Re: Stopping Spam

From: Michael J. Pelletier (mjpelletier_at_mjpelletier.com)
Date: 02/08/05 

Date: Mon, 07 Feb 2005 21:39:24 -0800

David MacQuigg wrote:

> Well folks, its been over a year since I posted on this topic, and the
> spam has definitely gotten worse. What's even more disturbing is that
> the articles and discussions I'm seeing are terribly pessimistic.
> Seems like nothing can be done about spam but work on better filters,
> pass more laws, or try to convince our fellow netizens not to respond
> to spam!
>
> Nonsense. I'm now more convinced than ever that spam can be stopped
> without any of the above. It can be stopped at the source, and
> companies like AOL are doing it. We just need to get other ISPs to do
> the same. Not all ISPs, just enough that there can be an effective
> "network" of ISPs that don't allow outgoing spam. Others will then
> decide if they want to clean up their domains and join the club, or
> leave their systems insecure, and be blocked by anyone using a white
> list. That may be a valid choice for a company that doesn't need to
> send a lot of email outside its domain.
>
> I've written an article on this topic, and I would like to get some
> feedback from experts in computer security. I'm an electrical
> engineer, not a computer professional, but I have a good book on
> internet protocols, so this time I'm not going to be discouraged by
> invalid technical objections. I'm also well aware that as a
> non-expert, I may be missing something important, and I would like to
> know that before submitting the article.
>
> http://ece.arizona.edu/~edatools/etc/stopping_spam2.pdf
>
> To summarize the article, in case you don't have time to read it:
>
> 1) It is possible to block emails with forged domain names, and there
> are no significant technical barriers to doing this right now.
>
> 2) Having valid domain names will allow anti-spam companies like
> SpamCop to replace their current unreliable IP blacklists with much
> smaller and reliable lists of domains, rated as to their fraction of
> spam.
>
> 3) A rating system based on domain names, not IP addresses, will allow
> quick and effective filtering at the receiving end.
>
> What can we do to raise awareness? Comments are welcome.
>
> -- Dave

You forgot the most basic and important thing WE ALL CAN do to help each
other out: Report SPAM via DNS blacklists.

The past two years I have been running my own email servers from my house. I
use Spamassassin + Razor + Anitvirus + MIMEDefang and DNS Blacklists on a
sendmail server. I get an average of 97% to 98% kill rate. Now, if you
look at my email address here it is real. I do not hide my email address. I
am on 20+ mail groups and I post on-and-off to 7 or 8 news groups and NEVER
hide anything.

But here is the difference, I REPORT SPAM (even the spam filtered by
spamassassin). I am amazed at how many people complain about SPAM but do
little to help out! If you run/manage/own a mail server sign up for a DNS
blacklist account and report the SPAM. If we all did this WE would reduce
it significantly.

Think about it. When you report SPAM via a DNS blacklist you help out
everyone who uses the DNS blacklist: Worldwide.

Michael

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Free Spam Filter
    ... It's free as so are its various plug-ins (the HTML-Modify plug-in is old, probably won't be updated, so if you use it then disable some of its protection; ... I eventually quit using the HTML-Modify plug-in because both Outlook and Outlook Express eventually got updated so I didn't need that plug-in anymore. ... Uses DNS blacklists for known spam sources, like Mailwasher does but Mailwasher attempts to rake in money with its commercial version and doesn't donate to the DNS blacklists that it uses. ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics)
  • Re: How to do rDNS. WAS: RE: educating rDNS violators
    ... It's done in the DNS server. ... As a spam prevention measure, a lot of end-user Internet providers are ... Using your own mail server as a slave to the ISP's mail server will add ...
    (Security-Basics)
  • RE: OMA and Outgoing Spam
    ... Someone hacked a user account and use it to spam emails; ... Your Exchange server is open relaying emails;(You have checked it ... Your server is under RNDR Attack. ... Microsoft is providing this information as a convenience to you. ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)
  • RE: OMA and Outgoing Spam
    ... Someone hacked a user account and use it to spam emails; ... Your Exchange server is open relaying emails;(You have checked it ... Your server is under RNDR Attack. ... When you enable recipient filtering on the SMTP virtual server, ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)
  • Re: Relay for spam?
    ... Now my ISP is complaining about being a relaay for spam. ... a SMTP mail sever set up as an open relay. ... A proxy server usually is set up so that people on the internal IP ... An open proxy allows ...
    (Ubuntu)