Re: Email Portability Approved by Knesset Committee

[Cian Brennan <cian.brennan () redbrick dcu ie>]

On Mon, Feb 22, 2010 at 04:24:54PM +0000, Robert Brockway wrote:
> On Mon, 22 Feb 2010, James Jones wrote:
>
> > Why does this seem like a really bad idea?
>
> While I think the principal is noble there are operational problems:
>
> 1) Large and increasing quantity of email will be forwarded between  
> Israeli ISPs, loading their networks with traffic that could have been  
> avoided.
Same thing applies to mobile companies. Realistically, this isn't going to be a
particularly massive amount of traffic.

> 2) Every time someone changes ISP and wants to continue using this 
> address they will need to notify their original ISP, who they may not 
> have had a business relationship with for many years.  This will be a 
> significant operational challenge I expect.  How do you confirm the 
> person notifying you is the real owner of the address, for example?
This bit is slightly more difficult. All the same, you can easily figure out a
password system for talking to support (with a login password, and a support
password, say. Not the most secure thing possible, but in practise as good as
any ISPs mail system's is likely to be.)
> IMHO it would have been better to require the ISPs to forward the email  
> for a reasonable period of time (say 3 months) to allow the user to make  
> relevant notifications (or just stop using an ISP bound email address).
Changing an email address takes far longer than 3 months, ime. I still get the
odd mail to one I stopped using 3-4 years ago.

> Unfortunately the links cited are in Hebrew so I'm only going on Gadi's  
> report here.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Rob
>
> -- 
> Email: robert () timetraveller org
> IRC: Solver
> Web: http://www.practicalsysadmin.com
> I tried to change the world but they had a no-return policy

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