From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: from atl4mhob22.registeredsite.com (atl4mhob22.registeredsite.com [209.17.115.116]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by lists.bufferbloat.net (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 7CFB23CB37 for ; Thu, 5 Oct 2023 16:44:19 -0400 (EDT) Received: from mymail.myregisteredsite.com (jax4wmnode3b.mymail.myregisteredsite.com [209.237.134.215]) by atl4mhob22.registeredsite.com (8.14.4/8.14.4) with SMTP id 395Ki4QB034722 for ; Thu, 5 Oct 2023 16:44:04 -0400 Received: (qmail 27159 invoked by uid 80); 5 Oct 2023 20:43:58 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO ?192.168.1.100?) (jack@3kitty.org@76.137.180.175) by 209.237.134.154 with ESMTPA; 5 Oct 2023 20:43:58 -0000 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="------------TpOXb56uUgClXPWVHSSOZm0z" Message-ID: <028f61d7-be24-4fe3-82d3-6eca0386d0d0@3kitty.org> Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2023 13:43:57 -0700 MIME-Version: 1.0 User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird To: nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net References: Content-Language: en-US From: Jack Haverty Autocrypt: addr=jack@3kitty.org; keydata= xsDNBGCm2psBDADGOWO8n9wfkDW9ZUEo8o+SZ5MU9us2il+fS4EFM/RaZFIbQ+P72bExzSd3 WnJdPfqO1O7Q+dRnvVO9+G2/9oT/uRZVaE05+SothzKZBv32HcZoUkdNZOTqSkdo3EwNPjid LLxX+dMBxMpR3pBdvGN8Z7lnZe6fV4QO2xtd58y3B33AVZJp+RuNwucby9dY2meyy2BJVKrx mKhYXAucVyg0ALVIchHt9UknVW4aLvQF+oMfzXVvCWeguW+DvbyazVceWGO7FSgUJ8ED3Ii7 xAR5zZJ1LASoMhG1ixg07P9Uy4ohV6c+c0yV9SY4yqhZ3+zN2cm9h/aXpwjSuiVVAJbK7zzb FjI+h89dbnaVQrLx6GikV0OVYqC6TCeMfCFZQAJLs1icxQi3BLL7O1fbTGatEfTgLa5nqfKq K/D/HlOCUeFxqZI8hXvT5dG4e1m3ilpF2/ytcWKSVg3d699UFntPv3sEbAQwwfXsnuD4Hem6 0Ao0/z41n8x1aeZE80FdkpEAEQEAAc0eSmFjayBIYXZlcnR5IDxqYWNrQDNraXR0eS5vcmc+ wsEJBBMBCAAzFiEEZLvMn5vmvTAlFEILdGzDIkA7jlAFAmCm2pwCGwMFCwkIBwIGFQgJCgsC BRYCAwEAAAoJEHRswyJAO45QuX0L/jOluv8fr/BmuEEQsWWGW6oARIbjDQrI93kXIJXuPnfp tGjkx/f1TMIzI2B9s/tejiYE7IZOhWbX1YvKF0UbkSJi50UyV9XtYRnLdD5TcksKB4luDF8S R+nj5WBm17Bp8qwriCMgA1jGL2wQ7J1KUw4Q/gsMcjhn/39PevswkriU2qqVplfCs9yTTMU5 SvtE2U9F3Y1ZINHn3kUysvxhRFd+Oh3PocWHmVE+hkII+qsra6z4eztDgoB+vqxmOJEdtvex GhT8OKu74DacguZVfu/AV+cwpX701sdjJrMyKjcv8uhFLM/E5gf6kSUAFxBVwe6pNDmAgmbS c0fAFrZjgXxNxxndpu/8OAUDVzKg+l5WJ0nWss9Q14BwA+FcoclO3lwzFu7jOiLvkm7jQkFB o+p8Owe4iAED1KK/aocIa/RiD4sZ3KXUJ92kkemZ1Qe2XpFVdzxaQDG0huNkc5Mie9rdt62O Ae+5cYdPeWmBVn+pFNs5H09kQQbVR5pUxe2Aps7AzQRgptqcAQwAzzougHNMFr/O/L8HnNJW 1YyOuX0PEVNUXQPwkxKuD8bAXsPr4Hv1a+840ByesiJSadhQgVSMruRqoQC5tTkbEWkqlfDW waNAdqCJOXl2T6gtK7RpcHNx7+/du/gCAhHOXqH1Qfs0Zi3YEbR/kQFRP3wD4GiCvHSny8zJ X9plIHqQGoE5DePNAtE2KimbFMsjguqJgq5x0tMf3qEaMNd0IGTStGpcC49iss71slotH091 Y1Yo9CpzL6rj8IP0BfssEujAvf3Gbf1oi92JRE3s2humFDfPvSlHmRIfWPQ4qFOw1zmlzsV1 eg83gErKbjaDdkbwQA85RTmMVKNVvonM80WB6jAg8tlJ5VlYlpbzASpJRNj+FL1LLBQxCbPU eFwrzqYgNvtdKR7j5nTgdndCxq+2aws/aAjdL10S8yeH7ZOpNPzjDJfMSt/L1O25zPUhXdQC 9AZNYsfyV7rf+POEgVpIEth1fT9WbmS0rZxRd/+y628n31GicbA+teN890vdABEBAAHCwPYE GAEIACAWIQRku8yfm+a9MCUUQgt0bMMiQDuOUAUCYKbanQIbDAAKCRB0bMMiQDuOUF1LC/4q 4pLtmDt6TIET2H7zGj5ie3ng7kC7YqtFPYwgLQzs9WeqQ/5WowEmHOPonBcqhGbtDj22GebQ 7w0RoUHb+aXsbC85I/C+nWgT1ZcfMBTHGlBcIQvOCNG18g87Ha9jgD0HnW4bRUkZmGMpP0Yd TLM+PBNu41AK6z82VPQrfTuPKqwAAS2FK/RpF2xB7rjpETzIPl9Dj9EAkRbviURIg0BQkmej l02FLzGmlTfBIDHBdEgzvD71Z5H9BP8DAbxBzonSTzx/KZyv7njSUzdVLW+5O/WzPgb4Qt4I jQd66LS9HWS1G7AcLjiSQAIf8v7JkX3NwtN+NGX5cmt2p0e9FOOKWXVgCIgPN3/712EEGAgq UUxuPEBD5DrRCgjZL40eHxQza2BAhoVoWopUCGZdCCZJP3iF7818wIph0U393DELG9NAGLJa qkoA8KBimXp9Rd2QvpA864JRy/REoEOEF9lm3clriLyEqaL/VMIQRhl/VSkUuez4Wr68eHus TFdwePg= In-Reply-To: Subject: Re: [NNagain] Introduction: Dr. David Bray X-BeenThere: nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.20 Precedence: list List-Id: =?utf-8?q?Network_Neutrality_is_back!_Let=C2=B4s_make_the_technical_aspects_heard_this_time!?