Slashdot Mirror
Spammers Busted
Scud_the_disposable_ writes "CNN has posted an article about the "shutting down" of several spammers who sell fake international driver's licenses. These licenses are supposed to win back suspended driving priviledges, and make holders immune to speeding tickets and other traffic violations." What makes me even more sad is that people fell for it. So far today is a slow spam day for me. Only 81 spam, but its only 9:30.
I thought for sure, with as much spam as you get, you'd be the first one to try out the bayesian mail filters that Paul Graham wrote about. One of the ones he suggested was CRM114 With a reputed catch rate of 99.8%, do you really not want to try it that much?
An international drivers license is usually only issued on the basis of having a _valid_ national license. Here in the UK you must take a valid UK license to the Post Office (or the AA) to get an International License.
It is also not valid for the country of issue, and I'm betting most insurance companies won't accept one when insuring your vehicle. So basically, I'd need some form of valid foreign license to get an international license that I could use in the USA, and even then I'd be driving without insurance, which I know is illegal in most if not all states.
So I don't see why anyone should fall for this scam...
-- "...I'm a bad guy because I, well, I sing some rock-and-roll songs." M. Manson
Since my ISP started using Postini I only get one or two, and as soon as they catch one the rest of the same type are blocked. I can still log into the message center where the suspicious messages are held, and review them just in case. I'd never heard of it before then, and have no interest in the company other than paying .50/month for extra spam filtering.
DIY hack for Orange smartphone revealed
OK, I have to ask: what the heck are you guys doing with your email addresses that make you get 81 spam messages before noon? Publishing it on a billboard in Times Square?
It may not be exactly like putting his email address on a billboard in Times Square, but he does, you know, run slashdot. His address shows up a lot on these pages that are a good target for havesters and he does reach a large audiance, of whom a small percentange might be vindictive towards him, for whatever reason, and sign him up for all sorts of nasty stuff.
Stupid Cheap Guitars
Provided they use only their own resources (i.e. they do not tax other people's hardware and bandwidth) and are regulated the same way that all other marketters are regulated. This means they can't "hide" themselves behind forged headers or other information designed to deceive the reader/recipient.
Unfortunately, those rules are simply in contradiction to SMTP. SMTP requires that the receiver provide the server to hold the message, and there is no way to authenticate the from and reply addresses.
If you have a US driver's license, you can get an international driver's license just by going to your nearest AAA office, filling out a form, and paying a small fee. You then get a little booklet you have to carry around with your regular license, which basically amounts to a bunch of pages that say "this is a driver's license" in several languages.
Simple solution: have ISP's block egress traffic on port 25. Use your ISP's SMTP server, or get the admin of the server you wish to use to use a different port (e.g. SMTP + SSL on port 465). Imagine the spam that would be stopped if just AOL implemented this!
DHS (The Distributed Home Spamming DHS Club)
Ok, I did not know what this was, but as my servers are under a storm of port scans from Send-Safe send-safe and I was trying to find out some information I found this DHS DHS Web site Scary , who will be the first that Put them out?
Also it clear that they are using slow and bad admin's to run their "bizz." UUNET/Worldcom is the DHS Club's current Internet connectivity provider. They have a reputation of failing to aggressively enforce their posted Terms of Service.
Oh, why not drop the DHS members an E-mail E-mail address list
Are we losing the fight Spam software ??
I just hate bit SPAM, (www.netnoise.com.kh)