1. Goal and provided services

The Greek Research and Technology Network (GR-Net) is the Greek National Academic and Research Network (NRN). It is an initiative of the General Secretariat for Research and Technology (GSRT) of the Ministry of Development, initially as part of the EPET II subprogramme of the 2nd Framework Programme of the European Union (EU). The goal of GR-Net is to provide advanced and high quality inter-networking and Internet connectivity services to both Greek Universities and Technological Educational Institutes (TEI) in cooperation with GUnet (http://www.gunet.gr/), as well as research organizations. GR-Net is a non-commercial national backbone and includes Points of Presence (pops) in major Greek cities, where the above mentioned educational and research institutions are located. "Non-commercial" means that GR-Net provides its services with education and research, rather than commercial profit and the greater "market" in mind. From a financial point of view, profit per se is not a goal. The coverage of expenses and the future availability of the necessary capital for upgrades of the provided services are expected instead. The services provided by GR-Net include:

• IP v4 connectivity
• IP v6 connectivity
• Multiprotocol connectivity
• Managed and guarantied bandwidth services
• Voice transmission
• Still and moving image transmission
• Tele-education and Tele-conferencing

GR-Net is also aiming at the support of research. To this extent, GR-Net gladly accepts to be used as a platform for the application of new or experimental technologies, provided of course that its basic "production" services are not affected.

2. Eligible networks

The following networks are eligible for connection to GR-Net:

• The GSRT network
• University networks
• TEI networks
• Networks of Public Sector research organizations and centers, either they are supervised by the GSRT or not.
• Networks of Ministries and Public Organizations directly related to the above mentioned institutions, e.g. the Ministries of Education, National Economy or Development.
• Research and Development Departments of other institutions

GR-Net may provide services to other networks, in case such a provision does not violate the non-commercial nature of the network and results in direct benefit of the already connected networks. In that sense, GR-Net installs and maintains Internet Exchanges and provides interconnection services to the Greek Internet community. GR-Net is a non-commercial NRN. Therefore:

• It is not permitted to use GR-Net to transfer data whose both the originator and the receiver are commercial institutions or non-eligible networks (see above) or their foreign counterparts.
• It is not permitted to practice business over GR-Net. This applies to both connected and other networks and includes selling products, services or bandwidth and advertising. It is permitted, though, for users of the connected networks, to buy products over the Internet. It is also permitted to provide free services to the benefit first of all of the Greek Academic and Research community and also of the Internet community.

In case one of the above mentioned fundamental rules is violated, GR-Net has the right, after proper formal warning, to suspend the connection of the offending network, until the latter conforms to the rules.

3. Acceptable usage policy

The users of GR-Net services must follow the written and unwritten laws of Internet (e.g. the "netiquette") and of computer and telephony use. Therefore, GR-Net may not be used for:

• GR-Net, connected networks and third parties computer security violation attempts (successful or not), whether such attempts have to do with actual data loss or not.
• Personal privacy violation attempts (successful or not)
• Denial of service attacks (successful or not) against GR-Net, connected networks and third parties computers
• Overloading or irrational use of GR-Net and other networks computers and other resources
• Unsolicited bulk E-Mail (spam)
• Activities that jeopardize national security and the relations of the country with other countries.
• Illegal activities.
• Copyright infringement activities.

In case of violation of the above mentioned rules, GR-Net has the right, after proper formal warning, to suspend the connection of the offending network, until the latter conforms to the rules. All connected networks should establish their own Acceptable Usage Policies compatible to the present one.