= List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 05 Oct 2023 20:44:19 -0000 This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------TpOXb56uUgClXPWVHSSOZm0z Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Thanks for all your efforts to keep the "feedback loop" to the rulemakers functioning! I'd like to offer a suggestion for a hopefully politically acceptable way to handle the deluge, derived from my own battles with "email" over the years (decades). Back in the 1970s, I implemented one of the first email systems on the Arpanet, under the mentorship of JCR Licklider, who had been pursuing his vision of a "Galactic Network" at ARPA and MIT.   One of the things we discovered was the significance of anonymity.   At the time, anonymity was forbidden on the Arpanet; you needed an account on some computer, protected by passwords, in order to legitimately use the network.   The mechanisms were crude and easily broken, but the principle applied. Over the years, that principle has been forgotten, and the right to be anonymous has become entrenched.   But many uses of the network, and needs of its users, demand accountability, so all sorts of mechanisms have been pasted on top of the network to provide ways to judge user identity.  Banks, medical services, governments, and businesses all demand some way of proving your identity, with passwords, various schemes of 2FA, VPNs, or other such technology, with varying degrees of protection.   It is still possible to be anonymous on the net, but many things you do require you to prove, to some extent, who you are. So, my suggestion for handling the deluge of "comments" is: 1/ create some mechanism for "registering" your intent to submit a comment.   Make it hard for bots to register.  Perhaps you can leverage the work of various partners, e.g., ISPs, retailers, government agencies, financial institutions, of others who already have some way of identifying their users. 2/ Also make registration optional - anyone can still submit comments anonymously if they choose. 3/ for "registered commenters", provide a way to "edit" your previous comment - i.e., advise that your comment is always the last one you submitted.   I.E., whoever you are, you can only submit one comment, which will be the last one you submit. 4/ In the thousands of pages of comments, somehow flag the ones that are from registered commenters, visible to the people who read the comments.   Even better, provide those "information consumers" with ways to sort, filter, and search through the body of comments. This may not reduce the deluge of comments, but I'd expect it to help the lawyers and politicians keep their heads above the water. Anonymity is an important issue for Net Neutrality too, but I'll opine about that separately..... Jack Haverty On 10/2/23 12:38, David Bray, PhD via Nnagain wrote: > Greetings all and thank you Dave Taht for that very kind intro... > > First, I'll open with I'm a gosh-darn non-partisan, which means I > swore an oath to uphold the Constitution first and serve the United > States - not a specific party, tribe, or ideology. This often means, > especially in today's era of 24/7 news and social media, non-partisans > have to "top cover". > > Second, I'll share that in what happened in 2017 (which itself was 10x > what we saw in 2014) my biggest concern was and remains that a few > actors attempted to flood the system with less-than-authentic comments. > > In some respects this is not new. The whole "notice and comment" > process is a legacy process that goes back decades. And the FCC (and > others) have had postcard floods of comments, mimeographed letters of > comments, faxed floods of comments, and now this - which, when > combined with generative AI, will be yet another flood. > > Which gets me to my biggest concern as a non-partisan in 2023-2024, > namely how LLMs might misuse and abuse the commenting process further. > > Both in 2014 and 2017, I asked FCC General Counsel if I could