[Wikimedia-l] Block evasion might be a federal offense

[Peter Gervai]

I am possibly failing to see the point of this part of the discussion.

On Wed, Aug 21, 2013 at 7:14 AM, FT2 <ft2.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:

>    - *If the IP is "sufficiently clearly connected"  to the individual
>    behind the Alice account*,

It is not and possibly almost never will.

However I fail to see how people hanging around quite a long time mix
up a banned user with a technical measure to _enforce_ a ban (namely,
blocks). Everyone seem to talk about blocks while meaning to talk
about bans.

IP based blocks almost never personally targeted since people do not
have IP addresses: machines do. We (and everyone else) use IP based
access control to mechanically enforce things on people not following
the "rules" (eg stay away when instructed to). It is much more like
putting metal bars on a window looking onto a street with troubled
neighbourhood.

We reasonably expect ourselves to use IP bans to minimise collateral
damage but it's guaranteed to be there; people may change IP address
to evade the blocks (and therefore violate the bans); IP addresses may
be reassigned to the innocent and obviosuly there are vast armies of
NAT gateways, multiuser servers, proxies, TOR exit nodes and whatnot.
The cases where we can 100% assure that one IP or range equals to a
given person are practically nonexistant.

Because of that I fail to see any possible validity of "legally
binding action against a person based on an IP address".

Peter