Re: [eff-austin] Antispam Bills: Worse Than Spam?
On Tue, Aug 05, 2003 at 07:06:46PM -0700, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > The state must protect my freedom of speech. So when I make a claim > against AOL for conducting a DoS attack against me, the state must > rule in my favor, or else they are failing to protect my free speech > rights. OK, for anyone who wasn't sure, it's time to stop feeding the trolls. pgp0.pgp Description: PGP signature
RE: [eff-austin] Antispam Bills: Worse Than Spam?
> Nice! I've been thinking I should move there for a while. I also > heard that by 2006 London and all the major cities will have seemless > wifi coverage. The reason Europe is on the ball with this is the EU We're on the way. We already have seemless camera surveillance coverage. -- Vincent Penquerc'h
Re: [eff-austin] Antispam Bills: Worse Than Spam?
At 23:03 +0200 5/8/03, Thomas Shaddack wrote: >Sometimes you don't have an effective choice. According to a friend, there >are still areas (especially rural) in the US where AOL is the virtually >only game in town. but AOL being the only access provider in town just means that you buy a TCP/IP feed off of them, ie use them as your PPP connection. You then run your mail off a.n.other service provider. AOL has great connectivity worldwide - all the people I know that use AOL just use it for IP not mail... f
Re: [eff-austin] Antispam Bills: Worse Than Spam?
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Nice! I've been thinking I should move there for a while. I also heard that by 2006 London and all the major cities will have seemless wifi coverage. The reason Europe is on the ball with this is the EU just passed five laws to deregulate emerging telecom companies so they can compete with the monopolists. A bit of wishful thinking here I think. [...] But it don't solve the spam problem :-( That's okay- the antispammers are a bigger problem, and this needs to be attacked first. Europe is already a step ahead of the U.S. on that. This is really not true at all. In fact it is far more likely (or maybe less unlikely) that European countries would pass draconian anti-spam laws than it is in the US because they don't on the whole have the same attitude to free speech. > I've got spamassassin to control spam. And so, maybe, do AOL. The real problem with your whole argument of the last week or so is that your mail is not passing across Mallory's back yard, or through pipes beneath his house - you are expecting him to carry it across and deliver it for you. And if he doesn't want to then he doesn't want to. Solution? Choose one of: - get your friends to use a different ISP - build your own network - get your government to take over AOL on your behalf and run it as a public utility - Get With The Program (TM) and fix your mail so it conforms with whatever arbitrary rules AOL have set up. After all SOME people manage to mail AOL customers. In their eyes you must be doing something wrong. How dare you stand against the Corporate Might (TM) of what Made America Great(TM)! - use letter post Each of the above has a downside.
Re: [eff-austin] Antispam Bills: Worse Than Spam?
* Sunder <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2003-08-04 17:00]: > > > Yes, this is the problem I'm trying to address. Normally when Alice > > tries to transmit information to Bob, if Mallory decides to sabotage > > the communication, this is a denial of service attack, forbidden by > > criminal law. > > Why is it forbidden by law? I can think of hundreds of reasons DoS attacks are illegal. Now I'm not sure if it's illegal everywhere; I'm only familar with the way it's written in the California Penal code, which is where Mallory is located in this case. But to answer your question, just look at all the damage that's caused by DoS attacks. Look at the Slammer worm. It would be a seriously neglectful to allow such damaging attacks on people and businesses. > Bob signed a contract with Mallory waiving certain rights in > exchange for the service provided by Mallory. Mallory provided full > disclosure of it's rights to Bob along with Bob's responsabilities, > etc. Bob chose to accept those terms, how is this illegal again? First of all, Bob was coerced into this contract because Bob had no idea that the fine print said there may be cases where he doesn't get the service he thinks he's paying for. Specifically, Mallory didn't tell Bob that she would be filtering his mail for him, and certainly didn't tell Bob that she would take the liberty of blocking some non-spam mail as well. Such a contract is quite questionable, and I'd like to see it put before a court for fair analysis. > If the service Mallory provides Bob is inadequate, that's between Mallory > and Bob, not between Alice and Bob. Alice and Mallory have no contract > what-so-ever. It's upto you, Alice, to convince Bob of this fact. If you > can't, that's Bob's choice, not yours. And you have no business to > interfere between Bob and Mallory. The problem with this argument is that Mallory is not just denying service to Bob, but Alice as