[Mimedefang] OS wars... [was Viruses: Bounce or Discard?]

[Ben Kamen]

On Tue, 30 Sep 2003, David F. Skoll wrote:
>
> I don't know what things are like where you live, but here in Canada,
> most of the big ISPs do not offer "unrestricted access" to the Internet.
> Most, for example, forbid you to run servers, and many actively filter
> out SMTP and HTTP inbound ports.  Quite a few block outbound SMTP, forcing
> you to relay through their mail servers.
>
> Sure, some customers grumble.  But for residential service, at least,
> that's the future.

 MSN does that. My mom has service on my mail server and can't "get to it"
because they have port 25 blocked. Whoopdee doo. This will stop spammers?
No.  One of these days, I'll stop being lazy and have sendmail listen on
more than just port 25. There. Problem fixed, a$$holeMSN circumvented.
While I agree it'll stop these new virii with the built-in SMTP MUA's....
It will really make me look hard (like I have lots of choices) for another
ISP.

SBC HAS a AUP that prohibits activities like SPAM, but considering they
wouldn't do crap about the person who was hacking my server --- I feel
like it's just lip service. But they have policy in place to deal with
people like that. That's the reason I got DSL. I can do whatever I want
with it. My only other choice is CableModem and it doesn't work out for my
needs (being a computer/electronics consultant and all).

On another note: I know one guy who runs his domain out of ComCast
cablemodem using myDYNDNS.org (which kept serving my server bad DNS from
SOMEPLACE causing mail to him to fail and it was always "my fault"... grr)

> > and I think
> > there is still debate over whether the unintentional propogation of a
> > computer virus is even illegal; so its almost certainly not going to be
> > "finable" by a non-government party.
>
> Legality or illegality has nothing to do with it.  Just as ISPs can charge
> for excess bandwidth use, they can charge for transmission of viruses.
> It's just a different class of traffic, and they don't need government
> permission to do this, as long as they state their fee schedule up front.
> In most parts of the world, ISPs are not as regulated as Telcos, so
> they have considerably more freedom.
>

Then they should make it progressively cheaper for those who have
addressed risks like this by installing top of the line firewalls and use
AV/AntiSpam software etc.... yea... yea... right.

> > Finally, there are so many rouge ISPs out there (mostly outside the US,
> > but...) that we can't even get to stop a user (for example) flooding our
> > network with UDP packets... that it just seems to make ISP fining on a
> > global scale impracticle.
>
> That's a different issue.

 blacklists baby...


 -Ben


-- 
Ben Kamen - O.D.P, S.P.
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'/usr/games/fortune' says:
Larkinson's Law:
	All laws are basically false.