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Subject: Re: your mail
From: Joel Sing (jsingORIGIN.NET.AU)
Date: Tue Sep 05 2000 - 08:11:33 CDT

Hi,

>>Here's my issue - Portscanning is not inherently illegal in the US. In
>>fact, I scanned a class C for telnet and was trying to find my friends
>>Linux box becauseit redialed and he didn't have its new IP. I was the
>>tecnical contact for the IP block and the DNS address it reversed to.
>>I scanned a few ISP boxes and they threw a fit. They sent me this
>>threatening letter.

Interesting that you should mention this. I'm currently debating this issue
with my ISP. On their main page they state that "It is a federal offense to
*attempt* to break into a telecommunications system." I challenged this
comment and got a reply stating that portscanning is illegal. They can't
provide any information on for such legislation and as far as I can tell it
is not illegal (at least in Australia).

If it was illegal you could take the whole issue further. By portscanning
you are simply attempting to establish a connection to the machine. Does
this mean that telnet and ping are also illegal?

>A fast large-scale portscan could be interpreted as recon from a hacker
>and/or a DOS-Attack. And its not very nice to do such a scan though. I
>wouldn't be pleased to and do at least some short checks to get infos
>about the originmachine.

True. Most ISPs will get annoyed if portscanned for the above mentioned
reason. However, I don't think that they can do anything as far as 'law' is
concerned (I'd be interested to hear otherwise).

Regards,

Joel Sing
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            => Joel Sing | jsingorigin.net.au | 0419 577 603 <=
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