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The Economics of Spam
higgins writes "The Wall Street Journal has the best story I've ever seen on the economics of spam. A self-described "spam queen" (Clean link; should work for non-subscribers) talks about not just the millions of emails she spews, but what it costs per mailing ($250 for 500k emails), what the response rates are (1-2 one-thousandths percent) and what she actually makes. (40% of each sale of one product: anti-spam software)."
"I'm just trying to make a living like everyone else," says Ms. Betterly. Her e-mail marketing operation, she says, allows her to raise her children, Chris, 10, and Craig, 11, and to spend quality time with them. "You can call me spam queen, I don't really care. As long as I'm not breaking any laws, you don't have to love me or like what I do for a living."
Not breaking any laws. Riiiiiiiight. Nice values to instill in those kids, too.
WorldCom lets spammers get away with 'first offence'.
Mr. Connell typed a response: "Problem solved. This guy won't receive anything from us again." He flagged the name of the offended e-mail recipient on Ms. Betterly's list so that person wouldn't be contacted again.
WorldCom helps spammers listwash.
WorldCom says that if problems with a spammer persist, the company will send increasingly stern notices and eventually cut off service.
WorldCom will let spammers get away with spamming several times before actually doing anything about it.
Paging SPEWS. SPEWS to the white courtesy phone, please...
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
Since the early days of my experiences on the 'net, spam has been a problem (1994 is when I first hopped on). Why is this? Obviously, as indicated in the article, spam does indeed make money. Sure, you may get one percent response, but if it only costs a couple hundred $ to send half a million e-mails, at one percent that's 5,000 people replying! Of course we know they're all real net newbies or suckers, but as with anything else, it's 'buyer beware'. In short, people spam because it does indeed work.
Spam via SMB is quite the new thing, I gather. This has the potential to _really_ piss people off.
But it could turn out to be a good thing. The reason we can't stop spam by blocking port 25 is that we need to accept email from people who have legitimate reasons to send it. But who has a legitimate reason to connect to SMB on a desktop machine via the Internet? Nobody. Ever.
If this leads ISPs to block the ports involved, the world will be a better place, with no more script kiddies owning Win98 machines via smbclient.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
Argh, I get people at work complaining about this. "I called Comcast, and they're not doing anything about it, those jerks!"
Your ISPs job is to provide you an internet connection that you pay for - it is NOT their job to secure your computer for you.
If you're getting Messenger spam, then you probably don't know how to protect your computer, which means if I were you, I'd be worrying about what else on your box is 0wned.
I suppose you believe that people who can't repair their own vehicles shouldn't be driving, too?
Like woodworking? Build your own picture frames.
Your ISPs job is to provide you an internet connection that you pay for - it is NOT their job to secure your computer for you.
It is their job to enforce their TOS--which most likely perclude spamming.
And if the IP is off-network, simply contacting whomever owns it would work.
It's not a matter of repairing the vehicle.. it's a matter of putting on your seatbelt.
"Truth is not decided by majority vote" consensus gentium -- Norman Geisler
No, but I would expect someone who doesn't lock their car door, leaves the keys in with the engine running everytime they park somewhere should complain when the car gets stolen.
"Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever." - Napoleon Bonaparte
The article showed a pie chart detailing the things spam was selling, and it only indicated "scams" as being 4%.
I'd have to say that only 4% of the spam I get (when I review my spamassassin mailbox for false positives..) to be anything approaching legitimate products and services.
Almost all of it is for penis enhancers (surely fraudulent), fake viagra (ditto), stock schemes (pump 'n' dumps), "financial offers" which are surely either pump-n-dumps or deals so loaded with fees they stretch the definition of legitimate, bogus health products (HGH and the like), and porn, which is far higher than the 12% indicated.
Since this is the WSJ we're talking about, I wonder if this isn't some editorial attempt to de-marginalize spammers and the borderline legal crap they push, with the goal of ultimately softening the opposition so that the big-name direct marketers can start in on this too. Claiming only 4% fraudulent content is stretching the imagination pretty thin.
In her mind, her time with her children is important, your time, and my time, weeding through UCE is not important.
In her mind, she's a moral and ethical person.
She's not out of her mind; she's just buried too deeply in it.
P.S.:And I am Marie of Roumania.
Stupid job ads, weird spam, occasional insight at
It certainly is more evil than commercials. Spammers abuse other peoples property (open proxies, open mail relays, bandwidth, inbox space); they don't pay (or even ask) for using those resources. "Normal" advertisers do pay for the resources that they use.
Donate free food here
I started getting that across my T1.
WTF? You have that T1 just plugged into the back of your Windows box or what? I'm sorry but anyone who has a Windows box on a T1 with nothing filtering NetBIOS is a goddam public menace. You'll get little sympathy from me.
Try NetBSD... safe,straightforward,useful.
Sure, I'd support it - cost me about a buck a month, certainly would be worth it. That is, if it worked.
