Josh Shapiro, the current Attorney General of Pennsylvania (US), has sent a subpoena to the Epik domain name registrar for information about the registrar’s communications with the social network Gab. The registrar has to provide official correspondence, information about Gab employees who interact with the registrar, users’ complaints about Gab and other communication with the social network.
The Attorney General is looking into Gab because Robert Bowers, who killed 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue on October 27, was a user of the social network. After the shocking incident, many leading US technology companies stopped providing services to this social network.
Thus, on October 29, the GoDaddy hosting provider that serviced Gab announced that it gave the network 24 hours to change provider following “a violation of service.” The social network then moved to Uniregistry, and then almost immediately to Epik at the invitation of Epik founder Robert Monster.
Gab representatives, in their usual way, responded to Josh Shapiro on Twitter, reminding him about the First Amendment and Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which provides immunity from liability for internet service providers.
The Gab network was founded two years ago by businessman Andrew Torba. It is primarily designed for far-right radicals, including those who promote violence, racism and anti-Semitism. Gab brands itself as an alternative to all other social media that are subject to censorship, as well as to mainstream media. In August 2017, Google deleted the Gab app from GooglePlay for publishing xenophobia statements. Apple did the same a year before.
