Feb 10, 2026, 11:10 PMfor all of y'all spinning up things in the wake of Discord's announcement, please _please_ do not use Hetzner
- Feb 10, 2026, 11:10 PM
Replies
- Feb 10, 2026, 11:13 PM
I complain about this every chance I get but Hetzner's Policy 8.2 under their Terms and Conditions is incredibly vauge and can easily be exploited to silence LGBTQIA+ people depending on who's interpreting it
- Feb 10, 2026, 11:19 PM
It's a sloppily written policy that sounds sensible on the surface, but if you think about it for more than two seconds it's awful.
What counts as "extremist content", "content that offends common decency" or "material that could seriously endanger the morals of children"?
All of these are up to the person reporting it and the person reviewing the report.
And it turns out if you ask about half of America's congresspeople, LGBTQIA+ people count for most of those things.
Noisytootnoisytoot@berkeley.edu.plFeb 10, 2026, 11:10 PM@alyx why not?- Feb 10, 2026, 11:12 PM
@noisytoot policy 8.2 continues to be vague and easily exploitable to silence groups of people
- Noisytootnoisytoot@berkeley.edu.plFeb 10, 2026, 11:22 PM@alyx do you have any recommendations for other providers in europe with similar pricing and without such onerous policies? (preferably one that offers aarch64 VPSes)
I currently use hetzner for several things, although I don't think that policy is likely to be used against any of them (IRC client/bouncer, secondary authoritative DNS server, nethack server, Tor relay that isn't currently running)
Unfortunately the nethack server means I'm kind-of locked in to aarch64 unless I want to use qemu-user emulation because save files are just structs dumped to a file and not portable at all 
Feb 10, 2026, 11:41 PM@noisytoot@berkeley.edu.pl @alyx@frogs.lgbt netcup is an option, and so is Scaleway
- Noisytootnoisytoot@berkeley.edu.plFeb 11, 2026, 12:51 AM@nay @alyx Scaleway doesn't appear to have ARM yet and is quite a lot more expensive (except stardust): the cheapest option with 4GB RAM is €14.45/month (compared to Hetzner's €4.55/month CAX11, which is what I have) and that doesn't even seem to include storage (it's also only 300 Mbps, Hetzner doesn't advertise their network speed but it's faster than that).
Netcup looks better, but they should add smaller/cheaper ARM options. The cheapest is more expensive than Hetzner (€7.01/month in Austria) but also quite a bit larger than CAX11 and is currently out of stock. I'd consider it if I wanted to host more stuff there and it wasn't out of stock. 
LilaHexeLilaHexe@fedi.lilahexe.topFeb 11, 2026, 1:16 AM@alyx In Hetzner's "defense", most of this crap is because of the rather strict German youth protection laws (www.bzkj.de/bzkj/meta/en). Most of the terms in that paragraph are taken from there, but Hetzner seems to interpret the terms far more broadly than the courts.
However, my conclusion isn't "oh Hetzner is fine then", but rather "maybe it's better to avoid all German hosting providers"
In Germany, "violent" pornography is illegal. This includes consensual BDSM porn. This is banned in the same paragraph as porn involving animals... www.gesetze-im-internet.de/stgb/__184a.html
Luckily, the rule against "violent" pornography isn't enforced. And if it were, it would probably violate the artistic freedoms outlined in the constitution.
Also fun fact: the constitution has a specific carve-out for youth protection when it comes to artistic freedoms.
TL;DR: maybe don't host your "18+" stuff in Germany- LilaHexeLilaHexe@fedi.lilahexe.topFeb 11, 2026, 1:22 AM
@alyx as context for how strict Germany can be: there is a certain popular kink social media site that starts with "F". Also a very very popular porn site that has the initials "PH". If I even mention either of these in front of a minor, it's considered making them aware of it. That's a crime, and I can end up in prison for up to one year.
Oh btw, the list of these sites that can land me in prison is fucking secret. I can ask by email if a specific site is on the list, but I can't get the full list. 
Orange 🍊orange@thicc.horseFeb 11, 2026, 1:40 AM- LilaHexeLilaHexe@fedi.lilahexe.topFeb 11, 2026, 2:26 AM
@orange @alyx better than that. There are lists of hashes embedded in FritzBox firmwares so they can be used as blocklists. Someone brute forced these and published the list, but that was quite a while ago: bpjmleak.neocities.org/
Feb 11, 2026, 4:38 AM@LilaHexe@fedi.lilahexe.top @alyx@frogs.lgbt There are words that are fully independent of context considered to be endangering to the youth.
I was once talking with someone involved in the organization of SMJG and they told me that if someone on the forum started a thread “My boyfriend calls me [word]” they have to immediately delete the entire thing and are effectively not allowed to provide support or advice.
The example they gave was not even all that wild, very sexualized, sure, but not on the level that feels to me like it would justify that reaction.
But then, all of that stuff is scientifically unjustifiable bullshit. I’d be curious about a constitutional case over whether restricting access to pornographic material can be justified under the protection of the youth clause if years of research have not found evidence of harm, whereas proven harmful things are not restricted…- LilaHexeLilaHexe@fedi.lilahexe.topFeb 11, 2026, 11:08 AM
- Feb 11, 2026, 1:40 PM
@LilaHexe@fedi.lilahexe.top @alyx@frogs.lgbt I'm aware, just adding to the discussion. 😉
- LilaHexeLilaHexe@fedi.lilahexe.topFeb 11, 2026, 1:53 PM
Feb 11, 2026, 5:34 AM@alyx I might be missing something here but "against public decency" and "gravely endangering the morals of the youth" are terms already used by German law, aren't they? Therefore I would think Hetzner cannot arbitrarily redefine them to their liking.