Subject: Chemistry Web Service Abuse

From: "Wolf-Dietrich Ihlenfeldt" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 12 Feb 1999 22:51:17 +0000

In the night of Feb 10th, our chemical structure GIF image generator
service (http://www2.ccc.uni-erlangen.de/services/gifcreator/)
was under attack. The unidentifyable host 134.192.72.194
posted several ten thousand image generation requests, which all failed,
probably due to some programming error in the requester script. Some hours
before that and again later a few requests from the same source were
successfully  processed, probably the result
of manual experimental submission.

We do not appreciate this kind of exploitation. Since this is
a pretty special Web service, the originator of this attack may
be listening. The conditions of this service explicitly forbid
the use of the images for a commercial application, which given
the number of requests looks likely. They contain copyright
information embedded in the image data. Even if the intended
use was for another, non-commercial purpose, we definitely prefer to be
informed beforehand if such a massive number of structures
is going to be processed. In such cases, send us an email.
We are willing to help and process your structures as a batch job
without going through the Web interface.

If this incidence is not resolved, the domain 134.192.72.xxx
will be locked out.

--
Dr. Wolf-D. Ihlenfeldt
Computer Chemistry Center, University of Erlangen-Nuernberg
Naegelsbachstrasse 25, D-91052 Erlangen (Germany)
Tel (+49)-(0)9131-85-26579  Fax (+49)-(0)9131-85-26566
---
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