I don't see how that is the same thing here. I have an agreement with cust X to provide services in accordance with my AUP. cust X resells that service to cust Y, etc. cust Y is bound to the terms and conditions of my agreement with cust X, despite that I do not have a direct agreement with cust Y.
Oh christ...network engineers trying to be lawyers.
I don't know much, but I do know that legal agreements in the US are NOT transitive in this way, unless each agreement is included by reference in the other.
Yes and no. If my agreement with cust X says that they take responsibility for ensuring that any customers to whom they resell my service (or any traffic they transit into my network, to be more specific) must conform to my AUP, then the fact that it is cust Y that originated the violating traffic has little effect. I can still hold cust X responsible. As a good guy and for good customer service, I will, instead, first ask X to hold Y accountable and rectify the situation. If that doesn't work, you bet X will get disconnected or filtered. Owen -- If it wasn't signed, it probably didn't come from me.