March 27th 06, 02:27 AM
Since you have refuse to remove Carolyn Adamo Gulley for her harrasment
and breaking your own TOS... your up for Blocklisting.
News.Admin.Net-Abuse.Blocklisting
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
- About News.Admin.Net-Abuse.Blocklisting -
Q. What is news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting?
A. news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting (often abbreviated
"n.a.n-a.blocklisting" or simply "NANABl") is a moderated Usenet
newsgroup, formed for the purpose of discussing issues related to
blocklisting. NANABl is a neutral forum. It is not operated by, nor
does it represent, any blocklist operation(s).
n.a.n-a.blocklisting's purpose and posting guidelines are fully set
forth in the Charter for news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting. (You can
also find it here.) New posters to NANABl are strongly advised to read
it before posting.
If you're unfamiliar with Usenet, perhaps the single most important
thing to understand is this:
When you post to Usenet, your comments are sent to thousands of
privately-owned news servers and archiving sites all over the world.
Due to the way Usenet works, it is impossible to remove or alter them
on all Usenet sites.
If you're new to Usenet, it would also be best to read A Primer on How
to Work With the Usenet Community before posting for the first time.
Q. Why won't you remove me from your list?
A. Whatever blocklist you're on, it isn't "our" blocklist. "We"
maintain no blocklists.
News.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting is a Usenet newsgroup--a public forum
for discussing issues related to blocklisting. It is not associated
with, nor is it a formal communications channel for, any particular
blocklist. When you post to NANABl, you're inviting public comment from
whomever cares to do so. In most cases: People that reply to your posts
have absolutely no control over the blocklist in question.
You need to contact the maintainer(s) of whatever blocklist upon which
you're listed. (See the section entitled "If You're Blocklisted" for
more.)
Q. Why is news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting moderated?
A. Manual moderation is employed in an attempt to keep discourse as
civil and on-topic as possible. Please search Google Groupstm for
articles with the subjects "RFD: news.admin.net-abuse.email.blocklists"
and "RFD: news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting" for the discussions
surrounding NANABl's formation and Charter.
Q. What is blocklisting.com?
A. Blocklisting.com is a domain that was set up to support the
moderation system for news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting, and for a web
site to host this FAQ and a copy of the newsgroup's Charter. That's
all.
Q. What is nanab.org?
A. Nanab.org serves much the same purpose as blocklisting.com
- Posting Issues -
Q. Why was my post rejected?
A. If you provided a valid email address when you posted, you should
have received an emailed rejection notice explaining why. In general
terms: If your submission meets the posting guidelines in NANABl's
Charter, it'll likely be approved. The posting guidelines are
purposefully somewhat vague. They were written to give the moderation
team wide latitude, but in such a manner so as to bias the process
toward approving posts, rather than rejecting them. A good
rule-of-thumb to follow, when posting to NANABl, is "When in doubt:
Don't."
Q. But I've seen other posts worse than mine appear!
A. The moderation team is only human. Different moderators may have
different ideas as to what's acceptable and what's not. We do strive
for consistency. Often a moderator will poll the entire team for an
opinion if he or she is in doubt regarding a "marginal" submission.
The moderation team does tend to grant somewhat more latitude to
first-time posters--particularly those complaining of being
blocklisted. This isn't a "pro-spammer" bias on the moderation team's
part, it's simply an acknowledgment of two facts: 1. First-time posters
complaining of being blocklisted can reasonably be excused for being a
bit... emotional. 2. Experienced posters should know better, and be
able to handle themselves in a more professional manner.
Q. Why are "[BLOCK]" submissions frequently rejected?
A. NANABl is a discussion group, first and foremost. Submissions must
make a reasonable attempt at fostering on-topic discussion. Simply
posting a "[BLOCK]" post, content-less other than some spam headers,
whois information, or whatever, is more evidence or a nomination than
it is a discussion-opener. NANABl is not a submission queue for
blocklist maintainers. These are perhaps more suitable for
news.admin.net-abuse.sightings (aka: "NANAS") than for NANABl. This is
not to say that submissions containing blocklisting recommendations
will not be approved, but they must contain more than just "evidence."
