RE: [cobalt-security] [RAQ4] Denying specific IP from DNS traffic

[Jaana Jarve <netcat@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, 18 Feb 2003, Happli, Drew wrote:

> Can someone tell me how this would be a bad thing?

it _is_ a bad thing if your clients have business partners, suppliers,
clients, friends, colleagues, family members etc in Asia.

depending how vital the information that they won't get if you blacklist
all known Asian networks is to them, things could turn ugly for you real
quick, if you do it without prior notice.

from my point of view, people pay mail account providers primarily for the
right to _receive_ mail. filtering, beyond normal measures such as open
relay/proxy blacklists and blocking known spamhouses, should be an
_optional_ extra. if you start blocking entire countries, that's not spam
filtering, anyway.

> includes Korea, China, and Singapore.  All of which have tried to relay spam
> through a non-open server (hell they tried on a server that didn't even have

hmm, wonder if you get a relay attempt from a US network, will you block
all of US? it would be only fair. :)

> I've been debating for years banning the whole of Asia from my network.

don't know a postmaster who hasn't, from time to time :)

if it's your private network, fine. if you have paying clients, ask them
first. i would definitely leave a provider who'd do something like that. i
like being able to write to my motherboard manufacturer's support address
_and_ receive a response..

rgds,
netcat