use > CAPTChA to try to reduce the volume of web scrapers or bots both > filing and pulling info from the Electronic Comment Filing System. > > Both times I was told *no* out of concerns that they might prevent > someone from filing. I asked if I could block obvious spam, defined as > someone filing a comment >100 times a minute, and was similarly told > no because one of those possible comments might be genuine and/or it > could be an ex party filing en masse for others. > > For 2017 we had to spin up 30x the number of AWS cloud instances to > handle the load - and this was a flood of comments at 4am, 5am, and > 6am ET at night which normally shouldn’t see such volumes. When I said > there was a combination of actual humans wanting to leave comments and > others who were effectively denying service to others (especially > because if anyone wanted to do a batch upload of 100,000 comments or > more they could submit a CSV file or a comment with 100,000 > signatories) - both parties said no, that couldn’t be happening. > > Until 2021 when the NY Attorney General proved that was exactly what > was happening with 18m of the 23m apparently from non-authentic origin > with ~9m from one side of the political aisle (and six companies) and > ~9m from the other side of the political aisle (and one or more > teenagers). > > So with Net Neutrality back on the agenda - here’s a simple > prediction, even if the volume of comments is somehow controlled, > 10,000+ pages of comments produced by ChatGPT or a different LLM is > both possible and probably will be done. The question is if someone > includes a legitimate legal argument on page 6,517 - will FCC’s > lawyers spot it and respond to it as part of the NPRM? > > Hope this helps and with highest regards, > > -d. > -- > > Principal, LeadDoAdapt Ventures, Inc. & > Distinguished Fellow > > Henry S. Stimson Center , > Business Executives for National Security > > > > > On Mon, Oct 2, 2023 at 2:15 PM Dave Taht via Nnagain > wrote: > > All: > > I have spent the last several days reaching out to as many people I > know with a deep understanding of the policy and technical issues > surrounding the internet, to participate on this list. I encourage you > all to reach out on your own, especially to those that you can > constructively and civilly disagree with, and hopefully work with, to > establish technical steps forward. Quite a few have joined silently! > So far, 168 people have joined! > > Please welcome Dr David Bray[1], a self-described "human flack jacket" > who, in the last NN debate, stood up for the non -partisan FCC IT team > that successfully kept the system up 99.4% of the time despite the > comment floods and network abuses from all sides. He has shared with > me privately many sad (and some hilarious!) stories of that era, and I > do kind of hope now, that some of that history surfaces, and we can > learn from it. > > Thank you very much, David, for putting down your painful memories[2], > and agreeing to join here. There is a lot to tackle here, going > forward. > > [1] https://www.stimson.org/ppl/david-bray/ > [2] "Pain shared is reduced. Joy shared, increased." - Spider Robinson > > > -- > Oct 30: > https://netdevconf.info/0x17/news/the-maestro-and-the-music-bof.html > Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos > _______________________________________________ > Nnagain mailing list > Nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net > https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/nnagain > > > _______________________________________________ > Nnagain mailing list > Nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net > https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/nnagain --------------TpOXb56uUgClXPWVHSSOZm0z Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Thanks for all your efforts to keep the "feedback loop" to the rulemakers functioning!  

