John, Let me thank you yet again for devoting your personal time (on a Friday night no less) to responding to me concerns. I may not always agree with you, but I appreciate the effort, and the consideration. In message <4DB05053-FCD4-4459-B226-991435E90C65@arin.net>, John Curran <jcurran@arin.net> wrote:
We will shortly be providing a "list of number resources with no valid POC" for those who desire it (per the current bulk Whois policy.)
But I think you understand that I was suggesting something that's readily accessible, even to the Great Unwashed Masses, within the individual WHOIS records... not exclusive to just your ordained bulk whois clientel. You did get that, right?
If you can put an annotation into a whois records for a POC, saying explicity that you can't get ahold of this person, then it would seem to me to be a rather trivial matter of programming to transplant a very similar sort of annotation into each and every IP block or AS record that has that same specific POC record as one of its associated POC records, either Admin, or Technical, or whatever.
Also a nice idea, and one that I've taken as a formal suggestion for improvement.
Thank you.
Your understanding of our fraud process is correct, and presently the only form of "hijacking" which we have the ability to correct...
Well, now, as Ronald Regan used to say ``There you go again!'' I've tried to be clear. I'll try again. Many many many people have told me, off-list, and even before this conver- sation, that you folks can't change the routing table, and that even if you could, most probably would never want you to exercise that authority. So I do fully understand where the weight of public opinion falls along that particular axis. Believe me, I do. But please do try to understand me. I was not asking you to ``correct'' any hijacking incident. You can't. So let's just agree on that, and also agree that that is not what we are even talking about. What I said was ``annotate'' and/or ``announce'' and/or ``make _some_ sort of public statement or comment''. This, I think, would not be straying so substantially outside of your charter than anybody would ever beat you up over it, especially if you folks exercised the kind of caution and careful investigation which I believe you are more than capable of, and if you thence only made public ``This is really fishy looking'' type comments when your internal investigations have shown that yes, indeed, this one really looks, smells, and tastes pretty darn awful. (And frankly, I think this would apply to all four of the cases I have written about here recently.) So have I been unambiguously clear now? I neither want nor expect you to ``correct'' anything. That sort of thing, I would agree, is not your job. But I don't think that fact implies that either you personally, or ARIN as an organization have any kind of formal responsibility to behave as blind deaf mutes with no opinions whatsoever, at any time, about anything. Some people would tell you that its a free country, and that you have a right to an opinion. I guess what I'm saying is that when it comes to ARIN, and allegations of hijacking of number resources that you have been chartered to administer, you have not merely a right, but actually a _responsibility_ to an opinion. And you should formulate it, and state it, publically, when the need arises, which is to say whenever you receive a credible allegation of the misappropriation of number resources that lie within your portfolio.
I think you can see where I'm going with this. You have, I think, tried to demur (is that the right word?) on ARIN's behalf, from _either_ investigating or, subsequently, from issuing any kind of ``determination'' as regards to whether a given block is being routed by the party or parties who ought to be routing it, or by some uninvited interloper.
Incorrect. We determine whether an entry for an address block in WHOIS has been changed contrary to community-adopted policy. This means carefully reviewing the information supplied on the associated change requests and various corresponding public records. *None of it related to whether a given party should be routing a given address block*
Right. You may perhaps not have realized it, but I do believe that you actually just _agreed_ completely with what I said just above. At present, you decline to even look at things that don't involve the fiddling of WHOIS records. Somebody could be murdered in the next room, and you would decline to investigate that too, because the community hasn't explicitly chartered you to do that. I understand your position, and I think I may even understand what motivates it... like maybe years and years of having your own constituency beat you about the head and neck whenever you try to do even the smallest, kindest, and most generous and well-meaning things if they... the herd of cats... haven't explicity approved of you doing it, themselves, in writing, and in triplicate. But to say I understand your position, and to say that I can even under- stand what I believe motivates it, is not to say that I agree with it. I don't in this case. I think you are perhaps not in quite such a tightly fitting straight-jacket... created for you by your primary constiuency, the ISPs... as you make out, and that you do actually have some freedom to Do The Right Thing, especially in cases like these blatant hijacking incidents. But I also believe that you have made a private personal and concious decision not to touch any of this with a ten foot pole, because years of surviving in the kind of highly politically contentious job you have has taught you to never stick your neck out, even a little bit, even for an unambiguously good cause, unless what you plan to do or say (or what you plan to eat for lunch, or when you plan to breath) has already been approved, in triplicate, by the whole of the ARIN membership. I'm quite sure that that is the only practical and viable way to