At 10:21 AM 9/4/01 -0700, Eric Murray wrote:
I don't think that there is enough remailer traffic or remailers to require the feds to go throught the work of getting a law passed and setting up a licensing program. It's be nice if there was!
Certainly not now, which is why I said I was talking about five years or so in the future. Going through the "work" can be something as simple as an attachment to a spending bill; unless it's controversial, it's truly not that difficult to do. Your point about ISPs as the targets for a "code of conduct" is a reasonable one, but the same analysis applies. Offshore ISPs will continue, at least at first, to host remailers, then perhaps be pressured into abandoning that plan if governments in other jurisdictions get sufficiently mobilized. Another point of attack, although more far-fetched, is restricting the sites to which network providers can carry traffic. A restriction like "knowingly providing connectiviting to a service that provides anonymous re-mailing capabilities." Then the helpful Feds will provide daily lists of offshore remailers. -Declan