well. Furthermore, Alice may not even have the option of explaining the service problem to Bob, because Mallory is preventing Alice from talking to Bob. Mallory is everyone's business, because a malicious attack on the Internet affects everyone. The fact that Bob is paying Mallory money doesn't make it okay- in fact, it worsens the problem, because the perpetrator is being compensated by her own victims. > > However, if the communication passes through Mallory's back yard, we > > can let the attack happen because it's on Mallory's property. > > Wrong. Bob agreed to those terms of service, it's not a denial of > service, it's part of Bob's agreement with Mallory. Such a contract is predatory, and has no business in this country. It prays on ignorant users, and provides a false representation for what the user is signing up for. FYI- you can't put anything you want in fine print, and expect it to be legally enforceable. Even if two parties agree that an illegal activity is okay, this does not legalize the activity. > > At the > > same time, if I sabotage the city water line that passes through my > > property, I can be held accountable. And rightly so. > > No. Either you have agreed to live in said house by purchasing it, and > have therefore become a citizen of said city, and by such actions agreed > to abide by it's laws, or pre-existing laws allowed the city to run such > water services through your propery. This too is by contract. This is just what I said. You're making my point here. Absolutely, I cannot sabotage the city water line that goes through my property. > Where, Ms. Alice, is your contract with Mallory again? No contract necessary; criminal law is enforceable w/out a contract. Even more so, actually, because there is no chance of a contract removing the effect of Alice's claim. > > AOL isn't even a human, so to put the private property rights of AOL > > above the well-being of any human is a silly mistake. > > So, in that case if you need a red stapler, you should be able to break > into AOL's offices and steal one? Since fucking when? Certainly not- there is no superceding free speech right or anything of the kind that would entail stealing a stapler. Blocking email, OTOH, violates multiple rights: free speech, right to assemble and petition the government, freedom of enterprise.. it could even run into public safety issues. So this stapler analogy doesn't really work here. > > In my particular case, AOL is blocking me from talking to friends and > > family. > > That's the choice of your friends and family, not yours. Take it up with > them, not AOL. While I have gotten all but one friend and all family members to drop their AOL/Earthlink services, this still remains an issue for users whome I don't know personally. > > and AOL is vandalizing my property by destroying > > these packets. > > No, dumbass, you placed those packets on said network repeatedly after you > have discovered that they will be dropped in the bit bucket, that's too > bad for you. You
Re: [eff-austin] Antispam Bills: Worse Than Spam?
* Peter Fairbrother <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2003-08-07 20:09]: > Peter Harkins wrote: > > > On Tue, Aug 05, 2003 at 07:06:46PM -0700, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > >> The state must protect my freedom of speech. So when I make a claim > >> against AOL for conducting a DoS attack against me, the state must > >> rule in my favor, or else they are failing to protect my free speech > >> rights. > > > > OK, for anyone who wasn't sure, it's time to stop feeding the trolls. > > > > Troll or not, if AOL censored email in the UK* it would be illegal > interception. 2 years for every interception. Nice! I've been thinking I should move there for a while. I also heard that by 2006 London and all the major cities will have seemless wifi coverage. The reason Europe is on the ball with this is the EU just passed five laws to deregulate emerging telecom companies so they can compete with the monopolists. In the U.S., the monopolistic heavyweights are eating our lunch. Telecom policy in the U.S. is warped by huge campaign contributions. Consumers are getting butt reamed on high broadband costs, and censorship is becoming a problem. > IMO, that's the only good thing to come from the RIP Act (the one with > not-(yet)-implemented GAK). > > Freedom to do your own thing is great, but what if the baby bells refused to > connect you to another baby bell? The benefits of a unified 'phone service > are such that legislation prevents baby bells doing that, and most of us > would agree with that legislation. IMO, email should be similar. With this republican absolute "free market" philosophy, the U.S. is going to end up eating it. As soon as Europe is fully wired (and unwired) I'll have one way plane ticket in hand. > But it don't solve the spam problem :-( That's okay- the antispammers are a bigger problem, and this needs to be attacked first. Europe is already a step ahead of the U.S. on that. I've got spamassassin to control spam.
Re: [eff-austin] Antispam Bills: Worse Than Spam?
