[ NNSquad ] Re: Peering dispute cuts off Sprint<->Cogent Internet traffic

[Barry Gold <bgold@matrix-consultants.com>]

From: Ed Jankiewicz <edward.jankiewicz@sri.com>
Subject: Total Filtering

> As many news organizations are now reporting, Sprint-Nextel (Embarq) has 
> decided to sever its Internet connection with Cogent, another Internet 
> service provider.  This action has caused a "hole" or "rip" in the 
> internet, meaning that Sprint-Nextel (Embarq) and Cogent customers may 
> find they cannot access resources hosted by the other company's 
> customers. Similar standoffs have occurred in the past, and usually one 
> company backs down after a few days, but no one can predict what will 
> happen in this case.
>   

OK, so what has happened to the "treats censorship as damage and routes 
around it" Internet?  Even if Embarq and Cogent are no longer talking to 
each other, the routers should be automatically finding routes via other 
carriers and sending the packets -- around Robin Hood's barn if 
necessary, but the Internet is supposed to be _robust_.  Jon Postel 
designed it that way -- I've read the RFCs.  That's what ARPA specified 
when they paid for the development of first the ARPANet and later the 
Internet -- and what NSF paid for when they branched off NSFNet and 
allowed commercial traffic.

Are these guys programming their routers to just drop packets with 
certain destination IP addresses, instead of finding the shortest 
available route?

I'm beginning to think that Congress (or perhaps an international body 
similar to the WTO) should make the core RFCs (IP, TCP, BGP, FTP, HTTP, 
SMTP, and RFC 822) have the force of law.  And anybody who violates 
those protocols should be fined and/or have their connections turned off.