EFF Call for sign-ons: ISPs, networking companies and engineers opposed to FCC privacy repeal

Patrick W. Gilmore patrick at ianai.net
Wed Mar 29 12:58:57 UTC 2017


Mike:

I know Mr. Glass thinks of me as a not knowledgeable network professional, but I hope you know I’ve been doing “ISP stuff” for a couple decades. I know how to work the system. There really are not any other broadband providers in my area. Hell, LTE doesn’t even work well in my house, and I am less than a dozen miles from the center of Boston.

But more importantly, even if there were a second provider, how do you expect Joe & Mary User to find that provider if I cannot? (Not trying to be arrogant, just saying I am more experience in this field than the average consumer.)

Broadband competition in the US is a myth, at least for most people. At best, competition is the exception, not the rule. At worst, it’s a thinly veiled monopoly. Hell, they brag about it being a duopoly where they can, as if that’s a great thing. Comcast’s chairman brags that Time Warner & Comcast do not compete in any cities.

-- 
TTFN,
patrick

> On Mar 29, 2017, at 6:35 AM, Mike Hammett <nanog at ics-il.net> wrote:
> 
> Are there really no others or are the ones that are there just marketing themselves poorly? Any nearby you could convince to expand? 
> 
> Over my WISP's coverage, I have at least 13 WISP competitors, 7 broadband wireline and nearly that many enterprise fiber. I admit that may be exceptional. 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ----- 
> Mike Hammett 
> Intelligent Computing Solutions 
> 
> Midwest Internet Exchange 
> 
> The Brothers WISP 
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> 
> From: "Patrick W. Gilmore" <patrick at ianai.net> 
> To: "NANOG list" <nanog at nanog.org> 
> Sent: Tuesday, March 28, 2017 9:25:54 PM 
> Subject: Re: EFF Call for sign-ons: ISPs, networking companies and engineers opposed to FCC privacy repeal 
> 
> Thanks, I was a bit confused why you said it, which is apparently because I was confused. :-) 
> 
> I agree we need to do a better job educating users why this is important. 
> 
> And just so my opinion is clear, if there were a true market, I would not mind ISPs who did this (with proper notice). Unfortunately, over half of all households in the US have one or fewer choices for broadband providers. I am one of them. What do I do if my ISP wants to collect my data? VPN everything? 
> 
> -- 
> TTFN, 
> patrick 
> 
>> On Mar 28, 2017, at 10:18 PM, Mike Hammett <nanog at ics-il.net> wrote: 
>> 
>> It was more a plea to educate the list on why this matters vs. doom and gloom with a little more gloom and a little less Carmack. Instead I got more of the sky is falling. 
>> 
>> Note that I don't intend to ever do this at my ISP, nor my IX. 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> ----- 
>> Mike Hammett 
>> Intelligent Computing Solutions <http://www.ics-il.com/> 
>> <https://www.facebook.com/ICSIL> <https://plus.google.com/+IntelligentComputingSolutionsDeKalb> <https://www.linkedin.com/company/intelligent-computing-solutions> <https://twitter.com/ICSIL> 
>> Midwest Internet Exchange <http://www.midwest-ix.com/> 
>> <https://www.facebook.com/mdwestix> <https://www.linkedin.com/company/midwest-internet-exchange> <https://twitter.com/mdwestix> 
>> The Brothers WISP <http://www.thebrotherswisp.com/> 
>> <https://www.facebook.com/thebrotherswisp> <https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXSdfxQv7SpoRQYNyLwntZg> 
>> From: "Patrick W. Gilmore" <patrick at ianai.net <mailto:patrick at ianai.net>> 
>> To: "NANOG list" <nanog at nanog.org <mailto:nanog at nanog.org>> 
>> Sent: Tuesday, March 28, 2017 9:12:15 PM 
>> Subject: Re: EFF Call for sign-ons: ISPs, networking companies and engineers opposed to FCC privacy repeal 
>> 
>> Mike: 
>> 
>> My guess is you do not. 
>> 
>> Which is -precisely- why the users (proletariat?) need to find a way to stop you. Hence laws & regulations. 
>> 
>> Later in this thread you said “we are done here”. Would that you were so lucky. 
>> 
>> -- 
>> TTFN, 
>> patrick 
>> 
>>> On Mar 28, 2017, at 5:58 PM, Mike Hammett <nanog at ics-il.net <mailto:nanog at ics-il.net>> wrote: 
>>> 
>>> Why am I supposed to care? 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> ----- 
>>> Mike Hammett 
>>> Intelligent Computing Solutions 
>>> 
>>> Midwest Internet Exchange 
>>> 
>>> The Brothers WISP 
>>> 
>>> ----- Original Message ----- 
>>> 
>>> From: "Rich Kulawiec" <rsk at gsp.org <mailto:rsk at gsp.org>> 
>>> To: nanog at nanog.org <mailto:nanog at nanog.org> 
>>> Sent: Tuesday, March 28, 2017 4:45:25 PM 
>>> Subject: Re: EFF Call for sign-ons: ISPs, networking companies and engineers opposed to FCC privacy repeal 
>>> 
>>> On Tue, Mar 28, 2017 at 06:45:04PM +0000, Mel Beckman wrote: 
>>>> The claim oft presented by people favoring this customer abuse is that 
>>>> the sold data is anonymous. But it's been well-established that very 
>>>> simple data aggregation techniques can develop signatures that reveal 
>>>> the identity of people in anonymized data. 
>>> 
>>> This needs to be repeated loudly and often at every possible opportunity. 
>>> I've spent much of the past decade studying this issue and the most succinct 
>>> way I can put it is that however good you (generic "you") think 
>>> de-anonymization techniques are, you're wrong: they're way better than that. 
>>> Billions, and I am not exaggerating even a little bit, have been spent 
>>> on this problem, and they've been spent by smart people with essentially 
>>> unlimited computational resources. And whaddaya know, they've succeeded. 
>>> 
>>> So if someone presents you a data corpus and says "this data is anonymized", 
>>> the default response should be to mock them, because there is a very high 
>>> probability they're either (a) lying or (b) wrong. 
>>> 
>>> Incidentally, I'm also a signatory of the EFF document, since of course 
>>> with nearly 40 years in the field I'm a mere clueless newbie and despite 
>>> ripping them a new one about once every other month, I'm clearly a tool 
>>> of Google. 
>>> 
>>> ---rsk 
> 




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