survive, long term, in a highly political job like your's. However I am equally sure that it is unhealthy for any human being to live in a straight-jacket for years at time, with no let-up. So despite you protestations to the contrary, I will say again that I think you have not only a right, but a responsibility to express an opinion on matters critically affecting the number resources that you are tasked to shepard... matters such as blatant hijacking of those resources by crooks... and that the same goes for ARIN, as an organization, and that furthermore, you do a disservice to the community, to your office, and yes, even to yourself as an intelligent, concious, living, growing human being when you hold your tongue on important matters simply because you have not been officially and formally bidden to speak. And you _don't_ always do that, consistantly and always, anyway. In fact right now, within this very exchange you and I have been having, you have expressed yourself in ways that, I feel sure, were not explicitly or specifically sanctioned by your board or your membership, yes? But you have shown yourself to be fully fit and able to express these opinions of your's anyway, as part of your reasonable exercise of your executive discretion, in your pursuit of what you believe to be the community's best interests. That is correct, isn't it? That's why you are here, arguing with me on a Friday evening, when we both should probably be doing something else. You are expressing your opinion, about certain matters relating to your job, and you are doing so in ways that you feel are supportive of the community which you serve... not with every sylable you utter having to have been be pre-approved... not with your corporate counsel looking over your shoulder at every keystroke. You're a bright guy, and a leader among men. You have an opinion, and you are expressing it, for the good of the community. Marvlous! I say Bravo! Just please explain to me how you taking a public position here, tonite, in this conversation with me... a position which you take and speak about and defend as part of your executive discretion, as the leader of ARIN, in what you hope will be its best interests and those of the community... is really all that different from what _I_ have requested you to do? i.e. take a position... a public position... on matters affecting your job and the resources you oversee, in the best interests of the community. I think you get my drift, because it isn't really all that subtle a point I am making. I don't think that you can have it both ways. I don't think that you can express your opinions, forcefully and eloquently, here with me, on a Friday night... as I believe you are free to do, within the limits of your executive discretion... but then go in to work on Monday morning and claim that you have been obliged to check all of your opinions at the door on the way in, and that both your and your organization are likewise obliged by protocol to remain utterly mute until cocktail hour, when you are off the clock and on your own time, even when it comes to matters as serious as raw blatant theft and hijacking... acts which deface and besmirch the very community you are sworn to protect. (Well, ok. Please _do_ allow me just a tiny bit of literary license, alright? They have Richard III on the IFC channel just now, and Shakespere in my general vicinity always makes my prose rather prolix.) Sigh. I feel sure that I haven't convinced you to bite off even just this tiny additional bit of authority/responsibility and stake it out as part of the turf that goes quite naturally with your executive discretion... discretion which you must be afforded, like it or not, by your constituency, in order for you to do your job. I'm sure that you have thought too long and too hard about your job, and what it takes to survive in it, long term, to be beguiled at this point by even the most evocative of retorical flourishes. But I will count myself as having been successful if I have at least caused you to think a bit more... not about what freedom you have to ``do'', but about what freedom I believe you have to speak, and to speak and express opinions in ways that benefit the community far more than your silence would (or does).
``Look folks, we've looked at this, and in our opinion, what's going on here just doesn't look kosher.''
The good news is that if you're referring to investigation of errant entries in WHOIS, we currently do expend effort to investigate and correct. In order for ARIN to investigate and annotate address blocks according to their state in the routing tables, it would take a very clear mandate from the community.
So you have said. So you have repeated. I am still not buying that you are nearly as handcuffed as you say you are, because if nothing else, you would have found it impossible to type this e-mail that I am responding to if you had actually been wearing the kinds of handcuffs you claim, i.e. ones which prevent you from even just expressing opinions on important and relevant matters.
You can suggest such a policy if you feel strongly about this; the process to to so is shown here: https://www.arin.net/policy/pdp_appendix_b.html
Thank you. I may perhaps do so. But I am not at all heartened to believe that doing so would be likely to have any effect, given that you have not evinced even the slightest hint, during this exchange of any actual desire to have your portfolio enhanced in this specific way. (And I think that your vote would, quite rightly, outweigh any others when it comes to such questions, i.e. those affecting the scope of your authority and responsibility.) In short, I leave discouraged, but unbowed. At least I know who _not_ to expend time reporting certain very naughty things to now, and I guess that is a small step forward, as it will save me some time which I can better spend actually chasing more of these hijacking weasles to ground. Regards, rfg