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From: jjones@cs.uiuc.edu (Joel Jones)
Newsgroups: comp.admin.policy
Subject: RFC on my "abuse"
Message-ID: <1991Jun25.154257.7452@m.cs.uiuc.edu>
Date: 25 Jun 91 15:42:57 GMT
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Organization: University of Illinois, Dept. of Comp. Sci., Urbana, IL
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I am posting this to start a new thread on the use of networking facilities.
Please post your comments to this group.
  Joel Jones
  jjones@uiuc.edu
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  While I was getting my MS in CS at Arizona State University, I ran into a
bit of trouble with the Engineering Computing facilities people.  Over
Memorial Day weekend in 1989, I ran a shell script that went through a list
of internet sites ending in ".com" to see if those sites allowed anonymous
FTP.  In my shell script, so as to not load the networks over-much, I inserted
a sleep 30 between each attempt.  I also deliberately chose a holiday weekend
so as to avoid overloading this way also.  During the weekend, I logged in
several times to check the progress of my script.  Every time the script was
no longer running.  Fixing what I thought was a problem in my understanding of
the built-in nohup in csh, I set the script running again.  On Tuesday morning,
when I attempted to login, I was not given a shell prompt, but a message saying
my account had been suspended.  I called an operator and was told that I needed
to make an appointment to see the assistant head of the engineering computing
facilities.  I made an appointment and went to his office at the appointed 
time.  When I arrived there, he handed me a copy of my shell script and asked
"What is this?"  I replied that it was a shell script for checking for 
anonymous ftp sites.  He seemed taken aback that I would be so forthright and
polite.  He then told me that he didn't appreciate getting calls from Colorado
asking what was going on at his facility. (apparently the network 
administration center for WestNet gave him a call)  He told me not to do this
again and I said I wouldn't and he restored my account on the spot.
  Here's where the questions arise.  Would it have been better if he have sent 
me email to stop doing this rather than suspending my account?  Should I have
been using the network facilities at all?  At the time there had been no
announcement from engineering computing services that off-site links were 
available, but the general computing services people had.  Was this particular
use an abuse of my privileges?  The written policy statement was not very
specific about what constituted an overuse or abuse of computing resources. I
knew from a friend that our link to the outside world (thru University of
Arizona) was a leased line and there would be not incremental increase in costs
due to my use of the network.  Does this make a difference?

  Joel Jones      (much happier at the University of Illinois)
  jjones@uiuc.edu
this after stopping my script?
-- 
Joel Jones      As the advertisment for an exhibition on Leonardo da Vinci said,
jjones@uiuc.edu "They called him a genius, a botanist, a demon, a philosopher, a
                 practical joker, an eccentric, and a visionary.  No wonder he 
                 was such a great engineer."