Q. I followed up to a cross-posted message; why was it accepted and
mine rejected?
A. As a general rule: Cross-posted articles will not be approved for
NANABl. There are exceptions. (A policy change announcement by a major
DNSbl operator, for example.) Other times it's simply a mistake on the
moderation team's part.
Q. You approved a post that's nothing but lies/slander/liable! It's
your fault! You're responsible! Delete those slanderous lies!
A. Comments posted to news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting are solely the
responsibility of their author. The moderation team's sole
responsibility is to insure that submitted articles abide by the
newsgroup's Charter. The Charter does not oblige moderators to embark
upon laborious fact-finding missions. Indeed: The Charter explicitly
discourages moderators from evaluating an article submission on
anything other than whether its content meets the Charter's posting
guidelines.
Once an article is approved and propagated, we have no way to "take it
back" or delete it. The article will be propagated to thousands of
privately-operated Usenet news servers all over the world as well as
Google Groupstm.
Q. To whom do I complain about a NANABl moderation decision?
A. Email board-at-blocklisting-dot-com
Q. Why does it take so long for articles to show up in NANABl?
A. If you're reading from Google Groupstm, be aware that there may be
some lag between the time articles are posted and when they show up
there. Lags as long as 24 hours have been noted from time-to-time.
Other delays could be due to a delay in moderation action, (we have to
eat, sleep and work too, you know), hiccups in the moderation system or
speed-bumps in Usenet article propagation. Who knows?
Q. My posts aren't showing up in news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting!
A. If you're reading NANABl via Google Groupstm, see above.
If you are not getting a Received Acknowledgment when you submit an
article, and your "From:" address is valid, then you might want to
confirm with whomever provides your Usenet news access that they've set
things up properly for NANABl being a moderated newsgroup. Most service
providers provide support groups and/or support email addresses that
you can contact.
If you can find no other reason for the problem, you might try
contacting the moderation team at board-at-blocklisting-dot-com for
assistance. If all else fails, you can try submitting articles by email
directly to ins-at-nanab-dot-org, but this method suffers from the
disadvantage that article relationships in a thread may not be kept
intact.
Q. Why don't I get auto-acks from my posts to NANABl?
A. There are almost uncountable reasons as to why this might be. For
starters: Are you supplying a valid, deliverable email address in the
"From:" field of your newsgroup submissions? See above. Are you
spam-filtering? If so: Have you checked your "spam" mail folder? Maybe
the auto-acks are ending-up there? Are you, perhaps unintentionally,
blocking the moderation system's mail servers?
Q. Why do I keep getting auto-acks from my posts to NANABl, despite the
fact that I've carefully, repeatedly followed the instructions on how
to make them stop?
A. Is it auto-acks you're receiving (the ones that start with "This is
an automatic acknowledgment that your message has been RECEIVED..."),
or article approved/rejected notifications?. You can suppress the
auto-acks, but not the approved/rejected notifications.
Q. News.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting isn't on my Usenet news server.
A. You need to talk to your ISP or Usenet news service provider about
that.
Q. News.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting is on my news server, but it has
little to no content.
A. You need to talk to your ISP or Usenet news service provider about
that.
Q. Unmoderated posts are showing up in
news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting on my news server!
A. You need to talk to your ISP or Usenet news service provider about
that. They probably failed to specify that NANABl is a moderated
newsgroup in their news server's configuration.
- If You're Blocklisted -
Q. How do I contact a blocklist maintainer to get removed from their
blocklist?
A. Most blocklisting systems have an associated web site with
instructions on how one might go about contacting them to get ones self
de-listed. We suggest you check there.
