Somewhat related to this same debate on censorship:
French regulators order block of Polymarket's website [0]
> The French gambling regulator said the site's continued availability constituted advertising. A ban on financial transactions to the site was already in place.
After failing to compel Polymarket to geoblock France, it's crazy that French "regulators" can just order ISPs to block a website without any judicial review just because the mere existence of it on the internet constitutes "advertising" to French people.
It seems like the EU in general is struggling badly with how to control internet access. Whether it's blocking VPNs, requiring access to private chats, or just blocking websites completely.
[0] https://www.lemonde.fr/en/france/article/2026/07/17/france-b...
Are you aware it’s the case in the US too? I don’t see what is supposed to be bad or terrifying here. French regulators (why the scare quotes?) entire reason d‘être is what you frame as suspicious, but it’s pretty standard, the state governs the infrastructure in its territory
US regulators don't order ISPs to block websites.
The FBI will occasionally seize a domain, but only after a court order.
Also notice that the FBI has no jurisdiction over foreign domains. It happens that the .com (in addition to .us) registry is in the US, but e.g. the .ru registry is in Russia and not under the jurisdiction of US courts.
This is a red herring.
We're not arguing about whether it is standard for governments to attempt to exercise maximal control.
We're arguing about whether governments executing censorship regimes via ISPs (like the Chinese Communist Party) without any balanced legal proceedings is a good thing.
And no, it does not happen like that in the US.
Devils advocate question: Isn't registering an ip to name essentially advertising? You're paying a registrar to return your Internet address location when searched for.
This is like saying that having a trademark in the US is advertising in France because you're paying the USPTO to publish your trademark registration.
If your scenario makes it impossible for someone to do ordinary business in country A but not in country B then it's fundamentally unworkable.
Not merely DNS names, but in IP routing, announcing a route is known as "advertising" it. You and your ISP are literally advertising a path for others to find your site via TCP/IP.
The two obvious problems being that a) you're advertising that so that people in the countries you actually intend to do business in can find it, and b) the same IP address may be hosting thousands of independent sites any subset of which could be intended to be accessed by people in the other jurisdiction, and publishing the route is done for them.
no, that is a ridiculous line of reasoning
Not really.
Why would people pay so much for the $brand_name.com, etc if there wasn't a marketing component to it?
I mean I pay for a domain for my homelab. No one else uses it.
Having a marketable address is not advertising.
I don’t think it’s crazy to enforce laws, especially given the leeway the government gave that predatory website.
> given the leeway the government gave that predatory website.
They are only blocking it because the French gambling mafia/authority is not getting their cut. They do not care in any way at all about a "predatory" gambling website.
They just want their share.
They want them to follow legally enacted laws in an open democracy.
It's all about nuance. The gambling mafia comment is pure gold.
If you’re aware of the organization called “FIFA” you can’t believe this is true.
I responded to the wrong comment, I ment to respond to the GP.
Fifa is Swiss, not French.
I didn’t say anything about the French.
So why are all 50 US states not allowing sports betting?
I don't care about sports betting. I care about government blocking websites just because it exists on the internet. It was already illegal for Polymarket to accept bets from French people.
FanDuel cannot operate in France but their website isn't blocked. So how do we explain this?
France, EU, Italy, Spain, La Liga are just consistently making fools out of themselves trying to block everything on the internet when they don't like it.
Maybe it's just because regulatory censorship is inconsistent and doesn't make any sense. It's like the China firewall but even dumber and less effective.
The decision was made in the context of foreign interference with elections.