Subject: Re: home network security

From: Stuart Cheshire <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 8 May 2000 18:44:11 -0700

>Incoming connections are NOT the issue. Beyond the technical
>issues, the contracts for cable modems and many DSL services
>specifically forbid hosting services. I'm talking about end
>users who sit in their houses and look to the outside.

Connections to the global Internet are outside the scope of ZEROCONF, but 
I have to disagree with this idea that incoming connections are not 
important.

One of the most important things about the Internet is that it is NOT a 
unidirectional infrastructure, like television, radio, newspapers, AOL, 
and most of the other communication schemes of the last century. In its 
uncorrupted form, the Internet is a pure peer-to-peer network, where any 
host can send packets to any other host.

Here's just one example. My computer at home is always on. My DSL line is 
always on. Like most people, my computer is continually polling a POP 
server 24 hours a day to see if there is any mail. Everyone's computer 
continually polling mail servers is a huge stupid waste of network 
bandwidth. Why couldn't the POP server just tell my computer when mail 
arrives? In fact, why do I need a POP server at all? Why doesn't the 
sending computer just open a direct SMTP connection to my computer and 
send the mail to it? Answer: because that would mean I was running a 
SERVER (!) at home, and that's not allowed. Only Pacific Bell is allowed 
to run servers. You may have heard in the news that Pacific Bell is 
averaging a twelve-hour delay on incoming mail, because their mail 
servers are so overloaded. Isn't the irony beautiful? Pacific Bell 
insists that they have to run all the "servers", and then they can't cope 
with the load. Slowly, we will outgrow these stupidities. I wonder which 
will be the first email client to offer a DirectMail(TM)* SMTP listener 
for users with always-on Internet connections?

(* Note: I made up the name "DirectMail". It's not a real trade mark :-)

Stuart Cheshire <[email-masked]>
 * Wizard Without Portfolio, Apple Computer