Idea on how to deal with the RMT issues

[Riinata]

I can somewhat understand certain rules like that, but not to the extent that SE has made it into. I live in the US. My IP CAN change via either a MAC address change for my router box or just being offline for long enough. Plus what happens if the next person to get the IP I got banned on tries to play the game? They won't be able to. I use Comcast as an ISP. CenturyLink (the DSL provider in my area) uses a system that if you powercycle your modem, you get a new IP. They have an instant recycling policy. Comcast says that until your Lease expires and even sometimes for a time after that Lease expires, you will still retain the same IP address. Leases for IPs from Comcast last a week at a time. So if I lose power 3 days into my lease, I'll typically have 4 days to get power back online before my IP is recycled. If I'm 1 day away from expiration though, typically Comcast's system will place a lock on the IP for up to 3 days after original Lease expiration should've occurred.

[DarkShado]

<SNIP>

So the IP address can change and if a person is abusing the IP address it should be banned and then
maybe these scumbag ISPs will actually start to take action against these people.

I know your IP can change via mac or IP.

The next person that comes along and has that IP can go complain
to the ISP and then maybe these scumbag ISPS will finally start
to do something instead of letting the abuse continue on.

Also the IP address is not immediately recycled either if it has been
pulled it is usually about 48 hours before the IP goes back into the
pool again on a dynamic IP system like cable and DSL modems.

If SE GMs are seeing a constant abuse of the free accounts then
they NEED to be able to have a way to stop that and stop the
people from coming back and creating MORE new free accounts
over and over again. banning the gold spammers are NOT going
to help if they can just laugh and create a brand new free account
instantly like they can right now.

Bottom line is once the ISP removes the offending customer then
the ban against the IP could be removed.

And chances are Comcast or any of the other big cable / DSL
companies here in North America are not going to be affected
and that these scumbags that sell gold are in China, Korea, and
other Asian countries.

Bottom line is the ISPs need to take some responsibility if there is
abuse even if it is Comcast or any of the major cable / DSL
companies.

I am tired of this abuse. If SE can NOT find a way to deal with the
trial account issue then they should TURN OFF the trial accounts
until they can because that is what is being abused by these gold
spammers.

[Riinata]

<SNIP>

Thing is this: In the US, the only piece of legislation that would deal with what you claim is the "ISP's responsibility" is currently undergoing massive reforms. That law is known as the CFAA or Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and Aaron Swartz's death has introduced new fights for reforms of the CFAA. He was prosecuted for "downloading too many academic journals from JSTOR" and yet JSTOR refused to press charges upon cooperation from Aaron in fixing the issue, but the US Government decided to keep pressing the fight which ended with Swartz committing suicide. In fact, the ISPs have no control over that law but instead are supposed to inform the authorities, which they do. A LOT of government agencies ignore the issue because it's not an issue to them or a direct threat to national security.

Also, Comcast DOES do immediate recycling in the case of IPs that exit their grace period which can either be when the DHCP lease ends or a couple days later depending on last connection time and it's relation to the lease duration. I'm unsure of CL though. But anyways, you do realize that with the dynamic IP nature that it's difficult for an ISP to respond in such a way as to remove the customer from their network, right? Because of how dynamic Comcast's network is, it's not exactly easy to pinpoint who had an IP at this date and time without combing through routing logs and other verification logs.