One notable exception to this is SPEWS. There is no known way to
contact SPEWS directly. Instead, the SPEWS FAQ directs readers to the
Usenet newsgroups news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting and
news.admin.net-abuse.email. But note carefully the wording! The reader
is directed to these newsgroups for discussion. There is no promise
that posting to them will necessarily result in SPEWS changing its
listings. Above all, keep this in mind: SPEWS' FAQ directing you to
these newsgroups does not mean SPEWS will communicate with you in them.
Even if it does, it's almost a certainty it will do so anonymously--not
identifying itself *as* SPEWS.
Naturally, one should make sure the reason for which they found
themselves blocklisted has been resolved before requesting to be
removed.
In any event, one should not rely on posting to NANABl as a means to
get removed from a blocklist. There are several reasons for this:
As noted: The people that participate in NANABl don't necessarily have
any relationship with, or control over, any particular blocklist.
NANABl is an open discussion forum, where all who desire may
participate.
There is no guarantee that whomever is responsible for a particular
blocklist even reads NANABl, much less that they read it with any
regularity.
There is no guarantee that an article you post to NANABl will actually
make it to the news servers.
Q. Hey! I'm not a spammer! How come I'm listed in SPEWS, and how do I
get off of it?
A. This is the single most frequently asked question to date in
n.a.n-a.blocklisting, and the most frequent answer is apparently
difficult for many to grasp. Please read the following carefully:
If you've read the SPEWS evidence file, and it does not mention your
organization or IP address specifically, then no, you're not a spammer.
The SPEWS listing that affects you is not directed at you personally,
but at your provider, whom SPEWS apparently feels is failing to act to
keep spam off of their network. SPEWS initially listed that spammer,
and then broadened that listing to cover more of that provider's space,
and that's why suddenly you're upset to find that some of your mail is
bouncing. You have one or more of the following options open to you:
Contact your provider and ask that they first address their SPEWS
listings and then post here when that has been completed. They may do
this, or they may not.
Contact the mail administrators at sites who are blocking your mail
based on this SPEWS listing and ask that they whitelist you. They may
do this, or they may not.
Alternatively: Contact the person to whom you are sending email,
explain to them how their ISP is blocking delivery of your email to
them, and suggest they ask their email administrators to whitelist you.
They may do this, or they may not.
Another alternative that's sometimes suggested is to contact the mail
admins at the sites that are blocking your email and suggest they stop
using SPEWS. Some believe some mail admins perhaps don't fully
appreciate the scope of SPEWS' listings and, once apprised of what's
happening, they'll stop using it. On the other hand: This tactic could
back-fire on you. The mail admin may take offense at an outsider
suggesting how they run their mail server(s). Particularly if they've
found SPEWS to be effective for them.
Smarthost your outgoing mail through a machine not affected by DNSBL
listings. If you choose this option, it is probably best to choose a
different provider for your outgoing smarthost, in order to prevent
your new outgoing mailserver from encountering the same problems your
current mailserver is experiencing. There is also no guarantee that
whatever new provider you choose may not eventually run afoul of a
SPEWS listing, but it may be a better choice than staying with one that
has already had demonstrated problems with SPEWS.
Ask your ISP to move you to a new block of IP addresses, not listed by
SPEWS (or any other blocklist), and not near your current IP address
block or any other currently-listed block of IP addresses. Of course:
This solution may prove to be a temporary one (for the obvious reason).
Change providers. If contractual obligations make this impossible in
the short term, SPEWS has been known to punch holes in listings for a
few weeks or months for sites that have stated they will be leaving
their current provider as soon as possible. However, there is no
guarantee that this will happen either, or that whatever new provider
you choose may not eventually run afoul of a SPEWS listing.
Give up trying to send mail to sites that block based on SPEWS
listings.
Q. Isn't it illegal for those guys to block my email?
A. In a word: No.
Disclaimer: Some portions of the following discussion verge dangerously
close to legal opinion. Please note that the author is not a lawyer,
nor a legal expert by any stretch of the imagination. Furthermore: It's
written from the perspective of a U.S. citizen. Some comments may have
no validity in other parts of the world.
