To remove a site from the internet [competitor, bad guy, good guy, enemy, let your imagination run wild]... What is keeping someone from spamming half a dozen or so sites (just enough to get noticed) with the line "please visit site 'http://www.xyz.com' for more information."
The same laws that apply to someone running a false advertisement on TV or newspaper should apply here. Any ISP would be willing to help law enforcement with appropriate warrants to track the identity of the spammer. Take that one step further: we need legislations to make spamming illegal, just like making crank telephone calls is. I've a feeling even the smallest ISP would rather cooperate with law enforcement to help track the identity of the "law-breaking" spammer than the messed up system today where the selp appointed anti-spammers feel good about heaping guilt on ISP's rather than actually punishing the spammer. It is upto us whether we want to extend the civilized system (that gives the state monopoly over judicial matters) that protects our physical property to our cyberspace property or continue to fantasize that every ISP must implement "my version of the AUP". Sanjay.
On Sun, 20 Apr 1997, Sanjay Dani wrote:
The same laws that apply to someone running a false advertisement on TV or newspaper should apply here. Any ISP would be willing to help law enforcement with appropriate warrants to track the identity of the spammer.
Sigh. Which country's laws? If Canada passed a law against spam, who will Canadians complain to about spam delivered from the US? Suppose the spam originates in Canada, but is relayed through a non-Canadian mailserver before it arrives at the Canadian site? Think about it. Such a law would be much like the internet 'decency' law which the US Supreme Court is reviewing. They may as well be deliberating on whether to make rain illegal on Saturday, because it doesn't matter what they decide. Some US porn sites could get busted, but the sites would move to another country. And maybe not even that -- Move the JPGs to another country, and just use links on the porn site which refer to the JPGs. Germany is leaning on Compuserve about their news feed. But there is nothing to prevent German Compuserve users from using a non-German newsserver, so naked-women pictures will be available for the boys in .de. The only way that national law can ever shape the internet, is to divide the internet according to national boundaries. With each country cut off from each other, then you can have enforcable laws. I expect that in the case of the US, it would reduce spam by up to 10%. Send email from France to the US? No problem -- Write your email and send it to 'US-CustomsSpamInspector@Email.Imports.US.gov'. They will relay to the addressee. Bill
participants (2)
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Bill Becker -
Sanjay Dani