How to Handle ISPs Who Turn a Blind Eye to Criminal Activity?

Fri Oct 12 21:45:47 UTC 2007

Paul Ferguson wrote:

> So, back to my original question: If you alert an ISP that "bad and
> possibly criminal" activity is taking place by one of their customer,
> and they do not take corrective action (even after a year), what do
> you do?

In at least one case, where I knew the offender had been booted off his 
last provider, I actually stalled disconnecting him for three months 
while I tried getting help from law enforcement. I felt we had a better 
chance of getting him permanently removed from the Internet by keeping 
him around long enough to get court orders to investigate his most 
likely illegal actions that were generating abuse reports. I started out 
with the feds, went on to the state and finally the local sheriff before 
giving up and just cutting him off for lack of any other hope.

But a year is too long. If it were impacting my network, I'd probably 
drop their routes (or blackhole the offending hosts anyway).