EFF employs a lot of attorneys, many with very impressive credentials. But at the end of the day, yes, any opinion anyone expresses on any subjects is "just his beliefs".

I have no interest in starting my own hosting provider, TOR friendly or otherwise.

May I kindly ask you to refrain from discussing me personally and keep discussion on subject, if at all possible? Thank you very much.

If you perform malicious activities yourself, than you are breaking the law. If you run TOR exit node and malicious traffic comes from TOR node, than you are not breaking the law. There is no contradiction here.

Not only TOR by itself is legal (whatever you think that means), but running TOR exit node (with inevitable outcome that some of the exit traffic will be malicious) is legal too (according to... see above).

Ah, note the word "believe". That doesn't mean it's a fact. Funny how I pointed that out earlier.

Also note that this may have the presumption that the traffic is, itself, legal. This is comment on the legality of anonymity, not of facilitating illegal activities.

Also note that the EFF has been on the losing side of many a court case. The EFF attorneys (who need not be lawyers, as it so happens) are frequently wrong. All the way back in 2005 there were questions about how good the EFF were (eg http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/12/06 ... ds_to_die/ ). I support the ideas the EFF fight for, but they don't do a very good job and I sure as hell wouldn't trust them unless I had no other choice.

_________________
Rgds
Stephen
(Linux user since kernel version 0.11)

Do you mean to suggest any opinion anyone expresses on any subject could be anything other than "just his beliefs"?

You may be right about EFF attorneys, maybe they aren't good, but I think the fact that overzealous RIAA/MPAA lawyers never sued anyone for running TOR exit node over many years of operation strongly supports opinion of EFF attorneys on this subject.

What exactly as a TOR exit node operator makes you believe you have any safe harbor protection status? That's just the civil side of the equation, for the criminal side of activities I can almost guarantee you won't be looked upon as an innocent provider.

You can argue ideology all you want, but that doesn't set aside the legal and ethical responsibilities. Think of this way, you own a property containing an abandoned building - if you don't take reasonable means to secure the property you can be liable for activities occurring on that property.

As you've been championing TOR and indirectly the "right" to run a TOR exit node for the last 8 pages, glg's comment seems quite on topic and well placed to me.

Once again, combination of these two things make me (not a lawyer) believe that running TOR exit node is legal under current US law:

1) EFF lawyers say so.
2) Overzealous RIAA/MPAA lawyers never sued anyone running TOR exit node over many years of operation.


When did I argue any ideology?

It means the statement is not a statement of fact, yet you've been pushing it as one. The EFF lawyers are not saying that it's legal to run a Tor node; they're saying they believe it is legal. Many many people have lost in court doing things they believe are legal.

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Rgds

Stephen

(Linux user since kernel version 0.11)

Whenever EFF lawyers (or anyone else) state anything, they are always stating their beliefs. Adding "I believe" at the beginning of every statement one makes is factually correct but logically redundant.

When? How about this entire thread? This thread was originally started by a former customer, under the guise of privacy protection, to whine that they were being required by Linode to provide a remedy after Linode received multiple DCMA and abuse complaints about their VPS.

Everything after that is why tor_zealot and yourself believe a person should be able to run a TOR exit node without any responsibility or consideration for traffic and how you believe a service provider should not have any problem with a user doing so. You both are attacking this from different angles, but you both are outright ignoring a service provider's legal obligations and ethical responsibilities in this situation.

Nope; that's why lawyers nearly always phrase in terms of "belief", because it is not redundant. It evokes different conclusions from the readers mind.

_________________
Rgds

Stephen

(Linux user since kernel version 0.11)

OK, let's say it's legal. But web hosts are under no obligation to allow everything that is legal in their jurisdiction. For example, a nontrivial number of hosts have a blanket ban on adult content, despite the fact that most porn is perfectly legal in most of the developed world. Other hosts (including Linode's Atlanta datacenter) often block IRC, even though there's nothing illegal about IRC. Tor could be in the same category of "potential nuisances" even if it were somehow guaranteed to be legal. Ethical obligations? I don't think so, when there are plenty of other ways you can run a Tor exit node.

If I were a sysadmin working for the adult content industry, I wouldn't complain about any host for not wanting to do business with me. The same applies to Tor. Linode staff has probably seen enough of this thread by now. It's their servers, so let them decide.

I argued that running TOR node does not seem to be illegal under current US law. I never stated my opinion of this law. For all you know I might be bitterly opposed to any laws which allow any kind of privacy and anonymity on the Internet. Assessment of law applicability and approval or disapproval of the law are two unrelated subjects.

So, once again, when did I argue any ideology?

This is actually a statement I agree with. It does indeed evoke different conclusions from a lot of readers' minds. You just demonstrated this personally, so it's hard to argue with that.

Still, explicitly adding "I believe" to any statement by any person on any subject does not change semantics of the statement because any such statement is by definition an expression of opinion and so implicit "I believe" is always present.