First of all: No blocklist literally "blocks your email." All a
blocklist does is list what its maintainers feel to be (potential?)
sources of network abuse. (Well, usually. See the relevant blocklist's
web site for its listing policies and criteria.) It is network and mail
server operators that consult the information published by a blocklist
that actually block network traffic. In other words: The blocklist is
publishing an opinion or advisory. The users of that blocklist, a
network's owners, operators and administrators, may choose to block
network traffic based on that. (Some only "tag" email based on
blocklist information, by the way.)
Granted, it may clearly appear to be the intent of of a particular
blocklist that its listings result in blocking network traffic, but
that doesn't change the fact that the blocklist itself doesn't actually
block anything.
Secondly: Understand that the Internet is not a "public" network, per
se. The Internet is a network of inter-connected private networks. No
private network is required to carry any network traffic it doesn't
wish to. Your Internet service provider is probably bound by a
contractual agreement with you to provide a certain level of service.
The other private networks on the Internet are under no such obligation
to you. Put simply: Your ISP may be required to see that your email is
sent. Other networks are under no obligation to receive it. If they
choose to base (some of) their network policies on the opinions of a
third party, so be it.
- Miscellaneous -
Q. What does "RTFM" mean?
A. Please see RTFM in the Jargon File.
Posters please note: Moderators are unlikely to approve follow-ups that
consist solely of "RTFM".
Q. What does "RTFF" mean?
A. Read The Fine FAQ, a variant of RTFM. Also RTFAQ
Posters please note: Moderators are unlikely to approve follow-ups that
consist solely of "RTFF".
This moderation business is harder than I expected it would be.
-- Anonymous NANABl Moderator
Related Links
Charter for news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting (blocklisting.com)
Charter for news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting (nanab.org)
news.admin.net-abuse home page
-[news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting Charter]-
Page Created: Jan. 4, 2004. Last Updated: Apr. 25, 2004
and breaking your own TOS... your up for Blocklisting.
News.Admin.Net-Abuse.Blocklisting
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
- About News.Admin.Net-Abuse.Blocklisting -
Q. What is news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting?
A. news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting (often abbreviated
"n.a.n-a.blocklisting" or simply "NANABl") is a moderated Usenet
newsgroup, formed for the purpose of discussing issues related to
blocklisting. NANABl is a neutral forum. It is not operated by, nor
does it represent, any blocklist operation(s).
n.a.n-a.blocklisting's purpose and posting guidelines are fully set
forth in the Charter for news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting. (You can
also find it here.) New posters to NANABl are strongly advised to read
it before posting.
If you're unfamiliar with Usenet, perhaps the single most important
thing to understand is this:
When you post to Usenet, your comments are sent to thousands of
privately-owned news servers and archiving sites all over the world.
Due to the way Usenet works, it is impossible to remove or alter them
on all Usenet sites.
If you're new to Usenet, it would also be best to read A Primer on How
to Work With the Usenet Community before posting for the first time.
Q. Why won't you remove me from your list?
A. Whatever blocklist you're on, it isn't "our" blocklist. "We"
maintain no blocklists.
News.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting is a Usenet newsgroup--a public forum
for discussing issues related to blocklisting. It is not associated
with, nor is it a formal communications channel for, any particular
blocklist. When you post to NANABl, you're inviting public comment from
whomever cares to do so. In most cases: People that reply to your posts
have absolutely no control over the blocklist in question.
You need to contact the maintainer(s) of whatever blocklist upon which
you're listed. (See the section entitled "If You're Blocklisted" for
more.)
Q. Why is news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting moderated?
A. Manual moderation is employed in an attempt to keep discourse as
civil and on-topic as possible. Please search Google Groupstm for
articles with the subjects "RFD: news.admin.net-abuse.email.blocklists"
and "RFD: news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting" for the discussions
surrounding NANABl's formation and Charter.
