[kwlug-disc] Evaluating webhosting

[Bob Jonkman]

Adam Glauser wrote:
> I don't think a "must be hosted in Canada" policy is a sufficient 
> response to fear of the Patriot Act. Any such policy I've
> encountered has had that fear at its root.

I'm not sure if it falls in the category of "fear of the Patriot Act",
but some organizations are concerned about the requirements of the
Ontario Personal Health Information Protection Act (PHIPA), which
vaguely states that

"A health care practitioner may keep a record of personal health
information about an individual in a place other than the individual’s
home and other than a place in the control of the practitioner if...the
record is kept in a reasonable manner" [1]

At least one Public Health department has interpreted that to mean that
foreign vendors were not allowed to bid on archiving and storage
solutions (and at least one foreign vendor countered by opening a
Canadian office, making them eligible to bid on the RFP again).


But back to the initial problem: If Paul's colleague is looking for a
WordPress solution, why not use wordpress.com as the host?  That way
she'll have the most up-to-date Wordpress code available, the domain
name is easy to re-direct, and mail is easy to forward (at least, it is
on my DNS provider).

--Bob.


[1]
http://www.e-laws.gov.on.ca/html/statutes/english/elaws_statutes_04p03_e.htm#BK19



On 13-10-03 10:41 PM, Adam Glauser wrote:
> There are at least two problems with such a policy.
> 
> First, lots of Canada to Canada traffic is routed through the
> States, as Paul said. Even if encrypted, this will possibly be
> collected by the NSA. It is even plausible that it could eventually
> be decrypted and studied.
> 
> Secondly, we know that the CSEC is up to at least some of the same 
> shenanigans as the NSA/GCHQ/etc.
> 
> https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CCsQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cbc.ca%2Fnews%2Ftechnology%2Fstory%2F2013%2F06%2F12%2Ff-communication-security-establishment-canada.html&ei=DCdOUsmMFNCUqwHKzoCwBA&usg=AFQjCNF7egL2610td3M0D25ZZ-1dW7wPHg&sig2=dBmFRE3j4Usx2AEPnrhrdA&bvm=bv.53537100,d.aWM
>
>
> 
Not only that, but they likely all share information with one
> another.
> 
> http://www.nationalpost.com/m/wp/news/canada/canadian-politics/blog.html?b=news.nationalpost.com/2013/07/29/harper-government-gives-eavesdropping-agency-ok-to-exchange-info-with-foreign-partners-despite-risk-of-torture
>
>
> 
I suppose there is something to be said for both all intended
> parties to the communication being under the same privacy laws, but
> I don't think a "must be hosted in Canada" policy is a sufficient 
> response to fear of the Patriot Act. Any such policy I've
> encountered has had that fear at its root. On Oct 3, 2013 8:48 PM,
> "unsolicited" <unsolicited at swiz.ca> wrote:
> 
>> Keeping content / traffic in Canada misguided at best?
>> 
>> Huh?
>> 
>> On 13-10-03 08:20 PM, Paul Nijjar wrote:
>> 
>>> 
>>> I agree that self-hosting email is a pain, and since I am not 
>>> going to be supporting this person in her webhosting I have no 
>>> intentions of doing so. But other people are more used to the 
>>> pain than me. I have the feeling that some sysadmins are into 
>>> pain, which may be a conversation not appropriate for this list.
>>> 
>>> Government requirements may be a factor here, but some of the 
>>> regulations (eg keeping services hosted in Canada even though the
>>> traffic will probably be routed through Chicago to be sniffed by
>>> the NSA) can be misguided at best.
>>> 
>>> - Paul
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Thu, Oct 03, 2013 at 12:31:48PM -0400, Khalid Baheyeldin 
>>> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> I want to iterate what has been said before that hosting your 
>>>> own email is not worth it. Better delegate that to someone
>>>> like Google Apps, and not deal with blacklisting, spam,
>>>> downtime, ...etc.
>>>> 
>>>> That is, unless you have government requirements not to.


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