FediModNov 19, 2023
Emelia 👸🏻

This was a good read by @thenexusofprivacy on “Blocklists in the Fediverse” — https://privacy.thenexus.today/blocklists-in-the-fediverse/

As noted in that article, FIRES is attempting to shift away from blocklists in favour of moderation recommendations and advisories. It also introduces finer-grain controls than just “defederate or silence”.

FIRES will support not just domains but also the ability to provide moderation advisories and recommendations on other entities, e.g., hashtags, actors, links, media, etc.

Blocklists in the ActivityPub fediverse

Part 2 of "Golden opportunities for the fediverse – and whatever comes next"

The Nexus Of Privacy
Nov 19, 2023 at 8:14pmWeb
Show threadEmelia 👸🏻Nov 19, 2023

So for instance, a provider of data could publish to FIRES things like “we recommend to blocking libsoftiktok on threads because of transphobia, hate speech, and harassment”, which means we can effectively disseminate information about bad actors on large instances without wholesale defederating from the large instance.

It also makes sure to include information about the appeals process and encourages having one.

@thenexusofprivacy

Show threadEmelia 👸🏻Nov 19, 2023

Of course, tooling can also help here, for instance, surfacing information about number of users blocked from a specific domain or domain blocks existing as "signals" for making decisions for issuing moderation advisories or recommendations.

@thenexusofprivacy

Show threadEmelia 👸🏻Nov 19, 2023
Also, it's important to note that @thenexusofprivacy isn't just talking in abstract here, with this statement. The author is actually one of the many peer reviewers of the FIRES proposal, and has provided some very valuable discussion and perspective.
Show threadThe Nexus of PrivacyNov 19, 2023

@thisismissem Yep! And our discussions certainly helped me think of blocklists as recommended moderation actions, and applying the blocklist as actually taking the actions.

And, agreed on the value of tooling here.

Show threadEmelia 👸🏻Nov 19, 2023
@thenexusofprivacy I think at the moment blocklists are more in-lieu of recommendations and advisories, like, they're in the direction of sharing OSINT, but they prescribe a direct action to take, rather than providing a recommendation
Show threadThe Nexus of PrivacyNov 19, 2023
@thisismissem I see blocklists more as recommending an action -- although in situations where they're automatically applied that turns into prescribing the action. But Seridy for example is very clear that his blocklists are just recommendations.
Show threadEmelia 👸🏻Nov 19, 2023
@thenexusofprivacy yeah, the problem we have is in the automated application of them, with a manual review process. That's why FIRES is designed to require a tool to take a recommendation or advisory and convert it into an action taken.
Show threadvolkrisNov 19, 2023

@thisismissem I really dislike how this proposal seems to double down on the model of instances over users.

I would much rather see systems where individual users can subscribe to, effectively, the moderation services they believe match the experiences they personally want here instead of relying on the opinions and choices of their own instances to impose moderation.

I really wish people acting in this space would shift to putting users first.

@thenexusofprivacy

Show threadThe Nexus of PrivacyNov 19, 2023

@volkris I very much agree on the value of giving users better tools ... I don't think there's anything in FIRES that restricts it to be instance-only. That said I also think there's value in instance-level defaults and in some cases instance-level decisions. Illegal content's a situation where instance-level decisions are needed; instance-level blocks of blocking Nazi, terf, and white-supremacist are another situation where it's valuable. If people personally want to federate with Nazi, terf, and white-supremacist sites, they they can find instances that don't block them.

@thisismissem

Show threadEmelia 👸🏻Nov 19, 2023

@thenexusofprivacy @[email protected] correct, FIRES doesn't limit itself to only providing moderation recommendations and advisories to instance admins only.

In fact, I'd probably argue that individual users, particularly those at high risk may wish to subscribe to advisories directly, and to be notified when an interaction matches an advisory or recommendation that they are subscribed to

(aside, not sure this will reach qoto.org since hachyderm doesn't federate with them from what I can tell)

Show threadhiddenNov 20, 2023

@thisismissem @thenexusofprivacy

First of all, thanks for your work and thoughts on moderation of social networks.

But where can I read more about FIRES?

Show threadEmelia 👸🏻Nov 20, 2023
@hidden @thenexusofprivacy it's not published yet. Follow @fedimod which will post about it once it's published.