The RIAA is specifically going after P2P networks. As far as I know, they are not going after Squid users/hosts. Although they may have at one point, it has never made the popular media as their effort against the P2P networks has. I'm not talking about caching at all anyway. I'm talking about what was suggested, that ISP's play an active role in helping their users locate "local" hosts to grab files from, rather than just anywhere out on the Internet. I think that is quite different than configuring a transparent proxy. Don't ask me why, it's not a technical or even necessarily a legal question (and IANAL anyway). It's more of a perception issue with the RIAA. If you work at an ISP ask your legal counsel if this would be a good idea. I doubt they would say yes. Fred Reimer, CISSP Senior Network Engineer Coleman Technologies, Inc. 954-298-1697 -----Original Message----- From: owner-nanog@merit.edu [mailto:owner-nanog@merit.edu] On Behalf Of Sean Donelan Sent: Monday, October 29, 2007 12:34 PM To: nanog@merit.edu Subject: RE: Can P2P applications learn to play fair on networks? On Mon, 29 Oct 2007, Fred Reimer wrote:
That and the fact that an ISP would be aiding and abetting illegal activities, in the eyes of the RIAA and MPAA. That's not to say that technically it would not be better, but that it will never happen due to political and legal issues, IMO.
As always consult your own legal advisor, however in the USA DMCA 512(b) probably makes caching by ISPs legal. ISPs have not been shy about using the CDA and DMCA to protect themselves from liability. Although caching has been very popular outside the USA, in particular in countries with very expensive trans-oceanic circuits, in the USA caching is mostly a niche service for ISPs. The issue in the USA is more likely the cost of operating and maintaing the caching systems are more expensive than the operational cost of the bandwidth in the USA. Despite some claims from people that ISPs should just shovel packets, some US ISPs have used various caching systems for a decade. It would be a shame to make Squid illegal for ISPs to use.