AIUI (IANAL), NNTP servers simply work in a peer-to-peer fashion (rather like BitTorrent) but cache the content their end, and newsreaders maintain an index of which headers have been downloaded, which content is newer, etc.VNVObit wrote:So what's the position if the ISP's news server is full of binaries? ( looking at you BT)
Content will be on the ISP's news servers since the server has allowed subscription to a newsgroup that isn't originally hosted by them but *is* cached by them. I could read some of the demon.turnpike.* newsgroups even though I'd hopped to another ISP for instance.
Demon could keep their newsgroups private - refuse to allow access to demon.* - so BT wouldn't see it on the lost of newsgroups to sync against. Similarly I could create a alt.binaries.yakyak.goatpron newsgroups on one server and flag it as being public, unmoderated, available, promiscuous, sluttish whateva and let BT, Demon et al capture the name as a viable newsgroup. If you were on BT and you decided to subscribe to it, BT's servers would then participate in the syncing so that content would by available to you and other BT customers.
So.. how does that answer your question? If there were binaries of suspicious nature on BT's servers, I'm guessing it is treated the same way as questionable content held in their web proxy caches. BT didn't directly access it, they did so on behalf of a customer request, and it is their prerogative - privacy policy withstanding - if they wanted to identify the customer in question. Some ISPs who don't want to be in this position may have a policy of keyword blocking against newsgroup titles; many aren't that interested in trying to block, just in controlling capacity issues whilst still making the most popular available. Hence many ISPs have a free (and unsupported) NNTP feed with a retention time of 30d on binary newsgroups (text-only 90d). I know years back my newsgroups access from BT was shite and forums were discussing if NNTP service was viewed as supportable - either it was and needed to be improved, or wasn't and shouldn't be advertised as part of the package.
