[AktiviX-discuss] who owns addresses?

[bou]

Hi

> [1] If a person uses an email address in the name of a group, do other
members of that group have a moral or legal right to access the account?

I think so. Although I would formulate the question differently; usually before a person 'uses' such an address there has been a 'previous' agreement to create that account and that a certain person should manage it. The 'ownersip' comes from that original agreement, not from the current use.


> [2] If a service provider provides an email account, is the provider
legally or morally responsible for the way in which it's used?

Not morally but certainly legally ... if there is some legal complaint, i see lawyers going after the holder (owner?) of the domain if they can't locate the sender .... 


> [...] If a group has a commitment to non-heirarchical practice, 

do we assume this is in the context of what aktivix provides now?

> the individual who operates the account should be fully accountable to anyone in the
group in who's name they act. 

the grey areas appear when the group changes, or disbands, or a new group with a similar name and name turns up, or a new person wants to take over the management of the old account, or a combination of some or all the above.

> [...] it's probably better to have a paragraph in
the terms of service saying it's the group's responsibility to make sure
that all the people who need access to an account have the necessary
details to use it, and that as a provider one should value the
preservation of privacy above other considerations.

which translates as: if you loose your password you've lost your account (or to me it sounds very similar)

>  [2] I think this is why it's a great idea to build systems that don't
give the service provider any access to the content of mailboxes, or
other supposedly private material. Other opinions may be more helpful than mine...

I agree, but I was more thinking of giving (who) a new password when they lost it which is something most email and other providers... provide? Which I think I would like to provide otherwise we'd be providing a reliabe service only to the best and most competent keepers of passwords which in my short experience is only a tiny fraction of users

Going back to my original query ... I would agree with those setence that "all emails with addresses @any_given_domain belong to the person or company who owns that domain" in terms of employer, or a group that has created that domain and email system with a specific objective. But not in the email providers from the likes of gmail to us.

With us, the agreement with users is to provide "personal" email addresses.

Maybe we should ask this question when creating new addresses? is this a group or a individual address? and do you want us to keep in our records an alternative address for when you forget your email? or a token like riseup does?

bou

leaving the answer for reference ...

-- 
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On 7/11/19 19:01, mark wrote:
> That's an interesting question.
>
> I think there may be two different issues here:
>
> [1] If a person uses an email address in the name of a group, do other
> members of that group have a moral or legal right to access the account?
>
> [2] If a service provider provides an email account, is the provider
> legally or morally responsible for the way in which it's used?
>
> My personal takes (AINAL) are these:
>
> [1] It depends on the way power and trust operate within that group. If
> a group has a commitment to non-heirarchical practice, the individual
> who operates the account should be fully accountable to anyone in the
> group in who's name they act. But group composition and structure
> changes over time, so unless you want to immerse yourself in an
> investigation of how a group works, and are comfortable putting yourself
> in a quasijuridical role, it's probably better to have a paragraph in
> the terms of service saying it's the group's responsibility to make sure
> that all the people who need access to an account have the necessary
> details to use it, and that as a provider one should value the
> preservation of privacy above other considerations.
>
> [2] I think this is why it's a great idea to build systems that don't
> give the service provider any access to the content of mailboxes, or
> other supposedly private material.
>
> Other opinions may be more helpful than mine...
>
> Mark
>
>
>
> bou:
>> Hi
>>
>> This may be a philosophical discussion.
>>
>> When a group asks for group email addresses and a person ends up
>> being the only one checking it to the point most people expect that one
>> person to answer, does that account belong to the group, or to the person?
>>
>> Ecosia gave me some pages related to domains and corporate email
>> systems, that, in summary, I understood, some (US only?) court judgments
>> have
>> sentenced that all emails with addresses @any_given_domain belong to
>> the person or company who owns that domain.
>>
>> This seems to rest on the idea that
>> if your employer provides you with an email address, it is in the
>> understanding that even after you leave, they have access to records
>> related to the business activity. Expanding from this, judgments have
>> also established that an employee has or should have no expectations of
>> privacy when using a work address.
>>
>> But then it expands to emails at gmail.com, All emails you send and receive
>> using a gmail address can then have no expectations of privacy.
>>
>> How do we want this to affect us when email
>> addresses are created for groups?
>>
>> bou
>>
>>
>>
> -- OpenPGP key expiry date extended - refresh from pool.
>
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