Subject: RE: [Asrg] Blacklist blackmail

From: "Hallam-Baker, Phillip" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2003 05:37:48 -0800

The paragraph in question being:

If you would like a site be added or removed from BlarsBL, you may hire
Blars at his normal consulting rates (currently $250/hour, 2 hour minimum,
$1000 deposit due in advance for non-established customers) to investigate
your evidence about the site. If it is found that the entry was a mistake,
no charge will be made and the entire deposit will be refunded. Send Blars
email from a non-listed account to verify current rates and arrange payment.

There is precedent here for this being considered outright blackmail. It is
not unusual for someone to call up a major software vendor to report a
'security problem' and demand to be paid a 'consulting fee' to fix it,
otherwise the 'security problem' will appear on Bugtraq or the like and
cause bad publicity for the company.

In this instance we have a threat to continue to advertise a statement about
the users of an IP address block unless a fee is paid. In most
jurisdicitions it does not matter whether the statement being made is true
or not. It is still blackmail if someone threatens to expose a true
statement such as reveal an affair, homosexuality etc.

Somewhat amusing is the following code points describing the reasons for
listing:

.8 Wants spam compainers to jump through hoops 

Would charging a $250/hr consulting fee constitute jumping through hoops?

Interesting side point, consider the MEDIA3/MAPS case:
http://www.mail-abuse.org/pressreleases/2001-01-02-media3.pdf

Here the court denies a preliminary injunction for the sole reason that
insufficient harm is demonstrated which in turn is shown by the fact Media3
waited 6 months to file the application. One of the side effects of this
case is that it implies that anyone who has been wrongly or maliciously
listed on a blacklist should apply for an injunction as a FIRST resort
rather than as a LAST resort because delay is likely to weaken their case. 

Another interesting point here, the ruling is typed on what appears to be
either a 1970s vintage Remington portable or someone messing with our minds
with software deliberately tricked up to look like one, complete with the
variable impact pressure of different keys etc. I suspect the former, so
deep in the home state of MIT courts who have yet to make it into the 1980s
with word-processing are deciding cases on the use of the Internet...

		Phill

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Kee Hinckley [mailto:[email-masked]]
> Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2003 8:34 PM
> To: [email-masked]
> Subject: [Asrg] Blacklist blackmail
> 
> 
> We are now getting RBLs who will remove your host from their 
> blacklist for a fee.  (See http://www.blars.org/errors/block.html for 
> an example.)
> 
> And yes, people actually subscribe to these.  And yes, they do block 
> non-spamming ISPs.
> -- 
> Kee Hinckley
> http://www.puremessaging.com/        Junk-Free Email Filtering
> http://commons.somewhere.com/buzz/   Writings on Technology 
> and Society
> 
> I'm not sure which upsets me more: that people are so 
> unwilling to accept
> responsibility for their own actions, or that they are so 
> eager to regulate
> everyone else's.
> _______________________________________________
> Asrg mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/asrg
> 
_______________________________________________
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---

From: wayne <[email-masked]>
Date: 28 Mar 2003 08:38:25 -0600

In <[email-masked]> "Hallam-Baker, Phillip" <[email-masked]> writes:

>                                                        In most

Right.

So what Blars is doing is *not* blackmail because he is not
threatening to release information.  He *has* released information.

It might be consider extortion if you think that Blars is intimidating
people by expressing his opinions, but I doubt that any court would
agree.  Blars doesn't seem very intimidating to me.

Blars is expressing his opinions via a DNSBL.  He is giving you the
option, for a fee, to have him reconsider his opinion.  I personally
don't think his opinions are worth the bits they are printed on.

-wayne

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2003 05:28:09 -0800 (PST)

I don't think its blackmail since they are not threatening to report to 
blacklist (the person is already on blacklist). But what they are doing 
isn't right be me either way and it maybe breaking some kind of law, 
though I can't immediatly see which one. If this is officially sanctioned 
by blacklist operator, I'd strongly advice not to use this blacklist.