere.
When one has to resort to Pingdom, downforeveryoneorjustme-esque services, etc... it's pretty lame.
Hint: The bigger the ISP, the bigger the effort they should make to inform and provide tools that allow for a self-service answer
Posted by: fudge.org
|
February 8, 2010 12:59 AM
This issue is unique to AS6167 (Verizon Wireless)
It appears from posts online that this filter actually started around Jan 31st at the earliest. Further, this issue was tested by 4chan and some VZW techs and was confirmed to be the return route to Verizon. Meaning, that packets can REACH 4chan from VZW but 4chan cannot RESPOND those packets as they simply get dropped at the myvzw network's edge.
Indeed, Verizon should /b/ very careful here...
this weekend i got even more reason to hate verizon wireless (although all verizon is a blood sucking leech virus on humanity)
my oldest (18 +) went out and got her own service with metro pcs(although she had a branch of our verizon family plan covering her).
went to verizon figuring we were not canceling our plan, this would be our 8th year with verizon. . . just reconfiguring the numbers. .. they wanted $140 to cancel.
i hope they know they have lost a customer.
my mantra for years has been "i hate verizon" all verizon. . .crappy service, crappy product. . .
If you hate Verizon so much, why have you been a customer for 8 years?
i bet 4chan gets back unblocked in under 24 hours, its like the tea party on steriods
Anon ftw lol everyone knows not to piss off 4chan (almost everyone i thought) this is going to be very interesting to see how this plays out
Works fine on my droid in GA
Needless to say, Verizon Wireless and Verizon are different companies. Sure, they have some ownership in common, but they have different officers and executive and internal decisions are completely separate. It would be more surprising if both VZ and VZW blocked the same sites than if they didn't.
Conspiracy: they're baiting anonymous.
I was just contacted by Jeff Nelson of Verizon Wireless PR through Twitter, apparently there were two (I'm assuming) DDoS attacks that originated from sites associated with 4chan. Those have recenty stopped, and verizon will restore service tonight.
Thoughts?
Sd: I don't buy it. A DDoS conducted via mobile devices on a 3G network??? Does that make sense??
Protecting Our Customers And Our Network
The most important thing we offer? Our network. When our network is attacked, or at risk of attack in a way that could harm our customers' ability to make and receive calls, or use wireless multimedia and data services, we jump to action.
Recently, Verizon Wireless security and external experts detected attacks from an IP address associated with the 4Chan family of web sites that was disruptive to our customers and our network. To protect both, we eliminated connectivity to the IP address. At no time was 4Chan itself blocked. Ongoing network security team monitoring has now determined there is no longer an immediate threat. Connectivity to those sites is being restored later today.
Typically, these attacks involve someone sending hundreds of thousands of messages to wireless devices to round up active customer addresses for follow-up activity including hacker attacks. These “sweeps” can jam our network and deliver unwanted electronic messages that also can drain customer devices’ battery life and slow their operation.
Verizon Wireless PR guy here. We take being the nation's most reliable wireless network seriously. Seriously enough to protect our customers and our network from malicious attacks, even if we get dinged in the blogosphere. It's easy to complain about "blocking" when your wireless data connection is stable, fast and reliable. But try connecting to the web from your Droid or Blackberry when attacks slow - and potentially block - use of our network all together.
We monitor against attacks and potential attacks to ensure the integrity of the Verizon Wireless network. Our customers expect nothing less.
Does that really piss anybody off?
Hi Jeffrey,
I'm a Verizon customer, and I can't complain about the network.
What I can complain about is the vagueness in Verizon's responses and the unanswered questions many folks still have.
If this happened on the wireless network, doesn't that also mean it's likely happening on Verizon's FIOS/DSL, and to a much greater extent?
Also, you said, "At no time was 4Chan itself blocked." However, last night, we were told *by a Verizon rep* that the site was, in fact, explicitly blocked. The site's owners were told the same thing.
I didn't write this post to "ding" anyone - in fact, it was an exercise in neutrality to not write something favoring Verizon's decision. But why was the site blocked, really, rather than reporting the users responsible for the attacks to the appropriate authorities?
As for your last question... Don't get me started on what pisses /b/ off. Just safely assume that the answer to that question is a resounding "Yes, everything pisses /b/ off."
Sorry for the issues you guys've had, and I hope this ends well for all parties involved.
Verizon, you're breaking some of the most basic rules of the internet.
So no surprise, but here's the Catch-22. The more detail, the bigger the bullseye for next time.
