-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 - -- "Steven M. Bellovin" <smb@cs.columbia.edu> wrote:

On Mon, 01 Sep 2008 11:08:20 -0400 Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu wrote:

...

a) There exist providers that are willing to take money from scum. b) We won't get rid of the scum until we admit (a) is true.

I mostly agree with you -- but I get very worried about who defines "scum". Consider the following cases, which I will assert are not very far-fetched:

I can certainly see how the definition of "scum" could be hijacked to fit any particular political agenda, too. For the particular purposes I referred to earlier, the definition would be: "Continuing to allow criminal activity to occur within your network." "Criminal activity" is easily definable by laws which state that malicious, willful, and concerted attempts to perpetrate financial theft, fraud, and unauthorized computer tampering are illegal. But with all the ensuing discussion, it would appear that this is a matter in which ISPs defer, and a matter best addressed by law enforcement. - - ferg -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGP Desktop 9.6.3 (Build 3017) wj8DBQFIvEXpq1pz9mNUZTMRAhRNAJ9nzEVp3PCAoQKFKltQFRwh3yLpwACg0gRO EnWO3Y4YQ/Z+F52z5il6Pdg= =cMVa -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- "Fergie", a.k.a. Paul Ferguson Engineering Architecture for the Internet fergdawg(at)netzero.net ferg's tech blog: http://fergdawg.blogspot.com/