On Sat, 17 Aug 2002, Sean M. Doran wrote:
Hm, why stop with just backbone networks?
Why shouldn't edge networks, corporate networks, and household networks chip in to uphold civil judgements against infringers?
The record labels don't want to give you that choice. If you read the complaint you'll notice the record companies never attempted to contact the immediate upstream ISP in China. Instead of following international treaties for the service of process, which would take "months," they are forum shopping for a "less burdensome" (to them, more burdensome to everyone else) forum. It is much easier to get on a "blackhole list" than it is to get off of one. If you are a non-US ISP, you could find your address space null routed by major US backbones without notice to you. Even if you later get rid of the customer, how does the non-US ISP get off the US court imposed blacklist? Will China Telecom, or the Chinese government need to hire a US lawyer to petition the US court for permission to have address space assigned by APNIC to China routed? Will RIPE and APNIC issue additional address space to a non-US ISP because their previous address space became unroutable due to US court orders? Will backbones be expected to only null route addresses within the court's area of jurisdiction? Worldcom, AT&T, Sprint and C&W operate world-wide routing domains. How far will the US court's order "leak?" Will Canada and Europe still be able to reach www.listen4ever.com in China over the portions of the companies backbones not located in US jurisdiction? Likewise when German and French courts order backbone providers with assets in those jurisdictions to block access to illegal websites, how far will those orders leak? AOL/CompuServe has experienced this in Germany already. Dr. Farber's statements to the contrary, I don't think this is trivial to implement. We have experience with AGIS, Napster, RBLs, etc.