Should ISPs Cut Off Bot-infected Users?

richi writes "There's no doubt that botnets are a major threat to the safety and stability of the internet — not to mention the cleanliness of your inbox. After years of failure to act, could we finally be seeing ISPs waking up to their responsibilities? While ISPs can't prevent users getting infected with bots, they are in a superb position to detect the signs of infection. Contractually, the ISP would be reasonably justified in cutting off a user from the internet, as bot infection would be contrary to the terms of the ISP's acceptable-use policy."

Comments

Re:Yes

[paulej72]

We have implemented this at Princeton University. Port 25 blocked, unless you specifically ask for it. All users who were using outside email services also had to change to use port 587 to connect to their mail servers.

We are trying to be good net citizens an not have mail bots running from our network.