* Sunder <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2003-08-05 17:29]: > > > > Why is it forbidden by law? > > > > I can think of hundreds of reasons DoS attacks are illegal. Now I'm > > not sure if it's illegal everywhere; I'm only familar with the way > > it's written in the California Penal code, which is where Mallory is > > located in this case. But to answer your question, just look at all > > the damage that's caused by DoS attacks. Look at the Slammer worm. > > It would be a seriously neglectful to allow such damaging attacks on > > people and businesses. > > No, you're ignoring my whole entire arguement - and that is telling. You > realize you're wrong, but just refuse to admit it. I didn't ask why > denial of service attacks are forbidden by law. That's obvious. This is exactly what you asked- just read the quote. > I asked why would AOL's policies in terms of their service > agreements be forbidden by law when their customers agreed to them? I answered this several times already. Listen up. Getting people to sign a contract excusing illegal activity does not make that activity legal. If it did, you would see drug dealers asking their customers to sign contracts stating that they're not to be held accountable. People cannot agree via contract to violate a law, then expect to be able to enforce such a contract. This is a concept you need to acquire. Contracts are not enforceable simply because there was an agreement. There is other criteria that must be adhered to, one of which is law. > They're not necessarily considered a common carrier since they > decided a long time ago to police the content of their service. And? It certainly doesn't matter to me whether we define these bozos as a "common carrier." What does matter is that they have a large piece of the market share, and their illegal practices have a significant impact on the internet community. > > > Bob signed a contract with Mallory waiving certain rights in > > > exchange for the service provided by Mallory. Mallory provided full > > > disclosure of it's rights to Bob along with Bob's responsabilities, > > > etc. Bob chose to accept those terms, how is this illegal again? > > > > First of all, Bob was coerced into this contract because Bob had no > > idea that the fine print said there may be cases where he doesn't get > > the service he thinks he's paying for. Specifically, Mallory didn't > > tell Bob that she would be filtering his mail for him, and certainly > > didn't tell Bob that she would take the liberty of blocking some > > non-spam mail as well. Such a contract is quite questionable, and I'd > > like to see it put before a court for fair analysis. > > Not at all. Bob agreed to the terms of service and was asked to both read > and acknowledge that he read them. AOL's terms of service are available > for anyone to read at any time. Regardless, should Bob not live up to his > end of said agreement, the contract would be null and void, as would his > access. This is just a restatement. I already explained that this is a predatory and misleading contract. If you don't accept this, then you must make an argument to the contrary. You would have a difficult time arguing that AOL users are aware of the TOS. Not a single AOLer who I convinced to leave AOL was aware of the AOL TOS. > Your claim that Bob was coerced is exteremely dubious. Care to support that statement with anything? > There is no proof of this, we do not have Bob here claiming this. We > have, only you, a third party uninvolved in Bob's agreement with AOL > making such claims because you cannot communicate with Bob. This is because Bob isn't a real person. Bob is a hypothetical character used to analyze security threats and activities, and Bob lives in a hypothetical world. So to summons Bob to this forum is quite a silly idea. You'll have for find a better way of making your point. > Either way, if Bob is unsure of what he agreed to, he (and you) can check > these pages: http://www.aol.com/copyright.adp and > http://www.aol.com/copyright/rules.html Why would Bob be motivated to check these pages, when Bob doesn't even know there's a problem? Remember, Bob is ignorant here; as Bob is not informed that legitimate mail with his name on it is being trashed. > Some relevant quotes addressing your dumb arguements: These quotes only prove my point that the contract is predatory. Again, you made my point for me. > These are the terms to which Bob has agreed to. It clearly states that > AOL may if it chooses to remove access to content it deems harmful for > whatever reason. It does not list what those reasons are, therefore, they > are at its discretion - NOT AT YOURS. Predatory- my point exactly. Again, you have made my case. > There is no need for any law to change this. Bob and AOL both voluntarily > agreed to these terms. End of story. Bob did not give his *informed* consent to these terms, only his consent. > > > If the service Mall
Re: [eff-austin] Antispam Bills: Worse Than Spam?
Peter Harkins wrote: > On Tue, Aug 05, 2003 at 07:06:46PM -0700, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: >> The state must protect my freedom of speech. So when I make a claim >> against AOL for conducting a DoS attack against me, the state must >> rule in my favor, or else they are failing to protect my free speech >> rights. > > OK, for anyone who wasn't sure, it's time to stop feeding the trolls. > Troll or not, if AOL censored email in the UK* it would be illegal interception. 2 years for every interception. IMO, that's the only good thing to come from the RIP Act (the one with not-(yet)-implemented GAK). Freedom to do your own thing is great, but what if the baby bells refused to connect you to another baby bell? The benefits of a unified 'phone service are such that legislation prevents baby bells doing that, and most of us would agree with that legislation. IMO, email should be similar. But it don't solve the spam problem :-( -- Peter Fairbrother *They do censor UK email, but they do it in the US. The relevant legal phrase is "public telecommunications service provider", not "common carrier". If you offer a telecomms service (eg email) to the public in the UK then you are a PTSP, and RIPA applies to you. No choice.
