Archive.today apparently hijacks visitor's browsers to DDoS a blog that tried to uncover the identity of the archive's admin. UBlock helps to stop that script.
this post was submitted on 20 Feb 2026
191 points (98.0% liked)
Technology
81612 readers
4283 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related news or articles.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
Another example why Unlock Origin should be considered essential security software, not just an "ad-block".
If a tool is demonstrably indispensable to disable some browsers' functionality, is it wise for browsers to have that functionality?
There may be genuine use cases to run a script, or whatever the attacker used. The problem is the browsers will auto-run stuff, the user isn't aware and there's no way to stop it. All ublock (and others) do is provide the missing security layer called "don't auto run shit from the web".
I like it being extensible instead, as some adblocks might be opinionated or unresponsive. It's easier to swap adblocks then browsers.
UBlock helps to stop that script.
Would that be by default, or do I need to enable something specific
from the blog in question
On January 21, commit ^bbf70ec (warning: very large) added gyrovague.com to dns-blocklists, used by ad blocking services like uBlock Origin. This is actually beneficial, since if you have an ad blocker installed, the DDOS script’s network requests are now blocked. (It does not stop users from browsing to my blog directly.)
- https://gyrovague.com/2026/02/01/archive-today-is-directing-a-ddos-attack-against-my-blog/
can't find anything from a quick look that confirms this list is used by default in ubo
I don't see that particular list, but the same filter is present in EasyPrivacy from EasyList, which is enabled in uBO by default.
nice one, cheers. it's there in line 16607 in EasyPrivacy, same guy runs btdig dot com?
||gyrovague.com^$domain=archive.fo|archive.is|archive.li|archive.md|archive.ph|archive.today|archive.vn|btdig.com
It's by default easylist-privacy list is default
I don't know more than what the wiki article linked to. It says UBlock blocks it. It doesn't say any more than that.
from what I heard, the default one is enough. Although I haven't checked it
makes sense, I didn't get it when people started saying it but I don't browse without ublock
An archive site that alters content in the archive is worse than worthless.
The DDoS is just confirmation that the site is actively harmful.
Deeply saddening. Archive.today was a great resource, and stored a vast repository of human knowledge. As the internet turns to slop, we need sites that preserve the history of the web more than ever, and it’s very disappointing that the team at archive.today has failed us so profoundly in our hour of greatest need.
It is not clear to me why archive.today is so important given the continuing existence of archive.org.
Because having one thing is never good. IA goes down then what? Also archive.today captures websites differently which can work in a pinch when IA fails to archive a site.
Altering the content of the archive certainly is different. And is undeniably worse.
It does more to handle client-side rendering than archive.org, so there are pages that could be rendered by today that were not archivable by org. Also, because of differing usage patterns, it has archives of pages that org didn’t, and even for pages that org does have, at times org doesn’t.
Sounds like the kind of deprecation that can be possibly fixed with an automation. And I can see why is Archive Today considered harmful.
Automation won't do it right. And that's the goal.
Besides, Wikipedia has always been human written for humans. Or at least, that too is the goal.
So they think archive.today can be replaced with:
Replace the archive link so it points to a different archive with a copy of the source, such as the Wayback Machine at the Internet Archive (https://web.archive.org/), Ghostarchive (https://ghostarchive.org/) or Megalodon (https://megalodon.jp/).
No.
They think that relying on a hostile archive will ultimately harm Wikipedia.
They know the shortcomings of the other options.
i’ve not used the others are they not as good?
i’ll be trying them soon
It's not that they aren't as good, necessarily.
More that the others do less "grey-hat" stuff, and therefore are less likely to cause harm or alter the content they host.