Subject: Question on FaxConnect Results..

From: Richard Shockey <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1999 12:09:39 -0600

I have a question on some of the results generated by the IMC FaxConnect event.

I'm curious how many vendors inserted the classic fax CSID identification
bar [ the watermark at the top of fax pages] into the TIFF Content-Type
before transmission.

I this considered "custom and practice" among IFAX vendors??

Inquiring minds would like to know!

Richard Shockey
Shockey Consulting LLC                  
8045 Big Bend Blvd. Suite 110    
St. Louis, MO 63119
Voice 314.918.9020
Fax   314.918.9015
INTERNET Mail & IFAX : [email-masked]  
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

---

From: [email-masked] (JDAHMEN)
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1999 17:09:43 -0500

Richard,

We do add the info in our messages. I would think that every fax manufacturer
would continue to add to the image as they currently do for PSTN. 

The firmware already exists, and it meets the legal requirement of the FCC. It
is image data, and is no different than scanned image. I don't see them
reworking this area, but........

Jim Dahmen 
Lanier Worldwide

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Richard Shockey <[email-masked]> 
> Sent: Thursday, January 28, 1999 12:10 PM
> To: [email-masked]
> Subject: Question on FaxConnect Results..
> 
> 
>

---

From: Stuart_McRae/STA/[email-masked]
Date: Fri, 29 Jan 1999 09:03:00 +0000

Richard wrote:

>Thanks Stuart .. this is helpful. My reason for asking this has to do with
>end user perceptions of what constitutes a "fax" as well as see how RFC2305
>compliant devices or software systems might attempt to satisfy the legal
>requirements for identification marking of documents that constitute a
>"fax" under US and, I'm told, German law.

My understanding is that US law (at least, and I believe German is similar)
requires originator information on either the cover page or on each page of the
fax. As we would normally generate a cover page identifying the originator (and
this could be forced) so an organisation would be covered. This would also allow
more space for a service provider to declare that they are transmitting the
message on behalf of someone else, and identify them, rather letting the user
assume that they were the original originator.

The issue with altering the image to include this information is that this
either means overlaying it, which may corrupt the content if there is
insufficient margin, or "prepending" it, in which case you tend to either push
over the page length (which means you either truncate the page and lose content,
or "generate alternate blank pages" with just a few pixels).

One significant point that I missed from my message is that many of the serious
fax modems/boards that we use have a capability to add such text and the top
and/or bottom of the page, and we allow the behaviour of this fax modem to be
configured. So a user could probably generate this if they wished, anyway. We
try to avoid problems with this by stripping trailing white space from the
bottom of the page, so it wont push over the edge, but nevertheless most
customers simply turn this off for page images being transmitted (and documents
like Word, 123, etc. which can have the same problem of clashing headers and
externally fixed page lengths).

>I know that the CSID is usually inserted by the recipient device (and some
>senders).. but most mail clients would never manipulate an image after
>reception so how might legal identification requirements be met in a end to
>end 2305-IFAX environment.

Well, in our case (as a receiving device) we present the originator's CSID in
the Subject line of the e-mail.

>...
>So would it be useful for 2305 senders to optionally mark pages in the
>usual manner to satisfy the requirements of what some end users may
>perceive as "fax"???  Maybe we don?t have enough experience in the market yet.
>...

I think this is one of a class of issues which I see up a lot when looking to
architect solutions to real world problems. That is one where the person who
cares about this is the recipient, and the person who controls it is the sender.
Ultimately, the recipient has a lot less control than the sender and needs to
accept what they are given, unless the world can be convinced that something is
important enough to either regulate it in law, or implement negotiation for it
(which tends to have a significant cost of one sort or another associated with
it).

Regards,
Stuart