Article: Stopping Spam and how to do it -- and also why it sucks. :)

[Joel]

Article:  Stopping Spam and how to do it -- and also why it sucks.

[Joel]

We've published a new article on spam (the mail, not the food) and why it should be killed, stopped, and punted, as well as some of the increasingly-large problems its causing.  Grab it here:
http://www.viahardware.com/spam.shtm
SPAM Article

[MarkPetty]

I largely agree with your article, however I think that you've gone over the top with your defense of the poor innocent Chinese.  Lets not forget that although most spam originates from western companies, the Chinese are just as corrupt and greedy for hosting it.  These people are not wide-eyed innocents struggling to come to terms with the wonders of computing.  Let's not forget that the bad seeds in our society that produce this spam could be controlled by our governments if they didn't have an outlet through such rogue 3rd world countries.  Also, the Chinese government's policies for economic advancement are extremely agressive and morally questionable (this is a dictatorship that thinks that replaces "research" with "industrial espionage" and murders and oppresses it's own people); this very environment encourages abuse of a system like the Internet.  You ask whether this is the kind of treatment that other countries can expect when they join the information age.  Well frankly, yes, this is the treatment they should get if they abuse OUR Internet.  If they want a part of it then they can conform to the fair standards, which we apply.  Only when they are responsible enough can they be allowed their rightful say.  A developing country should not be excused for the abuse of it's newly acquired technology, Western countries are demonised and blamed for every problem in the world, not only by envious poorer countries but by it's own overly politically correct citizens.  These corrupt governments and crackpot dictators should be blamed.  Our benevolance towards countries that abuse technology (and everything else they can grab) in this way is not received gratefully by them, but seen as weakness and taken as an opportunity for further exploitation.

[ricardjs]

i couldn't agree more, mark. The countries that cause more problems in the worls, are ALLWAYS the same countries that television and polititians want as to be sorry for. Afeganistan, China, Paquistan, Bosnia, Angola, ...

Because other countries feel sorry for them, they take it as an advantage to abuse even more! They know we will feel sorry if the violate human rights, and so, they simply couldn't care less! They do a mistake, and we send food to them! Go figure...

I know that there are billions of innocents in the middle of all this, but i'm not saying to punnish them, but their governments instead!

I know this is going a bit off topic, but the same applies. Spamming should be treated agressevely, or else it won't stop.

These are my thoughts...

Ric.

[lammypie]

I have had such a bad SPAM problem I have resorted to reporting SPAMMERS to their ISP which usually results in their account being closed. This has heavily reduced the occurrence now.
Most spammers forge the headers in the email to pretend it comes from say a yahoo.com mail account, when it actually originates from an excite.com account etc. It is still possible tracing remaining parts of the headers to find out at least which companies servers it came from  (usually by the IP number) and then the ISP can use their methods to trace the account. It is hard work but it is worth the effort.
I am currently building a list of ISPs Terms of Service Abuse report email addresses.

Anyone know the abuse report address for excite.com its not on their website and abuse@excite.com doesn't work?

[Fireheart929]

Ironically, considering the topic of my article, I've found the best solution is in blocking specific domains.  Its cut my spam flow dramatically.

Still, regarding China, I'll say this:

Yes, there are unscrupulous people in China, corrupt politicians, terrible businessmen, etc, etc.  All very true.  Still, these are not the people being abused.  These people, as you've pointed out, deserve to be blocked.

Nevertheless, I am confident that the average Chinese Internet user is not a criminal, deliberate spam-sender, or online crook anymore than the average American is.  These are the people who are being unfairly punished.  In fact, in a totalitarian government like China's, one could argue they are being even more unfairly punished than in America, where we at least elect officials to make laws.  If the Chinese government elects not to pass harsh anti-spam laws, there isn't a damn thing your average Chinese citizen can do about it.

Even in Afghanistan, for every Islam-crazed fanatic or megalomaniac warlord, you'll find a mother, child, or father who only wants the entire mess to go away so they can get down to the business of trying to scratch out a living in a country that has been at war for almost thirty years.  

Sorry this is a bit OT--but Osama Bin Laden made the decision that all Americans were guilty of crimes against Islam and deserved to die.  He was wrong--dead wrong.  But we can't fall into the trap of assuming that all Afghanistani's (or any other group) are "simply criminals" themselves.  We'd only be making the same mistake in reverse.

[ricardjs]

That's not what i meant. No one is blaiming all Afegans, for example, but what i blame, is the coutesy of negotiations, etc., they give to these guys, before they actually do anything to prevent it!

A perfect example of what i'm trying to say is Bosnia. They were killing everyone there, and do u see anyone move their butts?! No! First comes the conversations that we have to stop with that, and how sorry we must be for them, and so on... What i meant is, that these things should be taken care of first thing! No politics, no negotiations. If one is planning doing a genocide, why start any type of conversations?! Do u see these killers doing any type of conversation with the ones they're about to kill?! No! So, the same treatment should be applied aswell...

Ric.

PS - Sorry Dputiger! I know this wasn't quite what u expected for this forum to turn out to be...!

