The new Amazon Web Services

After Amazon Web Services (AWS) cut off the controversial website WikiLeaks, many spurned politicians around the world rejoiced, while web developers were left to wonder “Who’s next?” In the wake of AWS’ unprecedented censorship they’ve released a statement that creates more questions than answers.

There were several parts [of the AWS terms of service] they [WikiLeaks] were violating. For example, our terms of service state that “you represent and warrant that you own or otherwise control all of the rights to the content… that use of the content you supply does not violate this policy and will not cause injury to any person or entity.” It’s clear that WikiLeaks doesn’t own or otherwise control all the rights to this classified content. Further, it is not credible that the extraordinary volume of 250,000 classified documents that WikiLeaks is publishing could have been carefully redacted in such a way as to ensure that they weren’t putting innocent people in jeopardy.

The most concerning part about this statement is not the actual censorship, but just how arbitrary and subjective their stated causes for termination are. Not an encouraging precedent.

[via Dustin Curtis]