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Autistici / Inventati: It's still far too quiet
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Anne Roth started a blog at NoBlogs.org 19 years ago. Now the non-commercial platform has closed because the USA has classified the tech collective behind it as terrorism. The USA is attacking freedom of expression and internet freedom in other countries directly and without any legal process.
In late summer 2007 I was looking for a blog to start ahttps://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrej_Holm#Ermittlungverfahren_und_%C3%9...unusual storyto write down. My friend was arrested early that morning in our family's apartment in Berlin by police SEK units. At that moment we learned that he was suspected of being a member of a terrorist organization. He had been under anti-terrorist surveillance for a year and I was also affected by it, as collateral damage so to speak.
He is not a terrorist and never has been. He was finally released after a few weeks. The investigation was later closed. This is ahttps://netzpolitik.org/2024/systemstellung-04-unter-terrorverdacht...Story.
Blogs without tracking
I wanted to write online about what surveillance has done to us and how it has affected our everyday lives. I had heard about a fairly new phenomenon called “blogs,” or weblogs, which allowed people to publish texts without having to set up an entire website themselves. That's exactly what I needed: the ability to publish without having to worry about software updates, security, or domain registration.
I was already active as an online activist before this incident and certainly did not want to contribute to my readers being exposed to any form of tracking, be it commercial or governmental. It was difficult enough to communicate our situation without putting others at risk of being targeted by contacting ourselves. So I was very happy when I came across the blogging platform byhttps://www.inventati.org/">Autistici/Inventati(A/I), the Italian tech collective that promised not to let any of this happen.
As I write this, it is still clear who it is forhttps://web.archive.org/web/20260917150522/https://noblogs.org/">noblogs...operated. It says there:
Noblogs.org is a project of the A/I collective that has been providing communication and conspiracy services for activists and, in general, for everyone who identifies with the principles of our manifesto: to fight for a fairer, more equal and freer society; to escape the ever-present control of a society that cares too much about who you are rather than what you think and what you love or hate; to escape the idea that every moment of our lives somehow corresponds to money and economic transactions.
I had known about A/I for a few years. I had some of them in 2001 during the protests against thehttps://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/G8-Gipfel_in_Genua_2001">G8 Summitin Genoamet in the independent media center. Hundreds of activists reported on the protests there long before social media existed. Together we had to watch in horror as the policehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2001_raid_on_Armando_Diaz">oneSchool across the street attackedand brutally beat many activists who spent the night there after the demonstrations.
Classification as a terrorist supporter
If you're reading this,https://noblogs.org">noblogs.orgno longer online.
On August 26, A/I published a statement that the US government had designated the organization as a supporter of terrorism. According to onehttps://web.archive.org/web/20260829014011/https:/www.state.gov/releases...of the Foreign Ministryis “Autistici/Inventati (A/I Collective) an Italy-based extremist group that builds and operates digital infrastructure for violent Antifa cells and other militant left-wing extremists around the world.”
The collective rejected the allegationshttps://keepitfree.ai/announcements/statement-by-a/i-collective-about-us...back and wrote, that it “strongly reaffirms its commitment to providing a platform with digital self-defense tools to meet the need for free communication for activists and other individuals, groups and associations.”
https://netzpolitik.org/2026/autistici-inventati-pauschaler-terrorvorwur...Terrorism accusation
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The hut is on fire! We're going in.
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Domain gone
Two days later, her domain “autistici.org” disappeared. At first it was unclear what had happened since no one had bothered to inform A/I. According to onehttps://keepitfree.ai/announcements/press-release/">Press releaseby A/IThe decision to make the domain inaccessible was made by thehttps://pir.org/">PublicInterest Registry(PIR), a non-profit organization run by thehttps://www.internetsociety.org/">InternetSociety(ISOC) was founded to manage the .org domain and “serve the public interest on the Internet.”
The Italian section of the ISOC protested violentlyhttps://www.isoc.it/la-disattivazione-di-autisticiorg-minaccia-la-natura...an open letter, which was aimed not only at PIR and ISOC, but also at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and its European section, the European Regional At-Large Organization (EURALO).
