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Spammer Gets Spam Mailed

ssblood noted a story about a spammer getting what he deserves as well as a related story from the Register. Essentially the virtual spammer is capable of sending a billion emails a day, and is getting sacks of physical junk mail from irritable folks. Apparently part of this plot was hatched on familiar turf too.

4 of 341 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Hmm this really isnt new by Saint+Nobody · · Score: 5, Insightful

    never reply to your spam mail. sometimes the address will be forged, and you'll be harassing some poor shmuck. sometimes you're just replying to a bot that notes you as a valid email address. plus, if you do wind up on a spammer's bad side, you're probably more likely to be the victim of a forged address.

    by replying to spam, you're betting that your spammer is ethical. do you really want to make that bet?

    --
    #define F(x) int main(){printf(#x,10,#x);}
    F(#define F(x) int main(){printf(#x,10,#x);}%cF(%s))
  2. Re:Hmm this really isnt new by hector13 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    2, points:

    1) This has to do with sending real (snail) mail to a spammer, not email. It is a lot easier to filter out email then it is to go through 300+ letters a day to figure out if any of them are important.

    2) By replying to spam emails, you are probably doing yourself nothing but harm. I agree with your basic point, if everyone replied to every spam and swamped the spammer's network, it would work. Since that isn't the case, the only thing you are doing by replying is letting the spammer know that he has a valid email address.

  3. There oughta be a weekly profile... by mtec · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Let's make 'dup think' work for good, not evil...

    Spammer of the week.

    Ya' know - a puff piece profile. Who they are, what they do in their spare time, what their favorite color is, name address and phone number, shirt size...

    I'm serious. Why not?

    --
    Cake or Death? Cake Please!
  4. Re:Hmm this really isnt new by MonkeyBoy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I hate to break the news to you, but of all the spams I've received over the past 2 days, not a single one was SENT from the account that is listed on the reply-to address. In fact, if you read the contents of the spam, you'll usually see them point replies to a completely different address, and "remove" requests to another (usually bogus) address. In not a single case does the subnet of the sender, nor the mail server used to relay the message, match any email address contained within the spam.

    Now, that's not to say that there are idiots out there who are ignorant enough to send spam with their own return address via their ISP's mail server, nor do I mean to say that there aren't enough spam-friendly ISPs out there loaning bandwidth to spammers running their own server farms (like the scumbag weasel $!@#$@# who's currently getting ever-increasing amounts of old-fashioned junkmail). I'm just saying that it's unlikely your actions will cause the effect you intend, as spammers who operate in the manner you need are in the minority.

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    Moof!