This OT, and for those of you with virgin ears, don't read more. This is
specifically to Ronald:
Maybe, if you didn't act like a flaming douchebag, and were polite to
people, they would be more interested in helping you out. Learn to use some
fucking manners. Every single message I've seen from you has been
condescending. I agree, this entire situation and situations like it are
fucked up. That doesn't give you the right to start demanding answers from
people, and in general treating everyone else like we are your personal
servants, and are responsible for making sure your every whim is carried
out.
That being said, I'm probably going to get banned for that, but I feel it
needed to be said.
Grobe
And were it ten or fifteen years ago, I might agree with you.
But it's not. By now, everyone knows, or darn well should know, that abuse
of all descriptions has long since passed the threshold of "epidemic" and
is approaching "pervasive". With that in mind, everyone should also realize
that it's their obligation to do anything/everything they can to assist the
collaborative network community in (a) identifying abusers and (b) denying
them services -- permanently.
Which means that if, for example, an entity is identified as being
involved in network hijacking or phishing or spamming or whatever, that
everything known about them should be published -- including scans of any
paper documents involved. There is no reason to protect filth like this,
and every reason to out them. They flourish, in large part, precisely
because that *doesn't* happen.
And while Ron's bedside manner might be a little abrasive from time to
time (and so's mine, so I'm not criticizing), he's a cupcake compared to
kind of sociopaths we're up against. If you can't handle a few mildly
toasty comments from him, then you're no match at all for them.
So the hell with his prose: focus on the matter at hand. Let's find out
what happened here and how, who's responsible, and what it'll take to stop
them from doing it again and again.
Because they will.
---rsk
Well put, but falling on deaf ears. "Oh, we are not the police" mantra is either an excuse for being an idiot or too anal to see what should be done. But when gov'ts will step in to make sure this type of issue is fixed in thye future, those same talking heads will be crying about how the Internet is now ruined.
I've been down this path all too often to know you are tilting at windmills. Live with it. I do.
-Hank
Please note, I'm not arguing against fixing the problem. I just think we
should show each other some professional respect, and use some manners.
I may regret wading into this one....
Regarding posting from a Gmail account, I'm also posting from a non-work account, for two reasons. One, our company policy is to tag an annoying legal disclaimer onto every outbound message, and two, I don't want anything I say on this list to come back on the company I work for. I'm not authorized to speak for them, so I won't.
When it comes to abuse complaints, we investigate and act to protect our customers and our network when we determine that abuse is indeed happening. Only after we deal with the immediate threat do we contact our customer to let them know. Although there are cases of intentional abuse, the majority of the time the customer has no idea what we're talking about. They have to get their tech people or an outside support company to look into the problem, and then they call us back when they have it fixed. Sometimes we work directly with their tech people to help them identify the source.
We would NEVER "out" the customer to the public, even if we felt the abuse was intentional. My CEO and our lawyers would blow a gasket if we were to potentially libel a customer. There have been plenty of times when I was every bit as frustrated as some of the people on this list, but to start naming names without proof? Won't happen.
Jason
And this why we (the community) find ourselves where we do, because
nearly everyone has this policy or one quite similar to it. Until
this changes -- which will require CEOs with spines and lawyers who
craft ToS agreements that stipulate full disclosure in abuse cases --
there will always be one more place for The Bad Guys to go.
And they will: even if they *could* stop, and clearly many of them
are sociopaths who can't, why should they? It's too lucrative and
the chances they'll endure any meaningful sanction are tiny, doubly
so if they have any talent for the usual shuffle. (Which is: agree
to a pathetic settlement, promise not to do it again, dissolve the
company, start a new company, do it again.)
---rsk
Full disclosure in abuse is not necessarily equivalent to full disclosure in -suspected- abuse. The earlier comments in this thread were more or less demands for disclosure when the vendor had not yet been able to speak with the customer to determine if there was indeed abuse and if it was intentional.
I suppose theoretically that a ToS could be crafted that would allow the vendor to release customer information in the case of ANY suspected abuse, but do you really think that would make a difference to "The Bad Guys"?
Jason
Jason
A better question - would it make a difference to The Bad Guys if the ToS
included a "Name and Shame" clause, where if they were terminated for cause the
fact *would* be publicized?
I doubt it. The kind of person who perpetrates mass abuse probably doesn't have a conscience.