Q. What is blocklisting.com?
A. Blocklisting.com is a domain that was set up to support the
moderation system for news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting, and for a web
site to host this FAQ and a copy of the newsgroup's Charter. That's
all.
Q. What is nanab.org?
A. Nanab.org serves much the same purpose as blocklisting.com
- Posting Issues -
Q. Why was my post rejected?
A. If you provided a valid email address when you posted, you should
have received an emailed rejection notice explaining why. In general
terms: If your submission meets the posting guidelines in NANABl's
Charter, it'll likely be approved. The posting guidelines are
purposefully somewhat vague. They were written to give the moderation
team wide latitude, but in such a manner so as to bias the process
toward approving posts, rather than rejecting them. A good
rule-of-thumb to follow, when posting to NANABl, is "When in doubt:
Don't."
Q. But I've seen other posts worse than mine appear!
A. The moderation team is only human. Different moderators may have
different ideas as to what's acceptable and what's not. We do strive
for consistency. Often a moderator will poll the entire team for an
opinion if he or she is in doubt regarding a "marginal" submission.
The moderation team does tend to grant somewhat more latitude to
first-time posters--particularly those complaining of being
blocklisted. This isn't a "pro-spammer" bias on the moderation team's
part, it's simply an acknowledgment of two facts: 1. First-time posters
complaining of being blocklisted can reasonably be excused for being a
bit... emotional. 2. Experienced posters should know better, and be
able to handle themselves in a more professional manner.
Q. Why are "[BLOCK]" submissions frequently rejected?
A. NANABl is a discussion group, first and foremost. Submissions must
make a reasonable attempt at fostering on-topic discussion. Simply
posting a "[BLOCK]" post, content-less other than some spam headers,
whois information, or whatever, is more evidence or a nomination than
it is a discussion-opener. NANABl is not a submission queue for
blocklist maintainers. These are perhaps more suitable for
news.admin.net-abuse.sightings (aka: "NANAS") than for NANABl. This is
not to say that submissions containing blocklisting recommendations
will not be approved, but they must contain more than just "evidence."
Q. I followed up to a cross-posted message; why was it accepted and
mine rejected?
A. As a general rule: Cross-posted articles will not be approved for
NANABl. There are exceptions. (A policy change announcement by a major
DNSbl operator, for example.) Other times it's simply a mistake on the
moderation team's part.
Q. You approved a post that's nothing but lies/slander/liable! It's
your fault! You're responsible! Delete those slanderous lies!
A. Comments posted to news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting are solely the
responsibility of their author. The moderation team's sole
responsibility is to insure that submitted articles abide by the
newsgroup's Charter. The Charter does not oblige moderators to embark
upon laborious fact-finding missions. Indeed: The Charter explicitly
discourages moderators from evaluating an article submission on
anything other than whether its content meets the Charter's posting
guidelines.
Once an article is approved and propagated, we have no way to "take it
back" or delete it. The article will be propagated to thousands of
privately-operated Usenet news servers all over the world as well as
Google Groupstm.
Q. To whom do I complain about a NANABl moderation decision?
A. Email board-at-blocklisting-dot-com
Q. Why does it take so long for articles to show up in NANABl?
A. If you're reading from Google Groupstm, be aware that there may be
some lag between the time articles are posted and when they show up
there. Lags as long as 24 hours have been noted from time-to-time.
Other delays could be due to a delay in moderation action, (we have to
eat, sleep and work too, you know), hiccups in the moderation system or
speed-bumps in Usenet article propagation. Who knows?
Q. My posts aren't showing up in news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting!
A. If you're reading NANABl via Google Groupstm, see above.
If you are not getting a Received Acknowledgment when you submit an
article, and your "From:" address is valid, then you might want to
confirm with whomever provides your Usenet news access that they've set
things up properly for NANABl being a moderated newsgroup. Most service
providers provide support groups and/or support email addresses that
you can contact.
