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A far-right website that was among the platforms to organize the deadly violence at the US Capitol was once again forced to find new internet service protection after a tracking company owned by two Russians and registered in Scotland broke ties with the internet host of the platform.
The website 8kun, formerly known as 8chan, has long been one of the preferred platforms of the far right and followers of the unfounded conspiracy theory QAnon. It was used by rioters before the January 6 attack to mobilize other ‘patriots’ to ‘help storm the Capitol’, and some on the message board discussed which politicians they should kill as soon as they entered.
In the aftermath of the riot, users continued to incite violence, including maps of government buildings to fight and fight techniques for a proposed civil war.
This was not the first time that the platform has been linked to acts of violence. The predecessor site, 8chan, has been linked to a series of white nationalist terrorist attacks, including the massacres in Christchurch, New Zealand and El Paso, Texas.
8un faced serious obstacles to staying online before at least 2019, when the attack on El Paso took place. All websites are maintained online by a network of services, including web hosts and domain name registrars. 8kun had a loyal internet provider in Washington State VanwaTech, whose CEO has repeatedly defended his association with the hate website in the name of freedom of speech.
But the site could not function without platform protection services preventing DDoS attacks, or widespread denial of service attacks, and few providers were willing to work with it.
Following the removal of infrastructure company Cloudflare, 8kun, through VanwaTech, partnered with Oregon-based CNServers LLC for DDoS protection. This company also broke the ties with 8kun when it was informed of the violent history of the website.
Since October 2020, 8kun has received DDoS protection from DDoS-Guard, a company that provides protection to a number of controversial websites, including the neo-Nazi website Daily Stormer. 8kun’s ties to DDoS-Guard were first reported by security researcher and journalist Brian Krebs.
This week, DDoS-Guard became the latest company to sever ties with 8kun’s hosting company, VanwaTech, following inquiries from the Guardian.
8can now be protected by the American firm FiberHub, based in Las Vegas, Nevada, according to analysis by independent web researcher Ron Guilmette considered by the Guardian.
FiberHub does not provide direct infrastructure to 8chan, but supports VanwaTech as a customer, FiberHub co-founder and chief technology officer Rob Tyree confirmed to the Guardian via email.
“We have not received any reports that the content offered by VanwaTech, which is supported by our infrastructure, is in violation of our Terms of Service or Acceptable Use Policy, which contains a requirement to comply with all US federal and state laws and – regulations, “Tyree said. “If we receive such reports, we will follow our internal policies and comply with any legal requirements to resolve these matters as quickly as possible.”
DDoS-Guard, the company that provided services to VanwaTech until earlier this week, was registered on November 24, 2017 by Aleksei Likhachev and Evgeniy Marchenko under a limited partnership, a financial structure in Scotland that enables non-residents to operate companies with little investigation to create. – two Russian businessmen who remain owners of the company. The partnership under which DDoS-Guard is registered is called Cognitive Cloud and is listed at an address in Forth Street in Edinburgh.
Marchenko told the Don in the southern Russian city of Rostov earlier this week that 8kun was not a direct customer of DDoS-Guard, but that his company provided services to VanwaTech.
He described DDoS-Guard as a global information security service. He hosted ‘thousands of sites’, adding that it merely provided ‘transit protection services’ to VanwaTech to prevent it from falling victim to DDoS or other ‘brute force’ attacks.
‘It looks like they’re hosting some dubious sites like Qanon / 8chan / 8kun. I still do not understand what it is about and have no information about their content or activity, “he added.
‘We do not relate to any political issues and do not want to commit to them
any sense with customers offering such toxic sites as QAnon / 8chan, ”Machenko said after the company severed ties with VanwaTech.
Asked why he uses a company in Scotland, Marchenko says: ‘Why not? The UK is very comfortable with business. I visited London once 14 times ago. He said: “We do not support any illegal activities. We know nothing of what happened in Washington, or support either side. This company [VanwaTech] is just one of our many customers. ”
DDoS-Guard’s other clients include the Russian Ministry of Defense, as well as media organizations in Moscow. The firm’s website links to an official history of the ministry, outlining recent steps the Kremlin has taken to ban Russian soldiers’ use of smartphones, following a series of leaks.
‘It’s OK to make money with the Russian government or with any other government. It’s just business, ”Marchenko said.
DDoS-Guard’s office in Edinburgh is in 18 Forth Street, a terrace with small Georgian townhouses in the eastern part of Edinburgh’s New Town. There was no evidence that any Cognitive Cloud office was at that address or of the five other neighboring townhouses. An employee at a neighboring company said that in his seven years working there, he had never met anyone from Cognitive Cloud, but regularly sent requests to pick up mail and parcels for the firm. An Edinburgh website manager said Cognitive Cloud was not a tenant at the address, but the Guardian referred to another company with a different name in London, after which she said the email to Cognitive Cloud was sent.
The Scottish number containing DDoS-Guard on the website has been disconnected. A technical support representative contacted by the Russian phone number on the website said that the majority of its customers are based in Russia and do not want to answer any other questions.
Marchenko said his office in Edinburgh was an ‘EU subdivision’ manned by a ‘representative’.
VanwaTech did not respond to a request for comment.
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This article was edited on 15 January 2020 in one paragraph to reflect that 8kun is not protected by FiberHub.