Zen Internet Support Forum

sinister:

Will Zen be doing secret police work for the state?

If it becomes law then Zen will have no choice.

If ISP's are forced to 'police' the internet then I think this will add to their costs and so they would probably have to raise their prices meaning everyone would pay more for internet access

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7240234.stm

I wonder how many members of Parliament would get dragged into scandals if the Government were to instigate this? I suspect that may well influence how they vote?

What kind of a "Nanny state," is this country becoming?

I would suspect that packet sniffing peer to peer traffic would be quite costly to implement and would be on a random, cyclic, basis or instigated under reasonable suspicion.  

 Now I'm rambling! lol
 

The proposals as they stand are simply daft

1) Every ISP would have to buy in hugely expensive deep packet inspection equipment (which might increase latency) and devote a lot of staff time to the issue. The equipment used by some ISPs to traffic shape is usually only capable of identifying protocol, not the actual payload, so even ISPs with some DPI equipment already in place would probably spend a lot replacing/upgrading it. Inevitably the end users, including those who don't know what an MP3 is will end up paying for this in the end via higher subscription fees.

2) The equipment would not be able to decrypt encrypted traffic. This means it would be rendered useless pretty much as soon as its introduced

3) It would end up with false positives. Assuming it identifies copyright files by some sort of pattern matching on the filename of the file gives vast scope for mistakes. What about people who are falsely accused, or had their wireless network hacked or similar. If cut off due to a false accusation then the ISP could well be held liable. This stands true even for the simpler identification technique of a few BPI computers seeding the popular torrents and logging the IP addresses of people who download them (this is how they identify file sharers for the infamous US lawsuits, and we've all heard the stories of them suing elderly folk who switch on the computer once a week to check email, so its hardly infallible)

4) Its probably illegal to do this anyway under privacy Law 

From what I've seen of anyone who knows anything about the industry and Internet technology these plans are universally unpopular and a considered short-sighted as government IT plans tend to be, but its true that anything that becomes law must be abided with no matter how disagreeable the rule.

 
Personally, I'm concerned that government is getting involved in the matters of protecting these companies profits instead of fostering the nations culture, it's not the government's role to step in to protect a private business's failing business model because of it's inability to adapt, look what happened with Northern Rock and how we're all paying for it.

Simple Simon:

What kind of a "Nanny state," is this country becoming?

This government likes to interfere in almost everything - nanny state indeed.

In principle it's a good idea but badly thought out as usual like Tony Blair's daft proposal a few years ago where a yobbo would be marched to the nearest cashpoint (by a Police officer) for an on-the-spot fine  

David Nelson:

Personally, I'm concerned that government is getting involved in the matters of protecting these companies profits instead of fostering the nations culture, it's not the government's role to step in to protect a private business's failing business model because of it's inability to adapt, look what happened with Northern Rock and how we're all paying for it.

 I guess the Government is worried about the VAT element - which just goes to show how much the Media Industry rakes in!

Personally, I think it's time the Media Industry got with the times and changed it's marketing strategy. They're quick to bleat on about how much they're loosing but slow to mention the take up of such things as legal downloads. I wonder how much do they make from those when you factor in the reduced overheads?

As usual the Government's idea is naieve and ill informed - but then they don't have a good grasp of IT at the best of times.

I am surprised the Goverment has not just banned the internet, after all it's all pron and illegal downloads. 

Ban it, problem solved :)

I hope they dont read this and think it's a good idea.

Hi CurleyWhirly,

YES! I TOTALLY agree, you've taken the words out of my mouth. Typical knee jerk politics & control freakery of the best New Labor kind al la Tony Blair et al.

Look how the Blair crew wanted ID cards and now look how Gordon Brown is still trying to pursue them through the back door via digital passports with biometric data taken against the individuals freedom of choice.  More civil liberties slipping away or am I just becoming paranoid in my old age? :-((

Ivan 

Surely, it is only criminals who like to hide their identity.  Those who have nothing to hide have nothing to fear except from those who like to lay their blame at other people's door.

Whatever is hidden away will be brought out into the open, and whatever is covered up will be uncovered.   Zen have a reputation for leadership in the field.  Surely it is not beyond their technical capabilities to suggest a remedy to the government.

“Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country!” 

Surely, it is only criminals who like to hide their identity. 

Have you not thought that the more information about you the more chances of it being used against you.

llegal or otherwise, once it is stored you have no control over it's use.

And if you don't think thats true post your full name, address, social security number, mothers maiden name and who you bank with.

The goverment will have all that info but if someone else got hold of it there would be a few more virtual Lances around.

cyteck:

Look how the Blair crew wanted ID cards and now look how Gordon Brown is still trying to pursue them through the back door via digital passports with biometric data taken against the individuals freedom of choice.  More civil liberties slipping away or am I just becoming paranoid in my old age? :-((

No this country is getting more and more like a nanny state that's for sure.

I think that if the plans go ahead then people will be put off broadband to a certain extent due to the rising costs as ISP's will have no choice but to pass on the costs of monitoring our connections. 

BritBrat:

Surely, it is only criminals who like to hide their identity. 

Have you not thought that the more information about you the more chances of it being used against you.

llegal or otherwise, once it is stored you have no control over it's use.

And if you don't think thats true post your full name, address, social security number, mothers maiden name and who you bank with.

The goverment will have all that info but if someone else got hold of it there would be a few more virtual Lances around.

I agree.

I mean you only have to look at all the missing data over the last few months.

In my view losing peoples data like this is just as criminal as people illegally downloading music, etc.