An AUP for the RIPE DB ?!

[Daniel Karrenberg <]

Another short discussion paper.
As you see I'd like to keep this general issue separate from
the immediate measures discussed in the other paper.
Again comments are welcome.

Daniel


      Some Toughts about an Acceptable Use Policy for
                     the RIPE Database


Scope

This is a discussion paper intended to lay the groundwork
for the development of a more explicit acceptable use policy
(AUP) for the RIPE database.


Motivation

For the past six years we have been able to avoid the issue
of codifying acceptable use of the RIPE database because the
user community was limited.  Conventions and peer pressure
were sufficient to prevent abuse.  This is changing rapidly.
Therefore I believe we have to develop a written AUP and
enforce it.


Format

As with any AUP is it difficult to anticipate any potential
usage.  It is even impractical to codify something for all
usages that can be envisioned.  In our case a good approach
would be to list a number of common usages that are clearly
acceptable, such as searching for contact points in case of
operational problems or access by routing policy tools.
Subsequently we can list a number of usages that are clearly
not acceptable such as obtaining addresses for mass mailings
or unauthorised changing of data.  I think it will be rela-
tively easy to obtain consensus about that.  One can then
state that any use which is comparable to one of those
listed falls under the policy for the listed use.  Any use
not comparable at all will need to be determined by the
database WG and added to the AUP.


Enforcement

If we have a written AUP and consensus that it should be
enforced the NCC can get legal advice on how to best enforce
it.  However I would like to have the AUP defined first
because otherwise thinking about enforcement tends to be
less effective and also influences our goals, e.g. the
desired AUP.


Further Steps

I'd like to see some discussion and resolution on two
issues: Is an explicit AUP needed? and Is the format sug-
gested above appropriate?