The last spammer I blocked had actually provided an innocuous edit
summary, "punctuational corrections". Yeah, right: just visit our "pay
us to do your school homework" site, and we'll fix your punctuation.
W/r/t blocks, the option to block the IP address is always selected by
default. I always de-select it, because I can't be sure whether it's a
permanently-assigned broadband address (should block) or just a dial-up
address, assigned for the session; blocking that would just mess up the
next user who happens to dial in on that ISP port. Any thoughts?
Which brings me to the next question. Every privacy statement I've ever
seen has a provision like, "will be used for administrative purposes
only". I suggest that checking a blocked user's IP address against other
blocked accounts is a valid "administrative purpose", as it would help
determine whether to block it or not. The next level would be revealing
that address, and notifying the ISP that we have blocked that user. That
seems only polite to the ISP, which may reassign the address, possibly
leading to problems for an innocent user.
I suggest that we need a ruling from a manager (= "hire-fire power") on
how far privacy rights extend to a blocked user, and what are valid
"administrative purposes" in such a case.
--
/tj/
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