@Christi - Frankly, without protecting the network, there's No Internet. Reasonable network management not just a good idea - actually required for connection.
We've got absolutely no business model by not giving customers access to everywhere they want to go. But gotta make sure they can go there or they won't stay customers.
@Christi Johnson:
Verizon's not just breaking RULES of the Internet.
They - or someone in the Verizon Wireless division, at least - is actually breaking PART of the Internet.
(A small part, to be sure, but a part nonetheless.)
Also, @JNels:
Either someone's feeding you misinformation, or you're covering up for someone.
When your customers are bombarding your Network Repair Bureau and your Customer Support lines to complain about being unable to access a website that they were able to access prior to this supposed wave of malicious traffic, that kind'a puts the lie to your claim that 4Chan was never blocked.
Especially when - as Ms. O'Dell stated - your service technicians are stating that access to the domain boards.4chan.org is, in fact, explicitly blocked.
Frankly, I'd trust a company's techs over their PR department any day. The techs have some idea of what's going on, while PR's job is to make the company look good in the public arena.
Jeffrey, I understand that you don't want to give /b/ people a greater opportunity to screw up your network, but how can saying specifically why you blocked the site make Verizon a bigger target?
Is this the kind of attack you're talking about? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SYN_flood
Are you aware that, because of the way these attacks are structured, the number of attacks from 4chan could not have possibly degraded network performance? Moving away from any claims that the alleged attacks could have caused slower network performance, you also mentioned that customers might have been compromised. Have those customers been contacted and their needs met?
And you never spoke to my largest concern: If 4chan was harming Verizon wireless customers, why aren't Verizon's DSL customers being protected, as well?
You also said that your team has determined 4chan is no longer a threat. When will access to the site be restored?
Finally, the purported "bad guy" in this scenario, 4chan's founder, has now emailed me back three times and Verizon's PR people seem to be primarily interested in trying to spin my readers in my comments section. I hope you or any of the other Verizon PR people I've contacted so far will be able to email me at jolie@readwriteweb.com to answer these questions.
@Jnels
Verizon Wireless PR guy here. We take being the nation's most reliable wireless network seriously. Seriously enough to protect our customers and our network from malicious attacks, even if we get dinged in the blogosphere. It's easy to complain about "blocking" when your wireless data connection is stable, fast and reliable. But try connecting to the web from your Droid or Blackberry when attacks slow - and potentially block - use of our network all together.
We monitor against attacks and potential attacks to ensure the integrity of the Verizon Wireless network. Our customers expect nothing less.
Does that really piss anybody off?
Yes, this -does- piss people off. What your company wants to do is gate the internet so people are paying for different tiers of it, much like the current TV system is. While this works for TV because a lot of the programs that air on them require tons of work, web pages and information can be (relatively) cheap to produce. For example, I could go make a wordpress account and for so much a month, post whatever information I deem worthy onto the blogosphere. If I wanted to do that with a TV show, I would either have to find a public access station (which lets be honest, who watches those anymore?) or pay some heavy money just to throw out my ideas.
You and your company want to make it so only YOUR voice is heard. You and your company want to make it so only the people who PAY your prices can access what you want them to see. The Internet is and should remain a free place where the people decide what they want to see, not what YOU think they should see. This is a step in the wrong direction for everyone because we are soon going to be seeing what China was doing with their Great Firewall of China. While your company does have the right to defend against attacks, at no point should you outright BLOCK access to it.
As Ranger Six was saying, all you do is try to make the company look good. Chances are you have NO idea as to what really is going down in the IT department. You just get the watered down e-mails your boss sends to you and regurgitate that misinformation like a good corporate drone. Do us all a favor and actually read into some of this stuff for yourself instead of reading your cue cards over and over again.
That sucks that Verizon is blocking it, but then again so our my basic OpenDNS settings.
If I found out Verizon was blocking a website I need access to, I would switch ISPs in a heart beat.
The only thing more annoying, is not linking the website in discussion somewhere in the article ... :-)
I'm currently on Verizon FIOS, and the boards will not load. instead, they take me directly to the disturbing /z/ image.
Why is Verizon dictating what users can and can't see? After all, it IS a paid service, no?
I live in AL, and why is this just now occurring on my phone? Is there another DDoS happening in response to verizons actions or is verizon just mecrob?
4chan is no longer working and just started somewhere around
feb 28 21:00- March 1 0:30
What is this why is this only happening now, i heard about this couple weeks ago i thought they brought the block up but guess only certain areas. Tomorrow im fucking raging on them