Re: An alternative to remailer shutdowns (fwd)

[David Rosoff <drosoff@arc.unm.edu>]

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At 10:24 AM 5/21/96 -0800, jim bell <jimbell@pacifier.com> wrote:
>At 06:28 PM 5/20/96 -0500, Jim Choate wrote:
>>
>>Forwarded message:
>>
>>> Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 15:02:08 -0700
>>> From: Hal <hfinney@shell.portal.com>
>>> Subject: An alternative to remailer shutdowns
>>
>>> was apparently sent through my remailer.  According to 18 USC 875(c),
>>> "Whoever transmits in interstate commerce any communication containing
>>> any threat to kidnap any person or any threat to injure the person of
>>> another, shall be fined not more than $1,000 or imprisoned not more
>>> than five years, or both."  I may not be able to continue operating
>>> either of my remailers (alumni.caltech.edu and shell.portal.com) for
>>> much longer due to this kind of abuse.
>>
>>There should be a section in there dealing with 'knowingly'. If not then we
>>should immediately bring charges against any and all newspapers who have
>>ever printer a ransom letter, or perhaps even the Unibomber Manifesto since
>>there is clear evidence of 'threat to injure the person of another'.
>
>But even "knowingly" needs to be carefully defined.  A remailer operator 
>today KNOWS that his system COULD be used for illegal activities; he merely 
>doesn't know that they are, currently.  I think that the definition should 
>be so narrow that it is impossible for a third party (or the government 
>itself)  to incriminate the remailer operator by having his system forward 
>arguably illegal or copyright-violating material.
>
>
>Jim Bell
>jimbell@pacifier.com

Can the same sort of standards as per the U.S. CDA be applied? The first
draft of the
CDA would have held ISP's responsible for, e.g., porn transmitted using their 
services. Isn't this the same sort of thing - that is, that remailer
operators provide
a service, and they cannot be held responsible for people who abuse that
service? I
think that this line of thought is reasonable.

David

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