Is the .to (Tonga) domain completely rogue and should be removed?

Karl Denninger karl at Denninger.Net
Wed Sep 30 19:48:52 UTC 1998


Barry, 

You're wasting your time.

It would be nice if there was actually public accountability in ANY of the
DNS and IP space issues.

In my opinion, today:
	There is not.

My prediction is that:
	There will not be in the future.

Not now, not in the near future, and not, barring a major deviation from the
direction the US and other governments are taking today, in the far future
either.

If you like tilting at windmills, have at it.  Or just solve the problem 
for yourself by blocking everything from any TLD and IP range that offends 
you.

I know leaving everyone else twisting isn't nice, but its reality.

--
-- 
Karl Denninger (karl at denninger.net) http://www.mcs.net/~karl
I ain't even *authorized* to speak for anyone other than myself, so give
up now on trying to associate my words with any particular organization.




On Wed, Sep 30, 1998 at 03:40:15PM -0400, Alex Kamantauskas wrote:
> On Wed, 30 Sep 1998, Barry Shein wrote:
> 
> > 
> > In support of this assertion I want to show you an SMTP conversation
> > with what claims to be the Consulate of the Government of Tonga in San
> > Francisco (This San Francisco office is listed as an official Tongan
> > contact point for visas etc by the US State Dept):
> > 
> > world% telnet sfconsulate.gov.to 25
> > Trying 209.24.51.169...
> > Connected to sfconsulate.gov.to.
> > Escape character is '^]'.
> > 220 colo.to SMTP ready, Who are you gonna pretend to be today?
> > VRFY postmaster
> > 500 Bloody Amateur! Proper forging of mail requires recognizable SMTP commands!
> > 
> > --------------------
> 
> Well, beyond the cutesy error messages, at least relaying is turned off.
> 
> fz(alexk):[~] telnet sfconsulate.gov.to 25
> Trying 209.24.51.169...
> Connected to sfconsulate.gov.to.
> Escape character is '^]'.
> 220 colo.to SMTP ready, Who are you gonna pretend to be today?
> helo tugger.net
> 250 colo.to Is thrilled beyond bladder control to meet tugger.net
> mail from: alexk at tugger.net
> 250 sender is alexk at tugger.net, (yeah sure, it's probably forged)
> rcpt to: alexk at freetld.net
> 550 NOPE UNKNOWN(204.168.18.98), I don't allow unauthorized relaying.
> 
> 
> > 
> > Viewing the web page for the Tongan Consulate in the US
> > (http://sfconsulate.gov.to) reveals nothing but an ad for a software
> > company, this page ends with:
> > 
> >    Need a domain name? Contact the Kingdom of Tonga Internet domain name
> >                                  registry.
> > 
> > --------------------
> > 
> > Consequently, I assert there is no reason for this domain to exist and
> > it should be removed from the root name servers.
> > 
> > 
> > -- 
> >         -Barry Shein
> > 
> > Software Tool & Die    | bzs at world.std.com          | http://www.world.com
> > Purveyors to the Trade | Voice: 617-739-0202        | Login: 617-739-WRLD
> > The World              | Public Access Internet     | Since 1989     *oo*
> > -
> > Send 'unsubscribe' in the body to 'list-request at inet-access.net' to leave.
> > Eat sushi frequently.   inet at inet-access.net is the human contact address.
> > 
> 
> -- 
> Alex Kamantauskas
> Tugger Networks
> 
> -
> Send 'unsubscribe' in the body to 'list-request at inet-access.net' to leave.
> Eat sushi frequently.   inet at inet-access.net is the human contact address.



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