[170455] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: why IPv6 isn't ready for prime time, SMTP edition
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Laszlo Hanyecz)
Thu Mar 27 14:27:24 2014
From: Laszlo Hanyecz <laszlo@heliacal.net>
In-Reply-To: <5332EB04.9070409@frii.net>
Date: Thu, 27 Mar 2014 18:21:11 +0000
To: Scott Buettner <sbuettner@frii.net>
Cc: nanog@nanog.org
Errors-To: nanog-bounces+nanog.discuss=bloom-picayune.mit.edu@nanog.org
Scott,
You are exactly right, in the current environment the things I'm =
suggesting seem unrealistic. My point is that it doesn't have to work =
the way it does today, with the webmail providers, the mail originators =
and the spam warriors all scratching each others' backs. There has been =
a LOT of work done to make webmail easy and everything else practically =
impossible, even if you do know how it works. =20
What if Google, Apple, Sony or some other household brand, sold a TV =
with local mail capabilities, instead of pushing everyone to use their =
hosted services? If it doesn't work because we are blocking it on =
purpose, customers would demand that we make it work. Since this isn't =
a well known option today, casual (non tech) users don't know that they =
should be demanding it.
As far as why someone would want an MTA, it doesn't take long to explain =
the benefits of having control over your own email instead of having a =
third party reading it all. The problem is that instead users are told =
they can't have it. MTAs are built into every user operating system and =
they would work just fine if the email community wasn't going out of =
their way to exclude them. The lack of rDNS is just one of the many =
ways to identify and discriminate against end users who haven't bought =
their way into the club.
Spam is not a big problem for everyone. It's at a different scale for =
individuals and for large sites with many users.
-Laszlo
On Mar 26, 2014, at 2:58 PM, Scott Buettner <sbuettner@frii.net> wrote:
> This is totally ignoring a few facts.
>=20
> A: That the overwhelming majority of users don't have the slightest =
idea what an MTA is, why they would want one, or how to =
install/configure one. ISP/ESP hosted email is prevalent only partially =
to do with technical reasons and a lot to do with technical apathy on =
the part of the user base at large. Web hosting is the same way. A =
dedicated mailbox appliance would be another cost to the user that they =
would not understand why they need, and thus would not want. In a =
hypothetical tech-utopia, where everyone was fluent in bash (or =
powershell, take your pick), and read RFCs over breakfast instead of the =
newspaper, this would be an excellent solution. Meanwhile, in reality, =
technology frightens most people, and they are more than happy to pay =
someone else to deal with it for them.
>=20
> B: The relevant technical reason can be summarized as "good luck =
getting a residential internet connection with a static IP"
>=20
> (If your response includes the words "dynamic DNS" then please see =
point A)
>=20
> (Also I'm just going to briefly touch the fact that this doesn't =
address spam as a problem at all, and in fact would make that problem =
overwhelmingly worse, as MTAs would be expected to accept mail from =
everywhere, and we obviously can't trust end user devices or ISP CPE to =
be secure against intrusion)
>=20
> Scott Buettner
> Front Range Internet Inc
> NOC Engineer
>=20
> On 3/26/2014 8:33 AM, Laszlo Hanyecz wrote:
>> Maybe you should focus on delivering email instead of refusing it. =
Or just keep refusing it and trying to bill people for it, until you =
make yourself irrelevant. The ISP based email made more sense when most =
end users - the people that we serve - didn't have persistent internet =
connections. Today, most users are always connected, and can receive =
email directly to our own computers, without a middle man. With IPv6 =
it's totally feasible since unique addressing is no longer a problem - =
there's no reason why every user can't have their own MTA. The problem =
is that there are many people who are making money off of email - =
whether it's the sending of mail or the blocking of it - and so they're =
very interested in breaking direct email to get 'the users' to rely on =
them. It should be entirely possible to build 'webmail' into home user =
CPEs or dedicated mailbox appliances, and let everyone deal with their =
own email delivery. The idea of having to pay other people to host =
email for you is as obsolete as NAT-for-security, and this IPv6 SMTP =
thread is basically covering the same ground. It boils down to: we have =
an old crappy system that works, and we don't want to change, because =
we've come to rely on the flaws of it and don't want them fixed. In the =
email case, people have figured out how to make money doing it, so they =
certainly want to keep their control over it.
>>=20
>> -Laszlo
>>=20
>>=20
>> On Mar 26, 2014, at 2:07 PM, Lamar Owen <lowen@pari.edu> wrote:
>>=20
>>> On 03/25/2014 10:51 PM, Jimmy Hess wrote:
>>>> [snip]
>>>>=20
>>>> I would suggest the formation of an "IPv6 SMTP Server operator's =
club,"
>>>> with a system for enrolling certain IP address source ranges as =
"Active
>>>> mail servers", active IP addresses and SMTP domain names under the
>>>> authority of a member.
>>>>=20
>>> ...
>>>=20
>>> As has been mentioned, this is old hat.
>>>=20
>>> There is only one surefire way of doing away with spam for good, =
IMO. No one is currently willing to do it, though.
>>>=20
>>> That way? Make e-mail cost; have e-postage. No, I don't want it =
either. But where is the pain point for spam where this becomes less =
painful? If an enduser gets a bill for sending several thousand e-mails =
because they got owned by a botnet they're going to do something about =
it; get enough endusers with this problem and you'll get a class-action =
suit against OS vendors that allow the problem to remain a problem; you =
can get rid of the bots. This will trim out a large part of spam, and =
those hosts that insist on sending unsolicited bulk e-mail will get =
billed for it. That would also eliminate a lot of traffic on e-mail =
lists, too, if the subscribers had to pay the costs for each message =
sent to a list; I wonder what the cost would be for each post to a list =
the size of this one. If spam ceases to be profitable, it will stop.
>>>=20
>>> Of course, I reserve the right to be wrong, and this might all just =
be a pipe dream. (and yes, I've thought about what sort of billing =
infrastructure nightmare this could be.....)
>>>=20
>>=20
>=20
>=20
>=20