But it wouldn't. Spammers would just find an ISP that isn't implementing the fee, or they'd steal someone's account and pass the charge off on them, etc.
No, ISPs should NOT be blocking ANY ports. I pay them for a connection. Perhaps email, news, etc. Securing my machine is my responsibility. If there is a machine on their net causing a problem, then yes, they should kill THAT machine's connection. Filtering anything is not the right thing for them to be doing.
Likewise, most people have locks on their doors and windows. They don't leave their door open with a sign that says 'free stuff inside!' like people are doing by connecting their computers to the Internet without properly securing them.
While Betterly is one of the "lesser" spammers, the problem is that in this day in age, people are AFRAID to use opt-out/unsubscribe instructions.
Why?
Because using such instructions is the #1 way to get your email address propagated to more spammers. Anyone who knows anything about dealing with spam is that the #1 rule is not to do ANYTHING that could be used to validate your address. The only response to a spam that won't do more harm than good is a "User unavailable" or other similar delivery failure bounce message. Maybe Betterly actually removes people who wish to opt-out, but most spammers don't, and that's why all of this opt-in and opt-out bullshit will never work.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
I'd wholeheartedly support a 1 cent/email fee to be imposed across the board, by law, everywhere. Would you?
Nope. Then people who run legitimate email lists (hobbyists, listservs, PTA, whatever) would be out of luck. A 1000 family PTA group could incur almost $5k/year with a once a week mailing.
Let's not screw the honest person to block the dishonest.
She doesn't forge or falsify the message headers;
But at the far end of the article we read about her computer guy:
Ok, so isn't the "from" line in in some narrow, literal, technical sense, part of the message header? --Tom
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
Yeah, or maybe like... uhmm... sending spam to people about spam removal software? I fail to see how your analogy helps to enlighten anyone about anything.
"If you think education is expensive, try ignorance" - Derek Bok
- WorldCom lets spammers get away with 'first offence'.
- WorldCom helps spammers listwash.
- WorldCom will let spammers get away with spamming several times before actually doing anything about it.
Are you people never satisifed? Do you want the FBI raiding at the FIRST sign of trouble, or do you want to follow proper channels?Such an informative post. Where did that customers email address come from? How is Mr. Connell to REALLY know if that person merely clicked-through an agreement (Without reading it) that their email would be shared? Did that person then attempt to use anything posted within the email to remove his/herself from that list?
"And she only sends bulk e-mails to people who have indicated at some time that they want to hear more about certain products or offers. People do that, some unwittingly, when they sign up for free e-mail accounts or create chat-room identities or buy products online. Many Web sites ask users whether they are interested in receiving marketing offers and ask them to check -- or, more likely, uncheck -- an obscure little box if they don't want to receive that kind of e-mail."
So people, in this case, are not paying attention. Strangely, that's also why there's such hubub about cars and cell-phone use.
"He flagged the name of the offended e-mail recipient on Ms. Betterly's list so that person wouldn't be contacted again."
So wait a second, because some places don't abide by their privacy agreements, or don't remove people when requested, then EVEYRONE is bad?
I suppose, then, I should be in prison, because I've circumvented copy protection using a No-CD crack so my kids don't have to touch CD's.
Obviously, you belive that if SOMEONE is doing something illegal in a certain area (hacking government systems), then EVERYONE must be doing that. I guess we shouldn't have access to source code either. Who KNOWS what we could do with that!
Please. Tell us. Some of us want to know which side of the double standard you really stand at.
"I can't give you a brain, so I'll give you a diploma" - The Great Oz (blatently stolen sig)
Set up a mail filter to bounce all spam you get to her address! Genius.
;)
Beware! My bet is the AC is Laura herself with an evil plan to get everyone to email her account so that she can harvest all those fresh plump addresses.
As for your illegal use of CDs, that's your lookout - you have chosen to put your family at legal risk just to save a couple of bucks on CDs. Or maybe you are taking a moral stand, but you are still choosing to take a risk. Mayhap that's an OK risk for you, but it's still there, don't pretend you aren't breaking a law for your own convenience.
As for the spammers, I have NEVER EVER EVER given "opt-in" permission on my tech contact Email to any business. It was stolen from the Internic "whois" database over ten years ago, and now receives thousands of spams (ironically, I maintain that address as a spam trap now to help me keep a strong access.db) from hundreds of spammers, all of whom make exactly the same claims as Betterly.
It should be obvious that with individuals rapidly and constantly trading lists of as many as 60 million addresses, it is effectively impossible to get "opted out" permanently once one is on such a list. It is equally obvious that there is tremendous financial incentive to create lists without any regard for the wishes of those on the lists, and to represent those lists as "opt-in" when trading with other spammers.
At least you are consistent; you, an admitted scofflaw, are defending other scofflaws. Kudos to you for that, I respect a consistent code of ethics.
