Re: Relays, Blacklists, and Laws

[Anders Andersson <]

Sabri Berisha sabri@localhost wrote:
>MAPS/ORBS is for telling the world about open relays. Not about the kind
>of laywers some people have. If someone sues MAPS/ORBS I'd be happy to
>support them if they put the papers online. But I will not blackhole any
>individual or ISP that is involved in the legal actions. How am I gonna
>explain it to my customer? "Sorry, $ISP is sueing MAPS so you can't
>receive mail from your grandfather that uses $ISP".

I'm not suggesting that MAPS should blacklist people suing them,
but that _somebody else_ should do that.  Making it an entirely
different service, on a different blacklist, from a different
provider, is an essential part of the solution, as MAPS would
probably be legally prohibited from taking any such action.  Put
that in a different country as well, just to play safe...

With a different blacklist for that purpose, the choice of using
it is yours.  If your customers wouldn't accept it, fine, use
whatever mix of blacklists and filters your customers are content
with.  I have a different, and probably much smaller, set of
"customers" at my university department, and I'll implement what
they will be content with.  If they ask me why I think we should
blacklist YesMail, I'll explain why, just as I have explained it
on this list.  If any of your customers is a member of this list,
he will be able to read the same explanation.  What to accept or
not to accept is (or should be) the user's choice.  Ultimately,
you and I are simply the users' agents, acting on their behalf.

If my employer tells me we must not refuse mail from companies
known to deliver their "advertising" by breaking and entering,
or by hijacking the mail delivery van on its route to us, I will
object with a reference to our security policy, but I will not
and can not overrule my employer's ultimate decision, since it's
my employer's mailbox, not mine.

And, MAPS is not solely for telling the world about open relays.
MAPS RSS is, but the MAPS DUL and the MAPS RBL are each different
matters.  If you are worried about your customers not being able
to receive mail from their relatives, you probably aren't using
the RBL, since it lists also ISPs providing spam support services
such as spamming software and webhosting for businesses involved
in spamming, none of which implies actually transmitting spam via
their networks.  I use the RBL myself, but I could probably do
without it, since the amount of mail rejected due to RBL listings
is about 1/100 of what the RSS and DUL reject combined.

--
Anders Andersson, Dept. of Computer Systems, Uppsala University
Paper Mail: Box 325, S-751 05 UPPSALA, Sweden
Phone: +46 18 4713170   EMail: andersa@localhost