Matthew Prince, writing on Cloudflare’s weblog:

We have blocked Kiwifarms. Visitors to any of the Kiwifarms sites that use any of Cloudflare’s services will see a Cloudflare block page and a link to this post. Kiwifarms may move their sites to other providers and, in doing so, come back online, but we have taken steps to block their content from being accessed through our infrastructure.

This is an extraordinary decision for us to make and, given Cloudflare’s role as an Internet infrastructure provider, a dangerous one that we are not comfortable with. However, the rhetoric on the Kiwifarms site and specific, targeted threats have escalated over the last 48 hours to the point that we believe there is an unprecedented emergency and immediate threat to human life unlike we have previously seen from Kiwifarms or any other customer before.

If there was illegal content published on Kiwi Farms that was not removed by moderators, I can certainly understand this decision. Interestingly, though, it’s not mentioned whether or not Cloudflare attempted to notify Kiwi Farms’ owner about the content — only mentioning that it was reported to law enforcement.

Kiwi Farms has addressed this in their Telegram channel:

Cloudflare’s decision to block the site was done without any discussion. The message I’ve received is a vague suspension notice. The message from Matthew Prince is unclear. If there is any threat to life on the site, I have received no communication from any law enforcement.

Given that Cloudflare made this decision because they believed there to be an imminent threat and the seeming reluctance they had in doing so, I’m curious if this is even a permanent suspension. It isn’t mentioned as such in Cloudflare’s statement, they only refer to this move as “blocking”. If the illegal content is removed from the forum and Kiwi Farms cooperates with law enforcement — at least to the extent required by law — will the suspension be lifted?

➝ Source: blog.cloudflare.com