OFF: anon.penet.fi

[Niko Makila]

Paul's message dated: Wed, 13 May 1998 11:49:22 EDT
>
> This reminds me of another incident we can thank the gigantic legal arm
> of Scientology for.  If memory serves, they were responsible for the
> anon.penet.fi anonymous e-mail gateway guy having to hand over the
> subscriber list, because someone was posting "secret Scientological
> doctrines" (and maybe anti-Church rants) anonymously through that
> service.  It may have shut down the service for a while, I don't
> remember.

I just want to add a couple of comments here.

Yes, this is mostly true.  There are a few common misunderstandings though.
The whole subscriber list was never handed over -- just the address of the
person who sent the Scientology stuff.  Maybe that shouldn't have happend,
but it's slightly understandable if you think that the stuff was sent to
news, not e-mail (although e-mail was naturally used up to the gateway).
News is public, e-mail isn't.

        //niko

ObBOC-L: BOC are playing here in Helsinki June 4th.  Who else is going?