If you can find no other reason for the problem, you might try
contacting the moderation team at board-at-blocklisting-dot-com for
assistance. If all else fails, you can try submitting articles by email
directly to ins-at-nanab-dot-org, but this method suffers from the
disadvantage that article relationships in a thread may not be kept
intact.
Q. Why don't I get auto-acks from my posts to NANABl?
A. There are almost uncountable reasons as to why this might be. For
starters: Are you supplying a valid, deliverable email address in the
"From:" field of your newsgroup submissions? See above. Are you
spam-filtering? If so: Have you checked your "spam" mail folder? Maybe
the auto-acks are ending-up there? Are you, perhaps unintentionally,
blocking the moderation system's mail servers?
Q. Why do I keep getting auto-acks from my posts to NANABl, despite the
fact that I've carefully, repeatedly followed the instructions on how
to make them stop?
A. Is it auto-acks you're receiving (the ones that start with "This is
an automatic acknowledgment that your message has been RECEIVED..."),
or article approved/rejected notifications?. You can suppress the
auto-acks, but not the approved/rejected notifications.
Q. News.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting isn't on my Usenet news server.
A. You need to talk to your ISP or Usenet news service provider about
that.
Q. News.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting is on my news server, but it has
little to no content.
A. You need to talk to your ISP or Usenet news service provider about
that.
Q. Unmoderated posts are showing up in
news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting on my news server!
A. You need to talk to your ISP or Usenet news service provider about
that. They probably failed to specify that NANABl is a moderated
newsgroup in their news server's configuration.
- If You're Blocklisted -
Q. How do I contact a blocklist maintainer to get removed from their
blocklist?
A. Most blocklisting systems have an associated web site with
instructions on how one might go about contacting them to get ones self
de-listed. We suggest you check there.
One notable exception to this is SPEWS. There is no known way to
contact SPEWS directly. Instead, the SPEWS FAQ directs readers to the
Usenet newsgroups news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting and
news.admin.net-abuse.email. But note carefully the wording! The reader
is directed to these newsgroups for discussion. There is no promise
that posting to them will necessarily result in SPEWS changing its
listings. Above all, keep this in mind: SPEWS' FAQ directing you to
these newsgroups does not mean SPEWS will communicate with you in them.
Even if it does, it's almost a certainty it will do so anonymously--not
identifying itself *as* SPEWS.
Naturally, one should make sure the reason for which they found
themselves blocklisted has been resolved before requesting to be
removed.
In any event, one should not rely on posting to NANABl as a means to
get removed from a blocklist. There are several reasons for this:
As noted: The people that participate in NANABl don't necessarily have
any relationship with, or control over, any particular blocklist.
NANABl is an open discussion forum, where all who desire may
participate.
There is no guarantee that whomever is responsible for a particular
blocklist even reads NANABl, much less that they read it with any
regularity.
There is no guarantee that an article you post to NANABl will actually
make it to the news servers.
Q. Hey! I'm not a spammer! How come I'm listed in SPEWS, and how do I
get off of it?
A. This is the single most frequently asked question to date in
n.a.n-a.blocklisting, and the most frequent answer is apparently
difficult for many to grasp. Please read the following carefully:
If you've read the SPEWS evidence file, and it does not mention your
organization or IP address specifically, then no, you're not a spammer.
The SPEWS listing that affects you is not directed at you personally,
but at your provider, whom SPEWS apparently feels is failing to act to
keep spam off of their network. SPEWS initially listed that spammer,
and then broadened that listing to cover more of that provider's space,
and that's why suddenly you're upset to find that some of your mail is
bouncing. You have one or more of the following options open to you:
Contact your provider and ask that they first address their SPEWS
listings and then post here when that has been completed. They may do
this, or they may not.
Contact the mail administrators at sites who are blocking your mail
based on this SPEWS listing and ask that they whitelist you. They may
do this, or they may not.
