Talk:HTTP 451

4xx not 5xx?
There should be discussion about the controversy surrounding the use of a 4xx error code for this, which indicates the fault is on the client side. Blaming the reader for censorship at the server is not the clearest expression of the error, and it ought to have been in the server-side error 5xx set (cute literary allusions aside). 2001:8B0:FAC2:450C:4C47:8992:BADA:4F9A (talk) 07:58, 15 April 2016 (UTC)
 * What does "client error" mean though? It's not a question of "blame allocation", it's more about "who can fix this?".  A 500 has the implication that the server might one day work properly and deliver the content as it ought. 400 though is the server stating "I'm not going to fix that, it's not a response I ought to reply to". On that basis, it is a 400.
 * But mostly, geeks just love a sf reference. Even high-end geeks. Andy Dingley (talk) 08:30, 15 April 2016 (UTC)

Examples?
I don't if there are any others but www.reddit.com recently banned https://www.reddit.com/r/watchpeopledie [german source] for clients with a german ip on request of the german "Bundesprüfstelle" and is displaying this error code. --84.163.157.36 (talk) 15:08, 28 August 2015 (UTC)


 * I have a example! ShadowYC (talk) 11:33, 16 February 2017 (UTC)
 * @ ShadowYC ???

Er... Watch people die... The community is quarantineed on Reddit, and I think... it's normal! Luckily, their videos are not in an autoplay mode! It's really gore and digusting. I don't know if we should make them advertisement like this, or censor their site name too!

Serious?
Is this a serious proposal or just a "let's make a point" and a "let's honor someone" proposal? – Philosopher Let us reason together. 03:26, 10 September 2015 (UTC)

this is serious, so a client can differ between a non-existing and a censored resource. --80.254.155.51 (talk) 15:11, 29 October 2015 (UTC)

This is serious and should be rated TOP importance, because it is a part of HTTP protocol now. And network-protocols make the basis of information. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Overtonesinger (talk • contribs) 19:05, 27 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Most network protocols are low on the importance scale within WikiProject Computing. "Core" protocols which would "break the world" if they didn't exist, like IPv4, may be rated higher.  Remember, the WikiProject is "WikiProject Computing" not "WikiProject TCP Protocols."  davidwr/  (talk)/(contribs)  16:34, 29 December 2015 (UTC)


 * I don't know what is supposed to be "serious" or "not", because you didn't include what you were replying to. But the fact to can make the difference between censorship and unavailable resources: yes.

On the craftbukkit link
At one time, the link to the Minecraft utility craftbukkit, which was removed due to some legal concerns between its creators and Minecraft's owner, did return a 451 error. I suppose there's some case to be made for us having a link to a real page that is "Unavailable For Legal Reasons", although the link didn't really make the case for it (and it would be much better if whatever example we used was accompanied by a reliable source explaining the context - e.g. a newspaper article saying that craftbukkit wasn't available, that requests for it were returning 451, and giving context as to why". In any event, this link no longer returns 451 - it returns a 301 Moved Permanently to a URL with returns 404 Not Found. I see someone has removed the link, which I think is the correct thing to do. We do need a real example, but this wasn't it. -- Finlay McWalterᚠTalk 11:59, 4 November 2015 (UTC)

GDPR and HTTP 451?
I've recently noticed that quite a few websites are returning HTTP 451 responses, almost as a protest against the EU's new GDPR legislation, an example would be the entire Lee Enterprises website network, which returns "451: Unavailable due to legal reasons. We recognize you are attempting to access this website from a country belonging to the European Economic Area (EEA) including the EU which enforces the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and therefore access cannot be granted at this time"

Since GDPR went into force, this use of HTTP 451 responses has become more and more common, especially with US (local?) news websites, perhaps this should be mentioned in the article? --188.39.152.98 (talk) 12:33, 14 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I've seen this several times recently (2019 onwards), and AFAICR in every case it was a US local/regional newspaper website, most recently The News-Herald of Southgate, MI, which I was trying to access from the EU. Can be pretty frustrating, when an article has references that you can't verify. :( --DoubleGrazing (talk) 06:46, 24 July 2020 (UTC)


 * , archive the page. Often the archive is reachable. IAbot is an easy way of archiving every source on an article. Hope that helps, Cabayi (talk) 17:52, 24 July 2020 (UTC)


 * Cheers, wasn't aware, but am now. :) -- DoubleGrazing (talk) 21:30, 24 July 2020 (UTC)


 * I came here to make the same observation. Today's example: 2A00:23C5:FE0C:2100:5D01:A8EB:2E4B:45CE (talk) 09:54, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

Apache
Not sure if worth noting, but Apache does not seem to recognise HTTP 451 in its current version, and instead breaks if you attempt to make an ErrorDocument for it. --178.98.155.114 (talk) 11:40, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

Legal reasons, about cookies and privacy laws
I had this error, because I live in Europe, and because of the European law about cookies, on an American site.

Could the article tells us more about government censorship. Which kind of sites are censored? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.91.248.85 (talk) 13:54, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

Farenheit 451 reference?
That number rings a major bell Shentino (talk) 14:50, 21 May 2022 (UTC)
 * It is, as mentioned in the lead. -- Vaulter  14:57, 21 May 2022 (UTC)