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North American Network Operators Group Date Prev | Date Next | Date Index | Thread Index | Author Index | Historical Re: UK ISPs v. US ISPs (was RE: Network Level Content Blocking)
On June 11, 2007 at 06:22 [email protected] (John Levine) wrote: > > Also, ISPs in the United States are not common carriers. Even the > ISPs that are owned by phone companies (which are common carriers for > their phone service) are not common carriers. Are you possibly conflating the general legalistic term "common carrier" which applies to taxi cabs, UPS, trains (common carriage, i.e., generally cannot be held responsible for the contents of what they carry) versus telecommunications common carriers as defined under the "Communications Act of 1934" (CA1934) which established the AT&T monopoly? Granted there's no agency or body which takes out a big stamp saying COMMON CARRIER (in the common law, first sense) and sticks it on an ISP's head (in the second sense, CA1934, that'd be the FCC.) The common law sense is more a practical matter of law and precedence. The wikipedia entry has a nice brief summary: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_carrier Internet networks are in many respects already treated like common carriers. ISPs are largely immune from liability for third party content. The Good Samaritan provision of the Communications Decency Act established immunity from liability for third party content on grounds of libel or slander. The DMCA established that ISPs which comply with DMCA would not be liable for the copyright violations of third parties on their network. So, although it should be noted that by and large ISPs have resisted being classified telecommunications common carriers as specifically defined in CA1934 they seem to be treated by the law, in practice, as common carriers in the common law sense (i.e., offer their carriage to the general public, can't generally be considered responsible for content etc. any more than a taxi or fedex could be.) It's a very important if somewhat confusing distinction. It'd be a lot easier if we could come up with separate terms for common law common carrier versis CA1934 telecommunications common carrier. That said, nothing is absolute and even an unarguable common law common carrier (say, fedex) has some duty to raise suspicions about a package which is ticking or dripping noxious (or really any) liquid, and to cooperate with law enforcement where properly required (e.g., via warrants.) I think we're less in the realm here of who is or isn't some sort of common carrier and more "what are the responsibilities even within those constraints?". Even the old AT&T monopoly, probably as legally fortressed from liability as possible (other than its broad exposure to regulation) would be required to cooperate with properly executed legal process. (I suppose to be PC I have to say out loud this note is US-centric) -- -Barry Shein The World | [email protected] | http://www.TheWorld.com Purveyors to the Trade | Voice: 800-THE-WRLD | Login: Nationwide Software Tool & Die | Public Access Internet | SINCE 1989 *oo*
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