Alternatively: Contact the person to whom you are sending email,
explain to them how their ISP is blocking delivery of your email to
them, and suggest they ask their email administrators to whitelist you.
They may do this, or they may not.
Another alternative that's sometimes suggested is to contact the mail
admins at the sites that are blocking your email and suggest they stop
using SPEWS. Some believe some mail admins perhaps don't fully
appreciate the scope of SPEWS' listings and, once apprised of what's
happening, they'll stop using it. On the other hand: This tactic could
back-fire on you. The mail admin may take offense at an outsider
suggesting how they run their mail server(s). Particularly if they've
found SPEWS to be effective for them.
Smarthost your outgoing mail through a machine not affected by DNSBL
listings. If you choose this option, it is probably best to choose a
different provider for your outgoing smarthost, in order to prevent
your new outgoing mailserver from encountering the same problems your
current mailserver is experiencing. There is also no guarantee that
whatever new provider you choose may not eventually run afoul of a
SPEWS listing, but it may be a better choice than staying with one that
has already had demonstrated problems with SPEWS.
Ask your ISP to move you to a new block of IP addresses, not listed by
SPEWS (or any other blocklist), and not near your current IP address
block or any other currently-listed block of IP addresses. Of course:
This solution may prove to be a temporary one (for the obvious reason).
Change providers. If contractual obligations make this impossible in
the short term, SPEWS has been known to punch holes in listings for a
few weeks or months for sites that have stated they will be leaving
their current provider as soon as possible. However, there is no
guarantee that this will happen either, or that whatever new provider
you choose may not eventually run afoul of a SPEWS listing.
Give up trying to send mail to sites that block based on SPEWS
listings.
Q. Isn't it illegal for those guys to block my email?
A. In a word: No.
Disclaimer: Some portions of the following discussion verge dangerously
close to legal opinion. Please note that the author is not a lawyer,
nor a legal expert by any stretch of the imagination. Furthermore: It's
written from the perspective of a U.S. citizen. Some comments may have
no validity in other parts of the world.
First of all: No blocklist literally "blocks your email." All a
blocklist does is list what its maintainers feel to be (potential?)
sources of network abuse. (Well, usually. See the relevant blocklist's
web site for its listing policies and criteria.) It is network and mail
server operators that consult the information published by a blocklist
that actually block network traffic. In other words: The blocklist is
publishing an opinion or advisory. The users of that blocklist, a
network's owners, operators and administrators, may choose to block
network traffic based on that. (Some only "tag" email based on
blocklist information, by the way.)
Granted, it may clearly appear to be the intent of of a particular
blocklist that its listings result in blocking network traffic, but
that doesn't change the fact that the blocklist itself doesn't actually
block anything.
Secondly: Understand that the Internet is not a "public" network, per
se. The Internet is a network of inter-connected private networks. No
private network is required to carry any network traffic it doesn't
wish to. Your Internet service provider is probably bound by a
contractual agreement with you to provide a certain level of service.
The other private networks on the Internet are under no such obligation
to you. Put simply: Your ISP may be required to see that your email is
sent. Other networks are under no obligation to receive it. If they
choose to base (some of) their network policies on the opinions of a
third party, so be it.
- Miscellaneous -
Q. What does "RTFM" mean?
A. Please see RTFM in the Jargon File.
Posters please note: Moderators are unlikely to approve follow-ups that
consist solely of "RTFM".
Q. What does "RTFF" mean?
A. Read The Fine FAQ, a variant of RTFM. Also RTFAQ
Posters please note: Moderators are unlikely to approve follow-ups that
consist solely of "RTFF".
This moderation business is harder than I expected it would be.
-- Anonymous NANABl Moderator
Related Links
Charter for news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting (blocklisting.com)
Charter for news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting (nanab.org)
news.admin.net-abuse home page
-[news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting Charter]-
Page Created: Jan. 4, 2004. Last Updated: Apr. 25, 2004