"451" Error Will Tell Users When Governments Are Blocking Websites 255
Daniel_Stuckey writes "To fend off the chilling effects of heavy-handed internet restriction, the UK consumer rights organization Open Rights Group wants to create a new version of the '404 Page Not Found' error message, called '451 unavailable,' to specify that a webpage wasn't simply not there, it was ordered to be blocked for legal reasons."
I get the reference but... (Score:3, Informative)
... shouldn't it be a 3xx or 5xx error code? 4xx means the client screwed up.
Reference to... (Score:5, Informative)
For those who missed the reference and didn't click the links, this is a reference to Fahrenheit 451.
Old(ish) but brilliant (Score:5, Informative)
Already being done pretty much (Score:4, Informative)
If I visit www.thepiratebay.org on a browser that doesn't have an anti-censorship plugin installed, I get
"The page you're looking for has been blocked.
"We're complying with a court order that means access to this website has
"to be blocked to protect against copyright infringement."
Misunderstanding of HTTP? (Score:0, Informative)
I don't think that they understand the difference between the Internet and the Web. If an IP is blocked, no HTTP connection is made, and thus no HTTP response can be delivered.
This would instead put the burden of enforcing the block on the web servers themselves. Or are requests to blacklisted IPs rerouted?
Re:This may work........ (Score:2, Informative)
Haha, "court order"!
You naive believer in due process.
Here in the UK, an unregulated quango called the Internet Watch Foundation can block anything it pleases with no judicial or even executive oversight whatsoever.
Re:Already exists? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:It would be an error code (Score:5, Informative)
40X errors can still return an entity. The HTTP spec even says that the server SHOULD return an entity explaining the error. I'm afraid you're the one being a moron.
Re:It would be an error code (Score:4, Informative)
Just to clarify, if a web site is being blocked, then that web site can not send an error page to the client making the request.
The error would come from whichever device is blocking the web site, and it would prevent forwarding of any data packets to the blocked site. The blocked site can't return an error page because it has no way of knowing someone trying to access it was blocked. Whatever device is doing the blocking is the one that can send an error code, if at all.
Returning an html error page would be entirely optional, and I seriously doubt whomever is doing the blocking would give a rat's ass about a fancy custom error page. If they did, it might make for a nice amplifier in a DDoS attack. ;-)
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
Re:This may work........ (Score:5, Informative)
Re:This may work........ (Score:1, Informative)
Shall we begin?