Handling Campus AUP (non-)Violations?

speby asks: "I am a CS student at Northern Illinois University and I recently compiled a working peer-to-peer file web-based file indexing system. I refused to sign their agreement that says I violated their Acceptable Use Policy because I sincerely believe I did not violate them. My system scans a large portion of my school's network hosts looking for openly accessible, anonymous Windows File Shares, and bandwidth usage is minimal. The AUP does not mention scans and I did not 'break' or 'crack' security in any way. I agreed to shut the service down for a period of time until I can figure something else out. I do not agree with their stance on this issue and I believe I have a right to design, implement, and make available such a service. I certainly did not see anything in their terms of service that would disallow such a system. Do these other universities that allow this kind of system care? Why can this system not exist here?" I have no problem with a student being told to shut down a homebrew service if they find it offensive, but I do have a problem with them treating said students like criminals, even when they do comply with their wishes. What should students do, when they are bullied by their colleges into signing violations that are more stringent than the situation merits?

"I was contacted by the IT department after a few weeks of its public running. I did not actively promote the system. It works in ways similar to the file search engines like the ones at Iowa State University and Georgia Technical Institute. In terms of programming, this idea is so trivial anyone could do it with the help of some simple scripting and a lightweight database."

Comments

wow.

[timdorr]

I'm a student at Georgia Tech and a heavy user of Buzzsearch. We used to have a previous system in place that was actually a resnet-created invention (browse.resnet.gatech.edu). However, with the increasing quality of buzzsearch and the aging code that powered browse.res, it was shut down and now our file-sharing is a student-run affair. Perhaps the biggest reason why our college support this (and many others should as well IMO) is bandwidth usage. Namely, external bandwidth usage (aka, the stuff your school PAYS for). It doesn't cost anything for our school to have me send a file from me to my roommate, but it costs a recurring fee of an OC12 line to send something to my friend in New Hampshire. Realistically, you could EASILY come accross to your school saying that you're saving their bandwidth costs wtih such a system in place. Plus, keeping it student-run will keep down on their liabilities. Oh, and you could always "lose" some logs if there's an incident :) If I were you, I'd be fighting tooth and nail to keep that service up. You are browsing PUBLIC information. You're not exploiting some bug in an operating system. You're not spreading a virus accross campus. You're simply allowing students to find the stuff they want in a faster, less costly, and more privatized manner. Put it back up and don't stop until they pull the plug. Then bitch and moan load enough to get them to allow you back up :)