Re: Points on your Internet driver's license (was RE: Even you can

[Paul Vixie <vixie () vix com>]

owen () delong com (Owen DeLong) writes:

> Perhaps what is needed is a reporting agency, similar to the credit
> reporting agencies, where ISPs can register chronic problem-customers.
> Eventually, your internet credit rating deteriorates to the point that no
> ISP will offer you service.

it is with some discomfort that i watch the last decade or so of ultimate
final solutions to spam be rediscovered on a sleepy nanog weekend.  the
reason the above analogy fails to hold (and why that proposal isn't a
solution) is that credit reporting agencies have an established standard
for what "bad" is -- days overdue on payments.  there is no similar standard
for a tcp/ip endsystem, and there can be none.  a week doesn't go by without
some goober-with-firewall complaining that f-root is portscanning him.  as112
gets it every day at least two or three times.  someone else here reports
that his squid proxy is regularly reported by norton's tools because it sets
unusual bits in the tcp header.  and so on.
-- 
Paul Vixie