[9196] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: sleaze
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Paul Robinson)
Tue Dec 21 05:49:37 1993
Date: Tue, 21 Dec 1993 05:23:24 -0500 (EST)
From: Paul Robinson <PAUL@tdr.com>
Reply-To: Paul Robinson <PAUL@tdr.com>
To: Privatizing the Internet <com-priv@psi.com>, bukys@cs.rochester.edu
>From: Paul Robinson <PAUL@TDR.COM>
Organization: Tansin A. Darcos & Company, Silver Spring, MD USA
-----
bukys@cs.rochester.edu, writes:
> Re:
>
> A huge problem is that access providers do not control
> what's out there or reachable.
>
> The same is true of our phone company, which has the advantage of
> being a common carrier.
This is only for legal reasons; the phone company just wants to sell
lines, unless you are doing something that reduces their profits, they
don't really care what you send over the line. Which is why they have
been trying so hard to make people using data services to pay more,
because they use the lines more and thus they think they can make more
money off of them.
> Even so, there are still controls in place:
>
> * Phone companies put for-pay sleaze services behind special
> phone numbers. It is possible to disable access to those
> phone numbers as a group. Even if not disabled, it is
> itemized on the phone bill so it can't be done in secret.
Only because it was technically easier to do it that way. In theory,
the phone company can make any number subject to a special surcharge,
in practice this is usually done on a per-exchange basis.
In Chicago, Ameritech has a number you can call that will tell you the
name of the owner of any listed telephone number and it might even give
you the address, I'm not sure. It costs 35c per call and allows 2 lookups.
It is on a regular phone number.
> * There are criminal penalties for saying certain things
> to certain people over the phone.
Only to the extent that such things are unwanted by the recipient.
Otherwise, it is only illegal to distribute if the material in question is
obscene.
> Perhaps the days of "set up a mail reflector or newsgroup and take
> no responsibility for content" will come to a close. Sleaze
> purveyors may still be free to use the net to distribute their
> wares, however, the threat of criminal prosecution if they make no
> effort to qualify their subscribers may crimp their style a bit.
Actually, if you set up a mail reflector and totally ignore it altogether,
saying "if people don't like the content, don't subscribe, or unsubscribe
if you are offended" you are on safer legal grounds than if you _do_
censor the content, since a service which does not control content is
usually less subject to challenge than one that does. See the Compuserve
case for more details on this one. If you remove people based on
complaints, then it may be considered that you _do_ monitor for content
and are thus responsible for the material being transmitted.
> This is a little harder over international borders, but
> diplomats don't like international incidents, so perhaps some
> international agreement over "acceptable use" will evolve.
> Privacy-enhanced mail has some effect, but if the basic
> principle is that people take responsibility for what they
> send, the method of transmission is secondary. Enforcement is
> still possible.
Oh really? As a feature for the benefit of a service I am setting up -
but available for anyone that wants to use it - I have gotten Speedway
to set up a dial up SMTP port. Dial 10288-1-503-520-2222 via modem.
At the "login:" prompt, type "smtp" and you will be transferred to
an SMTP prompt allowing you to send an SMTP data stream.
Since the messages come in from anyone dialing via AT&T, do you want to
tell me how you identify where the message came from? Certainly you can
route back to Speedway, but from there, you would have to get their logs
of the ANI of incoming calls, and then figure where the calls came from
beyond that point.
I had this feature set up to allow for asymetric routing of mail, e.g.
someone takes an incoming mail feed under a domain name which is being
done through a remailer service (like what Internet.com is doing), and
sends it to some place, perhaps a commercial account such as AT&T Mail.
Since they can't send out mail under the domain name they have, what they
would do is set up a program that creates an SMTP stream, and send it via
modem to this provider and they could send out mail under their domain
name.
Now if I could only get Bob Raish's company to fix the remailer, the
service would be excellent. As it is, I can't recommend it for commercial
use. Too bad.
---
Paul Robinson - Paul@TDR.COM
Voted "Largest Polluter of the (IETF) list" by Randy Bush <randy@psg.com>
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