Scamming and spamming

Communicating by e-mail has become an integral part of life at work and at home.

Unfortunately, e-mail can suffer the same problems as snail mail-namely, unsolicited junk messages, or spam. It's worse when this junk e-mail is deceptive or fraudulent.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service are going after junk e-mail scammers. They have already put more than 1,000 junk e-mailers on notice that the agencies are monitoring unsolicited e-mail for fraudulent schemes and are keeping track of the schemers.

The largest category of junk e-meil targeted by the FTC was chain letters, which are illegal under state and federal laws. Most chain letter schemes urge e-mail recipients to send a little money to a list of people, then add their own name to the list and forward the letter on to others. Some even look like legitimate businesses, where participants receive "reports" or other worthless items in exchange for money.

The FTC and Postal Service are also warning about e-mail that are business offers that appear to be fraudulent, "cash grant" schemes, deceptive diet and medicinal solicitations, credit repair scams and suspect "guaranteed credit card" solicitations.

FOR YOUR INFORMATION :

You can forward unsolicited commercial e-mail that you believe may be fraudulent or deceptive to the FTC's e-mail box at uce@ftc.gov. Or you can also visit the FTC online at http://www.ftc.gov and the Postal Service at http://www.usps.gov.

 

Goals

Multacom's goals are to protect network resources, preserve the privacy and security of Multacom and our customers' networks, and maximize the utility of Multacom and the Internet, while recognizing Multacom's position in the Internet community as a whole.

Interpretation

The provisions of this Policy are intended as guidelines and are not meant to be exhaustive. Generally, conduct that violates law, regulation, or the accepted norms of the Internet community, whether or not expressly mentioned in this Policy, is prohibited. Multacom reserves the right at all times to prohibit activities that damage its commercial reputation and goodwill.

Security

Any "denial of service" attacks, any attempt to breach authentication or security measures, or any unauthorized attempt to gain access to any other account, host or network is prohibited, and will result in immediate service termination, which may be without notice.

E-mail and Usenet News

Using any Multacom account or server to send duplicative, unsolicited e-mail messages (commercial or otherwise), or to collect the responses from unsolicited e-mail, is prohibited. Similarly, using any Multacom account or server to post advertisements or messages that violate the charter of any newsgroup or mailing list is prohibited. Multacom reserves the right to make the determination whether a given message violates the newsgroup or mailing list charter. In most cases Multacom will defer to the judgment of the newsgroup or mailing list moderator or administrator. Commercial messages that are appropriate under the charter of a newsgroup or mailing list, or that are expressly solicited by the recipients, are permitted. Conduct in connection with e-mail or Usenet news that is an obvious nuisance (such as "mail bombing") or that would be unlawful in other contexts (for example, threats, harassment, defamation, obscenity, or software piracy) is prohibited. IRC (Internet Relay Chat) Using programs that interfere with others' use, or running an IRC robot, on any IRC server is prohibited. When logged into any IRC server, users are expected to comply with the rules and policies established by the server's administrator.

Forgery of Identity

Falsifying addressing information or otherwise modifying headers to conceal the sender's or recipient's identity, for the purpose of circumventing this policy, is prohibited. This provision is not intended to disallow the use of aliases or anonymous remailers for any legitimate purpose.

Copyright, Privacy, and Intellectual Property

Using a Multacom connection to commit, aid or abet any violation of copyright or intellectual property law is prohibited. This prohibition includes publishing a private e-mail message to third parties, by any means, without the express prior consent of the author. The e-mail addresses of Multacom subscribers are not for sale or commercial distribution to third parties without the express prior consent of the subscriber.

Broadcast Echo Requests (Smurf Attacks)

Multacom is committed to implementing the configuration required to ensure that Multacom infrastructure cannot be used as the host of smurf attacks. There are two types of network numbers in the smurf list that reflect a connection with Multacom: Customer network numbers for which we do not have control and backbone addresses. Multacom Customer Support is working with all customers on Multacom to ensure that their networks cannot be used as amplifiers for Broadcast Echo Requests.

Cooperation with Other Providers

Using Multacom's facilities to engage in activities that violate the Terms of Service of any other network access provider is prohibited. For example, sending unsolicited commercial e-mail through Notsol's facilities to the subscribers of any Internet or online service provider that disallows unsolicited commercial e-mail is prohibited.

Consequences of Violation

Violation of this Policy by a Multacom customer may result in temporary suspension or permanent termination of service, at Multacom's sole discretion. Multacom does not issue service credits for any outages incurred through service disablement resulting from Policy violations.

Modification

Multacom reserves the right to add, delete, or modify any provision of this Policy at any time without notice.