RE: Anti-spam

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Find the open relays and block the providing isp.  Inform the isp that none of the users on your isp will have access to or from any of their websites or customers and their ips won’t be forwarded through your system.  Pressure the isps to police their systems.  I believe it is getting to the point that we just need to block all china addresses as it appears that most people are finding open relays in china.  If china loses access to western internet, then maybe the government will want to act more respectfully against internet abuse.  Of course that goes for other isps as well.

 

Just my .02 worth

 

Buck

 

-----Original Message-----
From: psyche-list-admin@redhat.com [mailto:psyche-list-admin@redhat.com] On Behalf Of Gregory L. Hering
Sent: Wednesday, January 22, 2003 11:20 AM
To: psyche-list@redhat.com
Subject: Anti-spam

 

Dear Spam-haters (on Linux RH8),

 

    At first I parsed headers manually, e-mailing authorities as best I could. 

    Very time consuming and pointless.

 

    I found an article on writing a 'custom action' for the rules in my M$ based client.  I wrote rules and put bad addresses on a list, but the list kept growing and required daily maintenance.

    Time consuming and pointless.

 

    I found SpamCop.  Automatic headerparsing and e-mail generation.  Cool!  I used SpamCop for a long time, but the true benefit of SpamCop is realized only if you are a subscriber.  If you are, then you get your mail through them and they block all spam reported to them.  If you keep using your old method of getting mail it doesn't really have any noticeable effect.

    Time consuming and pointless unless you subscribe.

 

    Finally, I saw an article in Linux Magazine on the language Ruby, and after playing with it a while I wrote a 'despam' utility which runs on a Linux box. 

 

    The theory I went with is 'all e-mail is spam'.  Then there are those rare exceptions when someone you actually know writes to you and you want it, so that gets passed through.  They get put on a 'friends list'.  All others are moved to a 'soon to be deleted' folder.  There are problems with both the theory and the program, but it does help a lot. 

 

    If you've been on the Psyche list for a while you may have seen one of the problems.  I joined the list back in October and suddenly I started getting these (ranging from polite to hysterical) replies that I was spamming the list.  Part of the program is a (now optional) reply to the (usually fake) From: address.  I did it without thinking and it clashed with my system and so a lot of people got replies that were simple list submitters (some call it a 'feature').  I think if I had selected 'digest' format and pre-added the 'psyche-list-request@redhat.com' name as a friend it probably would have been 'ok'. 

 

    I wanted a system that was low maintenance so I wanted some automated features.  The (now optional) reply informed you that if you forwarded this to 'me@myserver' it would pass because of a signature in the message and I would get an e-mail with subject 'REQUEST FRIEND STATUS'.  If I replied in the affirmative then the program would add them to the list and they could send me mail.  If a spammer actually put their real e-mail address in the headers and they got the message and forwarded it to me, I would just delete the message.  If it became a problem because they had the signature, I just change the signature in the program.  If they got smart, they could automate replies and spam me anyway, but this is war!  Isn't it?

 

    Another problem is that my program pops the server at 1 minute intervals.  My e-mail client pops the server at 15 minute intervals.  If my client pops the server in the period after the spam is sent but before the despammer cleans the account then I get a little spam anyway.  It needs to be a proxy server.  Anyway, it's been turned off for the last two months because I've been looking for a job and I just didn't want to mess with possible job offers being deleted.  And I haven't been advancing the work on the program during this time. 

 

    There is probably an existing program like 'fetchmail' or 'SpamAssassin' (or maybe even qPopper) that could be set to this mode but I just don't know of it.  Anyone...?

 

    As someone mentioned earlier, the only effective way to stop spam is to block it at a server.  This is my attempt.  I don't think there is really a good solution yet.  It should be illegal, like littering, and spammers should be fined, but that would only work for US based companies.  What about countries that hate us?  They probably pay people to generate fake traffic.  We need some real creative thinking and a coordinated effort. 

 

Thanks,

 

Greg


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