Re: Use a Firewall, Go to Jail?
Hi,
Well, although I don't live in the US, their laws have surprised me from
time to time.
However, I read this as:
1) Don't spoof your IP address.
2) Don't sniff packets not belonging to you.
With encrypted e-mail channels, communications are still between your ISP
(if they store your e-mail) and yourself, so no problem there. And hey, if
they store your e-mail, they know the 'from' and 'to' fields anyway.
With NAT, communications cannot be pin-pointed to a single computer, but
still to an ISP's subscriber, so no problem there.
I don't know what they want to achieve with a bill like this, but
firewalls will not be banned.
That's my opinion, anyway, ;-)
David
On Wed, 2 Apr 2003, Peter Christensen wrote:
> Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2003 23:33:54 -0500
> From: Peter Christensen <christenpet@snip.net>
> To: debian user <debian-user@lists.debian.org>
> Subject: Use a Firewall, Go to Jail?
> Resent-Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2003 22:50:35 -0600 (CST)
> Resent-From: debian-user@lists.debian.org
>
> The reason I posted this here is because if you follow the link at the
> bottom, it says that most versions of Linux and recent versions of Windows
> would be in violation of laws that are being considered in several states.
> This sounds so crazy that it's hard to believe. Maybe the author is
> misinterpreting the law...
>
> Peter Christensen
>
> "The states of MA,TX, SC, FL, GA, AK, CO, & TN are preparing to consider
> bills that apparently are intended to extend the national Digital Millennium
> Copyright Act...bills would flatly ban the possession, sale, or use of
> technologies that 'conceal from a communication service provider...' Your ISP
> is a communication service provider, so anything that concealed the origin or
> destination of any communication from your ISP would be illegal - with no
> exceptions. If you send or receive your email via an encrypted connection,
> you're in violation, because the 'To' and 'From' lines of the emails are
> concealed from your ISP by encryption...Worse yet, Network Address
> Translation (NAT), a technology widely used for enterprise security, operates
> by translating the 'from' and 'to' fields of Internet packets, thereby
> concealing the source or destination of each packet, and hence violating
> these bills. Most security 'firewalls' use NAT, so if you use a firewall,
> you're in violation."
>
> http://freedom-to-tinker.com/archives/000336.html
>
>
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