[arin-ppml] Discussion on elimination of SWIP requirements.

[hostmaster at uneedus.com]

If enforcement of SWIP would result in the elimination of network abuse, I 
would not speak against it.  However, even with valid contacts in SWIP, 
abuse reports are ignored. Contacting the ARIN allocation holder also 
often goes unanswered as well, and this is not dependent on SWIP. In 
addition to enforcement of valid contacts in Whois and SWIP, there needs 
to be a corresponding required response to reports of network abuse by 
those using ARIN resources. I find that the presence or absence of SWIP 
records have little to do with if a given allocation holder acts on abuse.

The networks that you cite are examples of networks that deserve to be on 
a worldwide blacklist. From my point of view, most of my network abuse 
comes from addresses outside of the ARIN Region, mostly APNIC and RIPE. 
People hammer daily on my servers trying to get in with dictionary 
attacks. In the case of a couple of comment boards that I run, I ended up 
blacklisting from posting the entire APNIC and RIPE IPv4 space at the /8 
level, as well as selected portions of ARIN in my apache configuration, as 
the intended audience is US based. The comment spam is very bad, and 
reports to the responsible contacts, even in the ARIN region go unanswered 
in most cases.  Ditto with the Dictionary attacks.

Those receiving allocations from ARIN need to be held responsible for 
actually answering reports of network abuse.  I think this is vastly more 
important for enforcement than providing a SWIP record containing customer 
contacts which goes unanswered. Those with ARIN allocations should always 
be responsible for acting on reports of abuse, especially if no downstream 
SWIP records are provided, or the contacts in that record fail to act.

Maybe the RSA should make the number resources subject to revocation if 
someone receiving space from ARIN regularly fails to respond and act on 
valid reports of network abuse.  Maybe it already does, but it does not 
appear to be enforced.

However, I do not think ARIN or any other RIR should required to become 
the "Internet Police".  The purpose of ARIN is in 1.1 of the policy 
manual, which is uniqueness, contacts, transparency and assist in ip 
allocation studies.  While having customers who abuse cannot always be 
prevented, failure to act on valid, repeated reports of abuse by those 
customers is wrong and should subject the Allocation to revocation. This 
is one of the few sticks that ARIN has in regard with "bad" members.  The 
carrots do not seem to work.

Albert Erdmann
Network Administrator
Paradise On Line Inc.

On Sat, 3 Jun 2017, Ronald F. Guilmette wrote:

>
> In message <551ebd1d-517e-5fb2-e379-0c45674b1f9d at linuxmagic.com>,
> Michael Peddemors <michael at linuxmagic.com> wrote:
>
>> .. and given the
>> large increase in nefarious actors on the internet, it is important to
>> have accurate information on the responsible party for that part of the
>> internet.
>>
>> I for one want to see ARIN do more, and be given a mandate to enforce
>> the given requirements already in place.
>
> As should be evident to anybody who has been paying attention, I
> agree completely.  And it isn't just me.  Not by a long shot.  It
> should be self-evident also that essentially every member of the
> law enforcement community, at all levels, would also like to see,
> if anything, the existing SWIP rules strengthened, rather than
> diluted, and, more importantly, would like to see them actually
> enforced someday.
>
> Unfortunately, as the examples I gave, of 69.162.115.240/28 and
> 69.162.77.192/29, vividly illustrate, not only are the existing
> rules being openly flouted, but they are even being *brazenly*
> flouted, by at least some crooked providers... in this case
> Limestone Networks... who, for all I know, are selling identity
> protection services to criminals, as would appear to be the
> case here.  (If anyone wants all of the particulars about the
> specific bad actors that are hiding out within the two blocks
> in question, and/or their direct links to an active and ongoing
> malware distribution operation, you can contact me off list and
> I will provide details.)
>
> Of course, Limestone Networks and its clearly non-residential
> "residential customer" are far from the only example I could
> cite here.  It just happens to be among the most brazen and
> obvious.  A fuller listing of all of the active identity
> concealment services that are, as we speak, being provided
> by entities holding direct ARIN allocations (and to various
> flavors of bad actors / criminals)  would be so lengthy that
> I'm sure nobody here would bother to read it.
>
> In my more idealistic moments, I like to believe that we all have
> a shared and common interest in the security of the Internet as
> a whole.  Few of us find the ongoing presence of spammers,
> hackers, and malware distributors to be directly beneficial.
> But clearly there are exceptions.  Some holders of direct ARIN
> allocations are provably and unambiguously profiting from
> ignoring even the minimal and ineffectual SWIP rules that are
> currently on the books, and are doing so consciously, and in
> clear cooperation with bad actors, as a paid "service" to protect
> the true identities of these bad actors.
>
> Apparently, this is all exactly how the ARIN community wants things
> to be... nevermind the obviously negative effects to the security of
> all of us, and nevermind the general disrepute that these few "bad
> apple" providers bring to the ARIN community as a whole.  The
> community makes sure that nobody, least of all the bad apple providers,
> will ever have to do or document anything that they don't much feel
> like doing or documenting, and the bad apple providers then, in turn,
> drive their proverbial trucks through the gaping loopholes in the
> rules and/or their enforcement, and thus profit handsomely by selling
> identity protection services to snowshoe spammers and malware distribtion
> operations, presumably for some additional premium, addded on top of
> the price for the usual and customary provision of non-cloaked services.
>
> I like to think that someday the vast majority of law-abiding and
> rule-following members of the ARIN community are going to wake up
> and realize that a small minority (<5%) of ARIN direct allocation
> holders are responsible for the vast majority (>95%) of all of the
> problems on the Internet, and that at some point the majority will
> at last conclude that enough is enough, and that all of these clever
> "hide the ball" games and shenanigans should finally, seriously, be
> ended.  But I'm realistic enough to know that that day is not today.
>
> As with most problems faced by mankind... including global warming...
> things are going to have to get much much worse before they get any
> better, and the only thing that has been shown, over time, to reliably
> motivate homo sapiens to get up and out of their comfortable barcoloungers
> is a crisis that can no longer be ignored.
>
> I wish for once that we humans could be smart enough to act to solve at
> least this one evident problem early, i.e. -before- things reach crisis
> proportions, but in this case that doesn't seem at all likely.
>
> Would that it were otherwise.
>
>
> Regards,.
> rfg
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