----- Original Message -----
From: "John Glube" <jbglube(_at_)sympatico(_dot_)ca>
To: <spf-discuss(_at_)v2(_dot_)listbox(_dot_)com>
Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 2004 4:47 PM
Subject: RE: [spf-discuss] Indiustry Alliance Publish Anti-Spam Proposals
From: Karl Prince
Sent: June 22, 2004 2:55 PM
Subject: [spf-discuss] Industry Alliance Publish Anti-Spam
Proposals
I just read through the proposal. Okay, I don't
want to pick a fight with the big ISPs, but the
first mistake?
Not coming out and saying thou shall not use our
networks to send or transmit UBE.
If you read through pages 14 to 15 of the
proposal, the "Recommendations for Bulk E-mail
Senders" are - I better be polite here since this
is a public list - the DMA standards for
"legitimate" bulk mailers. This is code for
sending spam.
The proper course? Say "want to send email to
our networks in bulk? It must not be UBE and you
must be sender authenticated."
Please look into the history of agis.net and Cyberpromo.com to understand
the legal tangles an ISP can get into for creating, and especially for
enforcing, such a policy. They're deathly afraid of losing their "common
carrier" status with good cause, to protect themselves from being liable for
far more dangerous activity on their networks. Moreover, the backbone
providers (mainly UUnet) have adopted a completely hand-off policy towards
their lower and mid-level customers, which protects UUnet's short term
bottom line. (After all, they sell bandwidth, not quality!).
Many smaller and more major players have now adopted such policies, but it's
not yet enforced. Plenty of the companies sign "pink contracts" which
specifically exempt certain customers from such anti-spam policies.