News 

Last week, the FBI obtained a court order involving Rackspace, demanding that the company hand over two Indymedia web servers. Rackspace, which provides hosting services for more that 20 Indymedia sites at its London facility was forced to comply and hand over the requested servers, effectively removing those sites from the Internet.

The subpoena of the servers is the latest of a series of run-ins that Indymedia has had with the Feds. . In August the US government attempted to subpoena server logs from the organisation's ISP in the US and the Netherlands before

ADVERTISEMENT

the Republican convention. In September, the FCC closed down radio stations affiliated to the IMC in the US and just two weeks ago the FBI requested that Indymedia takes down a post on the Nantes IMC that had a photo of some undercover Swiss police officers.

According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which is giving the IMC legal assistance, the FBI has served the court order on the Texas-based ISP 'on behalf of a foreign government'. EFF staff attorney Kurt Opsahl said, 'This seizure has grave implications for free speech and privacy. The Constitution does not permit the government to unilaterally cut off the speech of an independent media outlet, especially without providing a reason or even allowing Indymedia the information necessary to contest the seizure'.

The list of affected local media collectives includes Ambazonia, Uruguay, Andorra, Poland, Western Massachusetts, the French services in Nice, Nantes, Lilles, Marseilles, the Basque Euskal Herria, the Belgian Liege, East and West Vlaanderen, Antwerpen, Belgrade, Portugal, Prague, Galiza, Italy, Brazil, the UK, part of the German site, and the global Indymedia radio site.