[MarkPetty]

...but in many ways these issues are similar.  They all concern worldwide relations/communication.  They all pose the problem of how to regulate everybody and not just yourself.  It's all very well when friendly countries like America, Britain, France, Japan etc. meet to agree on standards but what do we do when a hostile country, or a country which hasn't got a stable governing structure, or even just a country that has radically different opinions on how things should be refuses to play ball.  I think that short of setting up a world government the only thing that can sort these issues out is a policy of exclusion.  Our governments and courts don't have the power to regulate the whole Internet, any regulations they pass will only apply to ourselves and will be ignored by the countries that abuse the Internet.  This will lead to the very regulations that try to stop abuse, hindering only us and therefore encouraging the abusers.  However the Internet can govern itself if we let it.  If our infra-structure is increasingly configured to block trouble-makers then we will be no worse off, while the trouble-makers can go whistle.  This would not lead to permanent exclusion since our society is driven by money, therefore when a developing country has demonstrated that it's responsible enough to regulate it's own businesses then the rest of the world will greet them with open arms.  Spam needs to be stamped out, and it's not because of it's cheesy content either, it's because when we see 20 new emails in our inbox our hearts are lifted for a fleeting moment and then we're crushed when we realise that we're not popular after all... it's just spam.

[ricardjs]

that last sentence rocks!  

Ric.

[koitsu]

Ludicrous as it may sound, spam does have the capacity to become a serious international incident.

DOES have the capacity?  You mean ALREADY HAS become a serious international incident.  Spam is by far the #1 complaint people have with the Internet these days.

Spam does not necessarily "originate" in other countries -- most commonly, it consists of people in the United States illegimately using overseas SMTP servers to do their dirty work.  "Back in the day," when portscanners first came out, administrators like myself used to joke about how funny it'd be if someone tried to portscan 0.0.0.0/0 (the entire Internet's IPv4 address space).  Now people are ACTUALLY DOING THIS, to find open web proxies, and SMTP servers which are open relays.  The amount of traffic a portscanner sends out during that scan is *tremendous*.  It's considered synonymous with DoS in most providers' eyes, and is deemed trespassing in a slew of states.  But people do it anyways.

The problem with mail-based spam is that people are installing operating systems with services such as SMTP without knowing how to configure them properly.  For a long while (and may still be true in Linux's case -- I don't know), operating systems came shipped with SMTP servers which were "open relays" -- anyone on the 'net could send mail through your server, simply by it being up.  Now, OSes like FreeBSD come with open relaying turned off, and the administrator is expected to add the IPs of internal machines which can send mail through the server to the access control list.

Also, spam goes much further than the degree your article discusses.  I consider all forms of unsolicited online advertising as "spam."  I also consider television ads, telephone solicitation calls, and snail-mailbox letters "spam."  Spam is anything that is unsolicited by the recipient.  Your ex-wife calling you at the wee hours of the night about child support could be considered spam, I guess.  *grin*

I've written a huge rant about spam on my organisation's website, http://www.parodius.com/, in case anyone's interested in reading it.

When I got online back in 1991-92, the 'net worked fine without advertising and without spam.  Now, it's the most prevalent thing you'll see when spending time on a computer.  People seem to have forgotten the fact that the Internet was not built on commercialism, but based on the freedom to distribute information freely.  So why has that changed?  And why are netizens putting up with it?  Good questions without answers.  :-)

[kme]

From the "Update":
>"I will wait for advice (laws) to tell me what to stop and what to let go."

This is EXACTLY why some block all .cn originated mail! Completely irresponsible and/or incompetent admins who will do nothing unless forced.

Do you really think the old men in Beijing even KNOW what spam is?! They never ever saw an e-mail - their seceretary prints them and hand over a piece of paper...

Many admins - Chinese or not - will do nothing unless forced. Let's force them.

Personally I check all mail coming through a Chinese or Russian relay against ORDB (ordb.org) and I'm proud to have black listed a few.

Mike

[MarkPetty]

I agree with Mike, just because some chap spouts a load of romantic tosh about his unworthiness to judge the beauty of some tacky email everyone gets teary eyed.  Yes, it's tough to do the job right but deal with it.  Next time I get some spam I'm going to take the b**tard axe to my PC.

[Fireheart929]

As I've already stated, that reply doesn't help a thing.  Its not about it being "tough to do a job right"--its about not getting killed or fired for doing your job in the first place.

China isn't America, people.  OVer there, you piss the wrong people off, or do things you aren't supposed to, you don't get talked to or reprimanded, necessarily--sometimes you just disappear.

Such things aren't as common as they used to be, but they still happen. --and when someone does disapear, you don't ask why.  

[Inge]

Ain't life great, when one of the things that bothers us most is such an inferior subject? I mean, spam, yeah, ofcourse it's irritating, but a 150 years ago people were merely agitated by the plague or hunger. Be very, very happy that you can get agitated about such a thing, because it implies that your material of reference (or, in common words, your life) is in a good shape. Do you think that people who suffer from wars, feminine, physical or mental diseases or other forms of violence will think "oh, how much greater would my life be without spam?"

I only can get very happy from irritation which is brought up by such irrelevant subjects (same goes for trains which are late, computers which freeze, beer which is too warm or pizza without cheese) because it proves how high the standard of life in the western world is!

All in my humble opinion, ofcourse,
Inge