Complaints regarding the conduct of APANA^® Members

All complaints that do not fall into any category described below may be sent to:

abuse@apana.org.au

Complaints about Usenet (newsgroups) and/or Email messages and/or IRC

National APANA Policy is that APANA does not become involved in these disputes. This extends to complaints of alledged forged articles, abusive posts/emails, obscene language, defamation, off-topic postings, flame wars, breaches of charters, content of individual messages, censorship, IRC bans, IRC bots and other netiquette issues.

If this is the basis of your complaint, you may not receive a response from APANA on the matter.

Many of the issues described are civil matters and should be pursued according to civil law, should you wish to take matters further.

Complaints about SPAM

Advertising email (commonly referred to as SPAM) is, in most cases, unsolicited and unwanted. APANA supports this stance and affords zero tolerance towards the posting/emailing of SPAM by its Members and disciplines offending Members in line with the Association's Rules. In reporting SPAM, please include complete headers from the email message or Usenet post in question. Your complaint will be fully investigated and you will receive a reply from APANA in due course.

Many of APANA's Members operate their own private mail servers, and from time-to-time, some of these mail servers are discovered to be open mail relays. Whilst it is not possible to identify all possible open relays, we do appreciate notification of any such relays, so that they can in turn be closed.

Complaints of attempts to gain unauthorised access (hacking)

It is often very difficult to prove that a Member was acting in such a manner. Many APANA Sites do not log their Members' activities, nor do they censor them. APANA suggests that such complaints be referred to the relevant authorities and pursued in that fashion.

If this is the basis of your complaint, you may not receive a response from APANA on the matter.

Complaints of Copyright/Trademark/Intellectual Property violation

APANA will take affirmative action on Copyright/Trademark/Intellectual Property violations, provided the complainant can conclusively prove to APANA, via documentation or a judgement from the appropriate Australian jurisdiction, that a Member of APANA has committed a breach. In these cases, where APANA is satisfied a breach has occurred, the Member may be disciplined in accordance with the APANA Acceptable Use Policy and Rules of APANA Inc.

Complaints addressed directly to APANA's Secretary or other officeholders will receive no response and may result in the banning of your domain/IP/ISP from APANA's national mail servers.

Thank you for your attention.