Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mdisea!jackb
From: jackb@MDI.COM (Jack Brindle)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.comm
Subject: Re: Apple's FCC request
Message-ID: <1991Apr17.234623.7251@MDI.COM>
Date: 17 Apr 91 23:46:23 GMT
References: <1991Apr11.140850@ap.co.umist.ac.uk> <14937@life.ai.mit.edu> <1991Apr17.202011.20724@cs.uoregon.edu>
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In article <1991Apr17.202011.20724@cs.uoregon.edu> chris@idiotix.cs.uoregon.edu (chris hecht) writes:
>Just a thought on radio based networks:  What is to stop someone from
>walking into a building with a radio net and hiding a little xmitter
>which puts out a Chernoble(sp?) packet every half hour or so.
>
>The network would grind to a halt, then be shut down and powered up
>again, just in time for another packet o' death.

This depends entirely on the protocol in use. If properly designed, the biggest
effect would be to cause a retransmission. It indeed should NOT shut down.
Remember, even though the network might be ethernet compatible, it probably
is not using ethernet as a link layer protocol over the air. Thus the
"packet o' death" would have to be sent within the (probably) proprietary
protocol. Makes things a bit difficult. This actually seems like a remote
scenerio... (Which thus makes it quite likely to happen :-).

Jack Brindle
ham radio: wa4fib/7