Refusing to terminate someone else's account on your say-so is not a "breach of their policies." An abuse policy places limits on how the customer is allowed to use the service. It does not in any way imply that the ISP is somehow obligated to punish every infraction. They are well within their rights to terminate the offender's access, or suspend it, or give a warning -- or do absolutely nothing.
Visit a spammer's website and gather some contact information, then fire off an email. Don't be shy about including your phone number, suggesting you might be interested in mass mailing.
A couple minutes with pen and paper and you can probably come up with enough questions to keep them busy for an hour, asking about the effectiveness of their marketing technique, options, haggling on payment, so on and so on. If this type thinks there's any chance of completing the transaction, they will stay on the line for a long time. Never tell them off, leave them constantly wondering if you're another perspective client.
It's not dull. You learn quite a few things about the type of person who will do something like this. It's an insight into a pretty twisted world, and it's several million spams they won't get out.
Says the RIAA: When you EQ, you're stealing bass!
Incidently, my job is totally independent of fuckwit users.
A more apt analogy would be you, parking your car, locking it like you think you should, going inside, coming out the next day and finding it stolen. The thief broke in, hotwired it, and drove it away.
Would you tell the victim, "You should have secured the ignition wiring better!"?
While those savvy in cars might recognize the vulnerability and do something about it to make the thief's job harder (maybe even be l33t enough to install a hidden kill switch), your average user is going to go simply by what the vendor recommends, and what globally recognized best practices are (locking your car).
I do not recall any Microsoft announcements involving the default state of the Messenger service and its ability to receive unsolicited traffic from the Internet.
Let's think about this in a little more realistic light, yah?
I have a solution for you.... make a mailer filter that forewards every symantic email to sales@symantic.com abuse.symantic.com piracy@symantic.com etc....
they will eventually stop.... it worked for me.... No more microsoft spam.... I just have an autoforeward to about 7 of their email addresses whenever a microsoft spam hits.... they stopped sending to me over a month ago...
dont bug the spammer, bug the company listed in the spam... make their spam bite them in the arse.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Well, I could "make a living" selling small boys to pedophiles, or gassing kittens or beating up people on the street for gangsters, but that doesn't make it right.
Whatever... So when the 1 1/2 people who actually care about this call and complain, turn the port on for them.
In this case it's more a matter of turning on the anti-lock braking system. For 99% of the uses, you want it, so it's the job of the car company to make that the default. Not the people who own the roads, though.
In other words, Microsoft should make more sane defaults.
I'm getting criticism like this from folks who don't read closely enough.
The poster said should not and not can not. In other words, this is the way the poster wants things to be, or thinks they ought to be, or hopes they will be, for the reasons given, but not the way they must be. That filtering is "not the right thing" is a policy assertion, and it is implicit the poster will switch ISP's if the current one downgrades its service. However, the supply of ISP's, esp. broadband, is not infinite, and if ISP's react in a kneejerk fashion the availability of alternative service could dry up quickly -- and unnecessarily.
Before everyone launches a game of Internet doorbell-ditch: it is legitimate to send a real email or make a phone call criticizing what she does (politely -- remember, you're with the good guys). Collectively /. should be able to produce a lot of feedback, at one per person. If she just gets snowed by abuse, so you really think she'll going to think, golly, my ways are in error and I better change jobs? Or just, there are a lot of jerks out there and I better never give another interview?
Harassment is no better than spam. It's using illegitimate needs to get what you want. She is doing something wrong (ethically if not legally; and in many states, legally too) but that entitles us to complain, not retaliate. Two wrongs don't make a right, something like that.
She honestly appears not to get it, or is in serious denial. (By contrast, some spammers do appear to have struck a deal with the Dark Prince.) Explain to her, and everyone else, that spam is a serious problem and not just another form of junk mail.
And most important of all, support laws to regulate spam at the national level, as was done for junk faxes. Make it unquestionable that this hijacking of our tiem and resources is illegal.
(I do detest spam. When email arrives, half the time I switch apps over it's for junk. Currently 2/3 of my unfiltered inbox is spam, and the number keeps growing. I don't even want to think of the theoretical maximum to daily spam.)
Nothing is being stolen in the case of spam (processing power aside, yada yada, we're not all being paid by SETI@home).
It's analogous to locking you car, going inside, coming back out and finding a flyer on your windshield. Some places allow this, others don't, but we've ALL gotten these flyers before.
In my case, I don't figure it's a big deal, I'll throw it in the backseat with the rest of my trash.
--trb
The Problem:
The current email marketing business model is broken, it costs spammers almost nothing and the end-user or ISPs everything. (Plus it's annoying as heck!)
The (simple) solution:
For End Users: Create a 100% accountable email marketing site that allows users to signup to receive marketing material in exchange for money.
For Businesses: Do a search before you buy into the system to see how many people are willing to accept marketing information based on the criteria you select.
More explanation:
For End Users:
For Businesses:
Anti-Spam Links
(This is a patent free business model. If you like it, use it and make it better!)