NSI to be RBL'ed?

An anonymous reader, thank his kind soul, submitted the following: "MAPS is considering black holing NSI for its repeated spamming of the 5 million owners of domain names. I don't know about you, but I don't think being spammed is part of the "business relationship" I signed up for when I registered my domains, thus I don't think NSI should be spamming me. But, man it could hurt a lot of people if NSI does get RBL'd. Of course, it could help raise awareness of the issue, and maybe demonstrate to NSI that we don't appreciate being pushed around.". It will be interesting to see how this plays out. NSI certainly isn't making many folks happy these days. Read more for the full scoop. Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 16:02:14 -0700
From: Paul A Vixie
Subject: possible RBL event coming up involving NSI

------- Blind-Carbon-Copy

To: interest@mail-abuse.org
cc: rbl@mail-abuse.org
Subject: possible RBL event coming up involving NSI
Date: Fri, 30 Jul 1999 16:02:14 -0700
From: Paul A Vixie

You are receiving this because you are either an interested outsider, or a staff member or volunteer, or a customer of M.A.P.S., LLC. Note our new domain name, mail-abuse.org. (The old maps.vix.com domain name gave some the false impression that MAPS was not a separate company.)

Today we received the letter below from NSI in response to our repeated attempts to get them to stop sending unsolicited bulk commercial e-mail to all domain holders. In this letter, NSI implies that they will sue us for damages and incite entities like Amazon.com to do likewise if we decide to blackhole them, and then go on to say that they have no intention of stopping the current business practice of these which caused our complaints.

They are pretty much daring us to blackhole them. The board of MAPS, LLC will make its final determination in the next few days, and if we do decide to blackhole NSI it's going to get ugly. As an interested party, we want you all to know what's happening.

=================================

July 30, 1999

VIA FIRST CLASS AND
ELECTRONIC MAIL

Nick Nicholas, Executive Director
Mail Abuse Prevention System, LLC
950 Charter Street
Redwood City, CA 94063

Re: Nomination of NSI for Black List

Dear Mr. Nicholas:

Thank you for the opportunity to respond to your email to me dated July 16, 1999, regarding the Realtime Blackhole List ("Black List") managed by the Mail Abuse Prevention System LLC.

Enclosed is a copy of a letter I sent today to Mr. James Wagner, President of Hypertouch, Inc., the complainant who apparently prompted your July 16 email to me. Network Solutions has removed Mr. Wagner's name from its mailing list. As noted in the letter, Mr. Wagner could have avoided receiving the subject email in the first place had he simply followed the mailing list removal procedure specified in an email transmitted to him on March 30, 1999.

There can be no doubt that Network Solutions has an existing business relationship with the administrative, technical and billing contacts for a given domain name registered with Network Solutions. These people are the principal points of contact through which Network Solutions transacts business with its customers. They have been so designated by our customers in their domain name registration agreements with Network Solutions.

These are precisely the types of relationships that the California legislature wanted to shield from the restrictions contained in its unsolicited email statutes. Indeed, the statute's protection of communications between persons involved in existing business relationships reflects the state's determination that such communications are not "spam," but rather vital catalysts to free and open commerce. We are aware of no law that prohibits companies from communicating with their own customers.

We respectfully suggest that MAPS and any other person involved in the compilation and dissemination of the Black List adopt a definition of spam that is consistent with the principles recognized by California. Any more expansive definition is overly broad and may unreasonably restrain trade. Indeed, it is apparent that Mr. Wagner's principal concern about Network Solutions' emails is the competitive threat they represent to his company's ISP business. Those emails reference Internet companies that are competitors of Mr. Wagner's company, Hypertouch, Inc. It appears Hypertouch, Inc. hopes to shelter itself from such competition by combining with those who control the Black List and its technology to restrain such competition.

If inclusion on the Black List will effectively block Network Solutions from contacting 40% of the Internet, as you claimed in your email of July 29, 1999, MAPS's actions would have severe and irreparable consequences on the company's relationship with its customers. Network Solutions has over 5,000,000 customers. Consequently, if you place Network Solutions on the Black List, 2,000,000 (40%) of its own customers presumably would be unable to receive important information from Network Solutions, including invoices and deactivation notices, possibly leading to the revocation of their domain name registrations. You should be prepared to accept the consequences of your actions should a company such as Amazon.com lose its domain name, and thus its e-commerce business, as a result of having its notices and invoices intercepted and destroyed. It is difficult to believe that MAPS would be willing to take such drastic actions based on the self-serving complaint of Mr. Wagner.

Indeed, MAPS's overly expansive definition of spam exposes MAPS and those who own or control the Black List to, inter alia, civil claims of: (1) illegal combination in restraint of trade violating Section 1 of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. ? 1; (2) unfair competition; and (3) intentional interference with contractual relationships.

Network Solutions will not hesitate to take all actions necessary to protect its rights and ensure that its channels of communications to its own customers remain open. I hope that such measures will be unnecessary and that you will opt not to include the company on the Black List. p

Please advise me of your decision and do not hesitate to contact me if you wish to discuss this matter further.

Very truly yours,
Jonathan W. Emery ==============

Comments

L.O.L....

[trims]

I love lawyers. All they seem to know how to do is threaten and bully, regardless of how empty their threats are.

As I understand it, RBL is a subscription service. That is, the sites that use the RBL have chosen to participate, and are voluntarily not receiving email from anyone on the list. So, if you can't send mail to me, it's because I've chosen not to listen to you. All the ISP's that I've seen that use the RBL announce this fact, so businesses that use them should be aware of this.

Secondly, email is not a legally binding (or allowable) method of conducting business. You can't send invoices only by email, and then claim in court that you gave proper notice (at least in the US). Email has no guaranty of delievery, and the courts have not reconized it as a reliable method for transmitting legal/business documents. So NSI's invoice threat is moot. If they aren't sending invoices to Amazon via methods other than email, then terminate Amazon.com for some reason that was indicated in the email, well, guess who's liable for interference of interstate commerce? NSI!

Dolts.

I don't like the RBL. I think it's a poor (both technical and political) method of attempting to control SPAM. However, I dislike NSI even more. And if the Commerce Department is now stating that the whois database is it's property (which it is), then I can't wait for them to stick it to NSI for illegal use of government property for private commercial gain.

NSI sucks hard. They just need to die. Or at least fire all their top management.

-Erik