one-to-many messaging

[Roland Perry]

In article <031e01c89e34$a2983070$1601010a@neos.tv>, Tom Thomson 
<cmt@btinternet.com> writes
>> European Data Protection experts have made it clear that if there are
>> some cases (as in this example) where port numbers *are* needed, then
>> *all* port numbers are caught by the definition (because the
>> intermediary doesn't know whether they matter or not in an individual
>> case, so the fail-safe is to assume they do).
>>
>Do you have chapter and verse on that?  Has any court in any European
>country ever upheld such an assertion in any case?
>
>If the intermediary doesn't know, then the intermediary can't use them
>to do routing so they can't be traffic data.  If the intermediary is
>using them to do routing, then they are traffic data and the
>intermediary knows it (I don't believe that case occurs in practice, but
>that's beside the point). So I imagine that any attempt to make the you
>claim hold water in front of a judge would fail miserably.

I have always wanted to write a paper on "What is traffic data" (and 
therefore by inference "what is content"), but it has never become a 
reality. I'm convinced that the RIPA definitions, for example, can mean 
different parts of the communication are traffic data at different times 
in its life. In the mean time I can't give you any authoritative 
comfort, and as you suggest it may well be up to the individual Judge.
-- 
Roland Perry