FYI - Suspension of Cogent access to ARIN Whois

Tue Jan 7 06:06:29 UTC 2020

very interesting, so it will have quite a bit of collateral impact on
innocent cogent customers? I like this, because merely removing cogents
access probably wouldn't sway them much.

On Mon, Jan 6, 2020 at 8:30 PM John Curran <jcurran at arin.net> wrote:

> ARIN has suspended service for all Cogent-registered IP address blocks.
> Customers with their own IP blocks blocks that are simply being announced
> by Cogent are not affected.
>
> /John
>
> John Curran
> President and CEO
> American Registry for Internet Numbers
>
>
> On Jan 6, 2020, at 9:44 PM, Ross Tajvar <ross at tajvar.io> wrote:
>
> 
> Yeah this raises a great point - I'm curious how ARIN is differentiating
> between cogent and cogens customers when monitoring for prohibited access.
> Particularly those customers whose IPs belong to and are announced by
> Cogent.
>
> On Mon, Jan 6, 2020, 10:38 PM Martin Hannigan <hannigan at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>
>> — shifting a side thread
>>
>>
>> John,
>>
>> I have no stake in this, so far, but I have a few questions.
>>
>> Can you define exactly what services have been blocked? IRR/ROA/TLA
>> registry updates, etc? Were they blocked ^174 or 174$? This is a precedent
>> AFAIK. I’d like to understand consequences. In case I decide to attend
>> Dave’s sales training? :-)
>>
>> Cheers,
>>
>> -M<
>>
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Jan 6, 2020 at 10:45 John Curran <jcurran at arin.net> wrote:
>>
>>> On 22 Sep 2019, at 8:52 AM, Tim Burke <tb at tburke.us> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> That is just The Cogent Way™, unfortunately. I just had (yet another)
>>> Cogent rep spam me using an email address that is _only_ used as an ARIN
>>> contact, trying to sell me bandwidth. When I called him out on it, with
>>> compliance at arin.net CCed, he backpedaled and claimed to obtain my
>>> information from Google.
>>>
>>>
>>> ARIN has repeatedly informed Cogent that their use of the ARIN Whois for
>>> solicitation is contrary to the terms of use and that they must stop.
>>> Despite ARIN’s multiple written demands to Cogent to cease these prohibited
>>> activities, ARIN has continued to receive complaints from registrants that
>>> Cogent continues to engage in these prohibited solicitation activities.
>>>
>>> For this reason, ARIN has suspended Cogent Communications’ use of
>>> ARIN’s Whois database effective today and continuing for a period of six
>>> months.  For additional details please refer to
>>> https://www.arin.net/vault/about_us/corp_docs/20200106_whois_tos_violation.pdf
>>>    ARIN will restore Cogent’s access to the Whois database at an earlier
>>> time if Cogent meets certain conditions, including instructing its sales
>>> personnel not to engage in the prohibited solicitation activities.
>>>
>>> Given the otherwise general availability of ARIN Whois, it is quite
>>> possible that Cogent personnel may evade the suspension via various means
>>> and continue their solicitation.  If that does occur, please inform us (via
>>> compliance at arin.net), as ARIN is prepared to extend the suspension
>>> and/or bring appropriate legal action.
>>>
>>> FYI,
>>> /John
>>>
>>> John Curran
>>> President and CEO
>>> American Registry for Internet Numbers
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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