I'd like to offer a suggestion for a hopefully politically acceptable way to handle the deluge, derived from my own battles with "email" over the years (decades).

Back in the 1970s, I implemented one of the first email systems on the Arpanet, under the mentorship of JCR Licklider, who had been pursuing his vision of a "Galactic Network" at ARPA and MIT.   One of the things we discovered was the significance of anonymity.   At the time, anonymity was forbidden on the Arpanet; you needed an account on some computer, protected by passwords, in order to legitimately use the network.   The mechanisms were crude and easily broken, but the principle applied.

Over the years, that principle has been forgotten, and the right to be anonymous has become entrenched.   But many uses of the network, and needs of its users, demand accountability, so all sorts of mechanisms have been pasted on top of the network to provide ways to judge user identity.  Banks, medical services, governments, and businesses all demand some way of proving your identity, with passwords, various schemes of 2FA, VPNs, or other such technology, with varying degrees of protection.   It is still possible to be anonymous on the net, but many things you do require you to prove, to some extent, who you are.

So, my suggestion for handling the deluge of "comments" is:

1/ create some mechanism for "registering" your intent to submit a comment.   Make it hard for bots to register.  Perhaps you can leverage the work of various partners, e.g., ISPs, retailers, government agencies, financial institutions, of others who already have some way of identifying their users.

2/ Also make registration optional - anyone can still submit comments anonymously if they choose.

3/ for "registered commenters", provide a way to "edit" your previous comment - i.e., advise that your comment is always the last one you submitted.   I.E., whoever you are, you can only submit one comment, which will be the last one you submit.

4/ In the thousands of pages of comments, somehow flag the ones that are from registered commenters, visible to the people who read the comments.   Even better, provide those "information consumers" with ways to sort, filter, and search through the body of comments.

This may not reduce the deluge of comments, but I'd expect it to help the lawyers and politicians keep their heads above the water.

Anonymity is an important issue for Net Neutrality too, but I'll opine about that separately.....

Jack Haverty


On 10/2/23 12:38, David Bray, PhD via Nnagain wrote:
Greetings all and thank you Dave Taht for that very kind intro...

First, I'll open with I'm a gosh-darn non-partisan, which means I swore an oath to uphold the Constitution first and serve the United States - not a specific party, tribe, or ideology. This often means, especially in today's era of 24/7 news and social media, non-partisans have to "top cover".

Second, I'll share that in what happened in 2017 (which itself was 10x what we saw in 2014) my biggest concern was and remains that a few actors attempted to flood the system with less-than-authentic comments.

In some respects this is not new. The whole "notice and comment" process is a legacy process that goes back decades. And the FCC (and others) have had postcard floods of comments, mimeographed letters of comments, faxed floods of comments, and now this - which, when combined with generative AI, will be yet another flood. 

Which gets me to my biggest concern as a non-partisan in 2023-2024, namely how LLMs might misuse and abuse the commenting process further.

Both in 2014 and 2017, I asked FCC General Counsel if I could use CAPTChA to try to reduce the volume of web scrapers or bots both filing and pulling info from the Electronic Comment Filing System. 

Both times I was told *no* out of concerns that they might prevent someone from filing. I asked if I could block obvious spam, defined as someone filing a comment >100 times a minute, and was similarly told no because one of those possible comments might be genuine and/or it could be an ex party filing en masse for others. 

For 2017 we had to spin up 30x the number of AWS cloud instances to handle the load - and this was a flood of comments at 4am, 5am, and 6am ET at night which normally shouldn’t see such volumes. When I said there was a combination of actual humans wanting to leave comments and others who were effectively denying service to others (especially because if anyone wanted to do a batch upload of 100,000 comments or more they could submit a CSV file or a comment with 100,000 signatories) - both parties said no, that couldn’t be happening. 

Until 2021 when the NY Attorney General proved that was exactly what was happening with 18m of the 23m apparently from non-authentic origin with ~9m from one side of the political aisle (and six companies) and ~9m from the other side of the political aisle (and one or more teenagers). 

So with Net Neutrality back on the agenda - here’s a simple prediction, even if the volume of comments is somehow controlled, 10,000+ pages of comments produced by ChatGPT or a different LLM is both possible and probably will be done. The question is if someone includes a legitimate legal argument on page 6,517 - will FCC’s lawyers spot it and respond to it as part of the NPRM?

Hope this helps and with highest regards,


On Mon, Oct 2, 2023 at 2:15 PM Dave Taht via Nnagain <nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:
All:

I have spent the last several days reaching out to as many people I
know with a deep understanding of the policy and technical issues
surrounding the internet, to participate on this list. I encourage you
all to reach out on your own, especially to those that you can
constructively and civilly disagree with, and hopefully work with, to
establish technical steps forward. Quite a few have joined silently!
So far, 168 people have joined!

Please welcome Dr David Bray[1], a self-described "human flack jacket"
who, in the last NN debate, stood up for the non -partisan FCC IT team
that successfully kept the system up 99.4% of the time despite the
comment floods and network abuses from all sides. He has shared with
me privately many sad (and some hilarious!) stories of that era, and I
do kind of hope now, that some of that history surfaces, and we can
learn from it.

Thank you very much, David, for putting down your painful memories[2],
and agreeing to join here. There is a lot to tackle here, going
forward.

[1] https://www.stimson.org/ppl/david-bray/
[2] "Pain shared is reduced. Joy shared, increased." - Spider Robinson


--
Oct 30: https://netdevconf.info/0x17/news/the-maestro-and-the-music-bof.html
Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos
_______________________________________________
Nnagain mailing list
Nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net
https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/nnagain

_______________________________________________
Nnagain mailing list
Nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net
https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/nnagain

--------------TpOXb56uUgClXPWVHSSOZm0z--