OK, I'm not just "an innocent victim" and I'm responsible for
putting my high performance sports car on the net but M1/AT&T owns the
highway
and they certainly have capabilities and facilities that far outstrip what I
have on my Linux Firewall.
<rant to follow>
This, once again, raises the analogy between the highways ( a publicly
funded and governmentally policed piece of infrastructure) and the internet
( a collection of private and public networks that interopperate so long as
they can agree on some protocol which is not centrally funded or policed as
yet). The problem with this analogy is particularly obvious in this case.
A publicly funded (through tax dollars) piece of infrastructure should be
equally available to all taxpayers. Usage can reasonably be lisenced and
lisences can be reasonably be revoked by the government.
In the case of the internet your service provider is a private business and
is not subject to the interests of the taxpayers but rather the
shareholders. The legal liabilities of the government for creating roads is
vastly different from the legal liabilities of the ISV for providing
connectivity. The nature of the damage that can be done by a bad netizen is
different from that which can be done by a driver on the road. The
efficiency and welcomness of policing against this type of harm is
non-existant on the internet and in cases overwhelming on the highways. It
might be better if the internet were government owned and policed (or not
8-)) but it isn't and this makes a large difference. Do you want M1/ AT&T
or the government policing your data stream to ensure that you don't get
hacked? Think about what that means. If they have the ability to actually
monitor the datastream for improper activities as described by (pick your
big-brother organization) I am not sure that I want them to do that. What
else will they do with the information that they pickup along the way while
they are looking for the Bad-Guys? When will they retro-actively decide to
change the description of "improper activities" and use thier log files to
come and get me or your because of our "anti-american, commi, linux-loving
freedom activities"? If you want the privileges that come with
participating in a relatively free society then accept the responsibility of
being self policing. If we won't police ourselves we will be policed.
BTW: if you live in Nashua and you want physical connectivity to Boston you
only have one high-bandwidth provider - Rte 3. doesn't that suck. And yes
you can have your lisence and registration permanently revoked for
misbehaving there as well. One definate difference is that you can't be
banned from driving for what is done by your car when it is stolen. But, of
course, the bartender can go to jail because you left his establisment and
crashed your car into the minivan full of MADD mothers. so is this really
any different. We unfortunately live in a society which is frantically
striving to avoid anything that smacks of personal responsibility and / or
ethics, as such you are often more at-risk legally for the actions of others
than for your own (which you can usually blame on someone else).
<rant over>
-----Original Message-----
From: Greg Kettmann [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Wednesday, April 25, 2001 12:42 PM
To: David Roberts
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: A story and some advice.
Folks: First, I really appreciate all the feedback. Most has been
excellent.
About the only area that I fundamentally disagree with is sort of the
combination "it's my fault / M1 - AT&T is doing OK". Yes, I accept my share
of the responsibility but I really, REALLY think that M1/AT&T, who have the
resources, should be doing something to try to actually go after the
crackers. OK, I'm not just "an innocent victim" and I'm responsible for
putting my high performance sports car on the net but M1/AT&T owns the
highway
and they certainly have capabilities and facilities that far outstrip what I
have on my Linux Firewall.
That said, my brother is a reporter and I can either get published or he can
get published. M1/AT&T is a monopoly and I think simply discontinuing
someones service "forever" and ignoring the "cracker" is not an appropriate
behavior. So please, any suggestions for writing to cover M1's
responsibility in all this? They're the only game in town and they're a
major
player on the Internet. Are they really taking the most appropriate actions
and doing all they can to make the Internet safe for everyone?
Clearly I'm biased and I'm mad right now. But it really bothers me that M1
can have so little corporate responsibility for solving these problems.
Yes,
they can just kick anyone off that get's caught port scanning but we all
know
that this is not a permanent solution. The cracker will just crack another
box and nothing will have been done to correct the core problem.
Finally, I'm very concerned about the perception here that Linux is bad for
the Internet. True Windows is a brick and Linux a Porsche but people buying
stuff at Best Buy don't care about that. They just want to browse the web.
Remember the saying "guns don't kill people, people do" (FLAMES OFF, this
was
not a political statement, merely an analogy). If a Linux box is more
capable
of doing damage on the web then this is a PR or a perception issue that must
be addressed and yes, in my current job capacity that's exactly the types of
things I worry about. The perception here is that Linux is a loose cannon
on
the Internet, if not properly bolted down and yet the average user has no
idea
how to bolt it down, therefore Linux is inappropriate for the aveage user.
I don't know. Please feel free to comment away. I'll post what I write
before I send it to my brother.
Thanks for all your help.
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