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CDT Releases New Report on Origins of Spam
Carnth writes "CDT has released a new report based on a six month project entitled "Why Am I Getting All This Spam?" The results offer Internet users insights about what online behavior results in the most unsolicited commercial email and also debunk some of the myths about spam." A very good report - read it. There's also a story about yet another sleazy spammer in Ohio.
I never saw anything in their methodology about how the spam was analyzed. It would have been interesting to see what effect actually opening spam e-mail in a web enabled browser had on the recurrence rate.
I bet the web bugs would have kept the recurrences high even for addresses that were removed...
"I'm just here to regulate funkyness." - James Gandolfini, as Winston in The Mexican
I am sorry, smack me down if you must, but... Aaaahhhhhhhh!!!! Die Spammer, Die! Friggin White Trash sonsabitchin spammers. I feel slightly better now. Ready for Karma extraction.
If this article confuses you, don't worry. It was posted yesterday in a much clearer fashion.
In the debate over how much spam really costs, one factor that almost never gets discussed is the impact on behavior and openness. How many of us refrain from using our real email addresses in public forums or in correspondence with companies because of a fear of receiving more spam? There may not be a direct economic cost, but it makes the Internet less useful to all of us. Spammers have essentially driven all of us to have unlisted phone numbers on the Internet, which reduces the usefulness of the medium. Off with their heads, I say.
Actually, I was trying to be Insightful, not Funny.
Let's all go register for online lotteries with our new Hotmail accounts. Then we'll give our e-mail address to the airport on that little frequent flyer card because I know they're going to send me only useful info. Oh yeah, let's not forget Kazaa registration, seedy computer retailers, and mail-in rebates.
I participate in none of these activities. I have my email address on my website, but I spell it out instead of using the at@symbol.com . I've had two e-mail addresses since Summer 2001 and the only spam I get is from Windows e-mail viruses, which aren't compatible with my operation system. Yes, it *is* possible to have a public e-mail address that doesn't get spammed.
In the long run, we're all dead.
Oh god, here we go with the old "waah why isn't everyone as tough as I am" complaint.
I wonder, does he have children? If not, would he relish the idea of them constantly being hit with sex ads? How about elderly relatives?
It's not worth doing.
The people who obfuscate their email address to avoid spams arent the ones you want to spam, since they're pretty much 100% guaranteed not to even read the email.
The spammers want the messages sent to the dopes who might actually buy the product/service.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Obscuring an e-mail address is an effective way to avoid spam from harvesters on the Web or on USENET newsgroups... ("example at domain dot com")
I thought for sure by now spammers would have figured out regular expressions and e-mail address verifying modules, and I'm glad they haven't.
But doesn't that prove that there's never been a smart programmer who's worked on an e-mail harvester?
I think that says alot about the profession.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
... a user with a common or short name may want to modify or add to it in some way in his or her e-mail address.
For further information, please contact... ari@cdt.org.
Not taking their own advice?
http://www.ftc.gov/os/2002/04/universaldircmp.pdf
:)
Gentlemen, we have an address. Sic 'em.
Charles F. Childs
4132 Pompton Court
Dayton, OH 45405
--Posted by myself
It's possible that some government fiat could ram this new standard down everyone's throats, but I don't think anyone would be happy with that.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
That doesn't change the fact that you're still getting spammed!!! So what if you know who did it? Great, you won't do business with them again because they sold your address.
Your still getting spammed because in most places, it's perfectly legal for them to do so. Your bandwidth is still absorbing spam. Your mail server still deals with the spam/bounces.
Just making a cute address doesn't solve the problem.
Here's an idea along that theme...
If you are just giving the address because they demanded one, and you have no reason to expect them to contact you for any reason, set up a filtering/procmail config so that any mail sent to that customized address is automatically forwarded to EVERY corporate address for the site to whom you originally gave it. That way, if someone spams that address, the corporate addresses of the sleazebags who gave it out are the ones who get it returned.
STOP MISUSING APOSTROPHES, YOU MORONS!!!
That's not necesarily true;
If spammers were only concerned with "clean" lists of probable dupes, they could very easily filter out the following probable complainers from their lists:
- role accounts (postmaster@, abuse@ )
- well-known complainers (whitelisting)
- entire spam-unfriendly domains (@spamcop.net)
Yet they don't. Rule #1, folks.
Yahoo will just discard your email, if you splatter cast complaints to them. Your complaint won't get magicly escalated, it will just get ignored. You are not helping, you are just making it worse.
Michael Loves Me!
Some of the CDT's conclusions do seem obvious, but others really contradict prevailing beliefs. For one thing, they found that opting out of future mailings generally didn't result in the email address being sold or shared, thus attracting even greater quantities of spam.
:-/
Yes, it is suprising, but I think there is an important distinction between opting out via the same web site form that you opted in through, as opposed to opting out via the dodgy "Reply to remove" message at the end of most spam.
They seem to have used the former of those methods, but not the latter, and I suspect that it's that one that would have really brought the junk mail flooding in.
(Spudley Strikes Again!)
Then who is this?
Charles Childs
8002 Bellcreek Ln
Dayton, OH
(937) 837-6997
phone.people.yahoo.com
An activist! Bless you.
For anyone out there who cannot convince FirstUSA bank to stop telemarketting to your house, call the assistant to the CEO at 888-622-7547 x6839.
Tell her that you will call her back each time you get one of their calls. If she tells you that it could take several months to get off their lists, then tell here that it will also take several months for her to get off *your* list.
I went thru this about 7 years ago and finally put a stop to it with this method after my "properly channeled" requests were ignored. They started up again recently; so I went straight to plan B. It works! Just call the CEO, or as close as you can get.
Ok. I may not have beleived this myself...
BUT! Just before resorting to a filter, I went ahead and tried the 'opt out' link at the bottom of a spam message that was part of a 4-5 message a day flood from a service calling itself "Opt-In" email service. After a couple of days, I never heard from them again.
Funny thing is, tho: the very next day, a new flood began from a company calling itself "YourMailServer"...
CONSPIRACY?!