* Tom Beecher: > An email to a user notifying them they're likely compromised costs > basically nothing.
If this increases the probability that the customer contacts customer support, in some markets, there is a risk that the account will never turn profitable during the current contract period. (Granted, my information may be woefully out of date, but my impression is that price-based competition is still pretty much cut-throat over here.) > If you find me an ISP that can't afford to notify users, I'll show > you one that shouldn't be in business anyways. I'm not blaming the ISP. (I may have done so in the past.) If we end up in such a situation, it's hardly the fault of one single ISP. > There's this presumption of guilt here, that Sony is right, and Simon's > subscribers are doing something malicious, yet they won't provide any > evidence of that. Even if they didn't know what it was, come back with > 'We're seeing weird bursts of [traffic characteristics] aimed at PSN during > these times. We're not quite sure what it is, but it's causing [problem > X].' It would still be a question of maliciousness or not, but it would be > something to work with. Providing nothing just perpetuates this finger > pointing game, and nothing gets solved. Yes, indeed. Resolving most networking problems needs cooperation, because at the most basic level, the Internet is still about connecting otherwise unrelated networks.
