[194958] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: Vendors spamming NANOG attendees
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Mel Beckman)
Tue Jun 13 21:39:48 2017
X-Original-To: nanog@nanog.org
From: Mel Beckman <mel@beckman.org>
To: Mark Andrews <marka@isc.org>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2017 01:39:39 +0000
In-Reply-To: <20170614001037.527487BA2FBB@rock.dv.isc.org>
Cc: "nanog@nanog.org" <nanog@nanog.org>, Rich Kulawiec <rsk@gsp.org>
Errors-To: nanog-bounces@nanog.org
Mark,
The problem with your idea is that these NANOG attendee emails aren't illeg=
al under CAN-SPAM. This toothless Act let's anyone email any address they w=
ant, however obtained, with virtually any content (except sexually explicit=
), as long as they don't use misleading headers, deceptive subject lines, o=
r obscure the fact that the email is an ad. Those features, plus clear iden=
tification of the originator and an opt-out mechanism, let anyone send unli=
mited spam.=20
So, in reality, these so-called NANOG spammers are within the law. We just =
don't like what they're doing.=20
We definitely can't sue them as you advise. In fact, individual CANT use un=
der CAN-SPAM. Only we network operators can.=20
Thanks for nothing, Congress.=20
-mel via cell
> On Jun 13, 2017, at 5:10 PM, Mark Andrews <marka@isc.org> wrote:
>=20
>=20
> In message <38E506A8-247A-478F-9C4D-21602BEE6028@beckman.org>, Mel Beckma=
n writes:
>> That still leaves the question: how to you invoke this financial
>> punishment? Prohibit NANOG members from buying their products?
>=20
> Everyone that has received the email bring a action under the
> CAN-SPAM act. Really if you don't want the list to be harvested,
> which is illegal under the act, bring the action. Opt out doesn't
> save the sender if they have already committed a illegal act.
>=20
> Mark
>=20
>> -mel via cell
>>=20
>>>> On Jun 13, 2017, at 10:12 AM, Rich Kulawiec <rsk@gsp.org> wrote:
>>>>=20
>>>> On Tue, Jun 13, 2017 at 03:31:46PM +0000, Mel Beckman wrote:
>>>> Sometimes they're ignorant and don't realize they're spamming.
>>>=20
>>> That excuse stopped being viable sometime in the last century. They
>> know
>>> exactly what they're doing, they're just counting on the prospective
>>> gains to outweigh the prospective losses. If they're right, then the
>>> spamming will not only continue, it will increase. (As we've seen:
>>> over and over and over again.) That's because they don't care about
>>> being professional or responsible or ethical: they only care about
>> profits.
>>>=20
>>> So the choice is clear: either make it plain to such "people" (if I
>>> may dignify sociopathic filth with that term) that this is absolutely
>>> unacceptable and that it will have serious, immediate, ongoing negative
>>> financial consequences, or do nothing while the problem escalates
>>> indefinitely.
>>>=20
>>> If you give people the means to hurt you, and they do it, and
>>> you take no action except to continue giving them the means to
>>> hurt you, and they take no action except to keep hurting you,
>>> then one of the ways you can describe the situation is "it isn't
>>> scaling well".
>>> --- Paul Vixie, on NANOG
>>>=20
>>> ---rsk
>=20
> --=20
> Mark Andrews, ISC
> 1 Seymour St., Dundas Valley, NSW 2117, Australia
> PHONE: +61 2 9871 4742 INTERNET: marka@isc.org