In the letter, ISOC Italy states that there is no evidence that A/I carried out or supported terrorist activities.
With thehttps://www.inventati.org/campaign/press">Wordsby A/I:
The US government has decided to use a non-judicial procedure that makes appeals impossible through due process and puts both those who provide services to A/I and those who use A/I services within the US at risk of being designated as terrorists.
ISOC Italy further stated that their concern was the role of the PIR:
.org is neither U.S. property nor a for-profit venture, but rather a global, supranational resource critical to freedom of expression and association online. Its administration must take this objective into account, as was agreed upon in the unlimited award to the Internet Society and its wholly owned subsidiary, the Public Internet Registry.
.org administrators should work to ensure that no government has control over the online presence of nonprofit organizations that do not belong to or operate within its jurisdiction, and more generally, that no single government can decide who can keep or lose a .org domain name anywhere in the world.
And this should indeed be a concern for the entire Internet governance community. If .org domain registration is effectively subject to the arbitrary decisions of the US government, we need to consider whether and how this can be changed.
Account gone
Again, a few days after the classification, A/I's bank, Italy's Banca Etica, informed the collective that it intended to close its account. The PayPal account was blocked on the first day without prior notice.
Closing bank accounts of organizations accused of terrorism or supporting terrorism is not uncommon. But here too, there was no legal process that forced or asked the bank to close the account. The background is that the inclusion of an organization on a terrorist list by the US government can result in further sanctions.
The bank, fearing the possibility of such further sanctions, decided to freeze A/I's account. Since September 4th, A/I no longer has access to its own funds, which were raised through donations from its users.
Alessandro Messina, former director of thehttps://www.ondarossa.info/redazionali/2026/09/banca-etica-chiude-defini...href="">https://www.ondarossa.info/redazionali/2026/09/banca-etica-chiude-defini...Etica commented:
It is plausible that many banks would choose to close A/I's account. However, one would expect something different from an organization founded to promote ethical financial transactions when faced with a classification of such a distinctly political nature.
A/I stops
Another two days laterhttps://keepitfree.ai/announcements/a/i-shuts-down-stay-human/">kA/I announcedto stop operations completely:
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“Stay human” is not an empty phrase for us.
Above all, it means that we have a responsibility to protect our users and those who make up the human networks we rely on, as well as the communities that have showered us with messages of support and solidarity.
We cannot engage in a struggle or subject ourselves to manipulations that threaten the lives of these people and their loved ones and leave them at the mercy of autocrats, fascists and authorities who take extralegal measures.
Attacking political opponents
A shock went through the community of users of A/I's services. This community is huge: A/I has been around for 25 years and claims to host 20,000 blogs, 20,000 email accounts, 5,000 mailing lists and 1,500 websites.
As I write this, it is mid-Septemberhttps://web.archive.org/web/20260916213017/https://annalist.noblogs.org/...Blogstill online – but only in read-only mode. I no longer have access to the administration. Soon it will be gone, and with it 19 years of my texts on digital politics and digital rights.
The same goes for the many other blogs and websites from numerous countries into onehttps://unicornriot.ninja/2026/activist-blogging-platform-shuts-down-aft...of topics, including climate change, anti-militarism, rights of indigenous peoples, health reform or anti-fascism.
If they disappear, many, many links from sites across the internet will go nowhere. And I have once again become collateral damage in an accusation of terrorism. As do many others.
There needs to be an outcry
The British human rights organizationhttps://www.article19.org/resources/usa-terrorism-designation-has-global...19 warns: “Apart from the fact that this violates the standards of freedom of expression, this classification itself has a chilling effect”, i.e. a deterrent effect.
20,000 blogs shut down and there was no outcry. Because people are wondering whether it is wise to defend an organization that the US has designated as terrorist.
When authoritarian governments attack non-commercial, independent digital communications infrastructures, as in this case, we must not underestimate the impact. This time it was Italy, but next time it could be closer to you.
It's still far too quiet.
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Become part of this unique community and support our public interest-oriented, advertising- and tracking-free journalismhttps://netzpolitik.org/spenden/?via=rss">nowwith a donation.
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