On Mon, Nov 17, 1997 at 01:18:21PM -0500, Leo Bicknell wrote:
In article <64q19v$o1@gizmo.dimension.net> you write:
Best guess at ths time, without having had a full review done, is that filtering spam at the source *might* fall into the same category. However, since in theory mail is *personal* in nature ratehr than broadcast, it might be deemed to fall into the same category as blocking all carrier route sorted bulk mail in the real world. However, note that you *can't* get USPS to do that, either.
The follow your argument wouldn't there be a difference between blocking e-mail from a site (eg, the RBL, or your own sendmail.cf rules) and blackholing an entire site at the IP level? In one case you are acting as an editor claiming that only mail is offensive, in the other you are acting as a service provider preventing damage to your network?
It would seem to me that if you argue that the site causes "network problems" and simly toss all of their packets regardless of content you are safer. It is also nastier to the spammer/their provider (eg one or two bad apples render all of AGIS's network unreachable to a great many), which in theory should get better responce to fix the problem.
To site an example, no one questions a providers ability to filter a site when it is Smurf'ing them, why not when spamming them?
-- Leo Bicknell - bicknell@dimension.net Network Engineer - Dimension Enterprises 1-703-709-7500, fax, 1-703-709-7699
Filtering at the SMTP level does exactly that. It prevents the damage done by the spam. Its also carefully crafted to do ONLY that, where a general packet filter is not. A general packet filter is appropriate in the case of a smurf attack. -- -- Karl Denninger (karl@MCS.Net)| MCSNet - Serving Chicagoland and Wisconsin http://www.mcs.net/~karl | T1's from $600 monthly to FULL DS-3 Service | NEW! K56Flex modem support is now available Voice: [+1 312 803-MCS1 x219]| 56kbps DIGITAL ISDN DOV on analog lines! Fax: [+1 312 803-4929] | 2 FULL DS-3 Internet links; 400Mbps B/W Internal