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FTC vs. Open SMTP Relays

Posted by michael on from the because-we-care dept.

HighOrbit writes "Cnet reports on news.com.com that The U.S. Federal Trade Commission, several state Attorneys General, and Australia, Canada and Japan are sending this letter (pdf) to operators of open relay mail servers to educate them on the dangers of open relays and how they help spread spam. Although the letter does not threaten direct law enforcement action, it does let open relayers know that they have been noticed and warned. The threat of being blacklisted has not worked yet, so will this finally convince mail server admins to shut down those open relays?"

5 of 328 comments (clear)

  1. Oh hell. by grub · · Score: 4, Funny


    How am I supposed to find out about herbal viagra, hot co-eds, batteryless flashlights or stainless steel if this succeeds?
    I'm going to write my Member of Parliament about this.

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  2. Re:Education is the key by Angry+White+Guy · · Score: 5, Funny

    This just means I don't have to test all my servers. Someone will let me know. Man, andministrating my home network just got easier!

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  3. Re:Some simple logic in order? by jdreed1024 · · Score: 5, Funny
    So to relate this to the article, I'd say that a letter from the FTC that doesn't threaten *legal* action will provide no more incentive to these system administrators to close the relays; thus the letters become little more than a waste of paper...

    I agree, it's a terrible waste of paper. I think instead the FTC should send out mass e-mails about this and... uh.... wait a minute...

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  4. Considering lack of spam legislation otherwise by pecosdave · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'm really glad to see the Texas seal on this document. It's really disturbed me to see Texas just standing by and ignoring the spam problem. I personally think any spammers caught in-state should be roped and dragged to the middle town to let the people decide what to do with them. We're already proud to be #1 in executions, cowboy justice would just up our position.

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  5. Thanks guys! by Jade+E.+2 · · Score: 4, Funny
    It would have taken me *weeks* of flying around the world to get fake signatures from all those people, but the PDF makes it easy!

    Watch, for their next letter, they're going to warn about the dangers of using Microsoft products!