-----Original Message----- From: owner-nanog@merit.edu [mailto:owner-nanog@merit.edu] On Behalf Of Dr. Jeffrey Race Sent: April 19, 2004 9:11 AM To: Jeffrey Race Cc: nanog@nanog.org Subject: Re: Microsoft XP SP2 (was Re: Lazy network operators - NOT)
On Mon, 19 Apr 2004 06:12:16 -0400, Chris Brenton wrote:
An uneducated end user is not something you can fix with a service pack.
A profound point, again highlighting the fact that there are no technical solutions to this problem. (Though technical measures to enhance traceability are a big help.)
So, the logical inference is training and licensing to get internet access. When I was 16 in Connecticut many many years ago, we had to take a driver-training course (given by a policeman) to get a driver's license.
I see no discussion about this approach, here or elsewhere.
Well, there are a number of problems with this. Firstly, who enforces it? The reason it "works" with cars is that the state (or province for those of us north of the border) effectively says "you can't drive a car without this lovely piece of paper/plastic that we'll give you" and "if we find you driving a car without the lovely piece of paper/plastic, you're going to be in serious trouble". Are you proposing that each jurisdiction that currently licences drivers also licence Internet users and tell ISPs "sorry, but if they don't give their licence, you can't give them an account"? Secondly, HOW do you enforce it? Motor vehicles only require a licence to be operated on public roads in all jurisdictions I'm aware of. IANAL, but if some 14 year old kid without a licence wants to drive around on his parents' private property, that is not illegal. Now, the instant that vehicle leaves the private property, it's another story (assuming, of course, cops around to check licences. In some jurisdictions, this is more true than in others). My point is, driving is ONLY regulated when it is done in public view, for obvious reasons. Computer use is an inherently private activity, so how do you propose to verify that the person using a computer is in fact licenced? Mandatory webcams? :P Thirdly, WHO do you enforce it against? It's pretty difficult (and illegal) for $RANDOM_JOE (or $RANDOM_KID, etc) to just go out and drive someone's car without their explicit knowledge and permission. (Okay, so you can hotwire a car, but...) It's very easy for someone other than the computer owner or ISP contractholder to have access to it and abuse it and stuff. So what do you propose? Mandatory cardreaders on all computers? Fingerprint scanners integrated into keyboards? How else can you avoid Mom logging online, and then letting the unlicenced kids roam free online, allegedly to do "research for school"? Do you want to fine/jail/etc Mom if the kids download a trojan somewhere? Fourthly, as someone pointed out, the first generation always complains. I hate to show how young I probably am compared to many on this list, but my jurisdiction introduced graduated driver's licencing a few years before I was old enough to get a driver's licence, and it angers me that the random guy who's out on the road driving like a moron had to go through way less bureaucracy, road tests, etc than me simply because he was born ten years before me. That said, if no reforms are made to make this system stricter, I'm sure the next generation won't see this system as an outrage simply because they won't remember an era when the bureaucracy. Currently, people can buy computers/Internet access/etc unregulated at the random store down the street. You're proposing that some regulatory authority require licencing... Why should these voters accept it? Especially since, unlike with cars, the damage done by poorly-operated computers is rather hard to explain to a technologically-unskilled person. Most would respond something like "well, it's not my fault some criminal wrote a virus/exploit/whatever. Put that person in jail, and let me mind my own business." Good luck educating them on the fallacies in that statement. Fact is, until home computer security issues result in a pile of bloody bodies to show on CNN, no one in the general public and/or the legislative branches of government has any incentive to care... Vivien