The Anti-Spam Research Group's Plan for Spam

egoff writes "Speaking of standards, the ASRG, a member of the IETF, has a plan for "consent-based communications." Among the suggestions, according to Internet Week, are authentication services for falsified addresses, trusted senders, reputation systems (karma?), opt-out tools, best practices for challenge/response, and even a proposal for micropayments on unwanted mail. Instead of defining spam, the ASRG wants to provide administrators and users the tools necessary to avoid what they consider to be unwanted. One of the tools, Reverse MX, is expected to be in place in several months. It would allow the receiving mail server to query a domain to determine if the sending server is allowed to send on its behalf."

Comments

THAT would be very useful...

[WCMI92]

"One of the tools, Reverse MX, is expected to be in place in several months. It would allow the receiving mail server to query a domain to determine if the sending server is allowed to send on its behalf."

This would more or less force spammers to send from their own domains... Or from ISP's that are spam friendly.

It might not STOP spam (though blacklisting would be easier), but it'd make it traceable...

Which would make it easier to file complaints under the anti spam laws.

Cooperate and I'll Read

[AvantLegion]

You know, I wouldn't mind receiving advertisements in email if:

1. They were about things I gave a damn about
2. They were marked (like ADV:) for easy filtering

What bothers me about spam are the violations of those two. I don't want emails about printer toner, or bigger schlongs. And I don't like having ads clutter up my inbox, where email from people I know and such belongs.

But if I could filter it all into an "Ads" mailbox, just like I have mailboxes for various mailing lists, I would scan the offers about stuff I might actually want. I'd be much more inclined to "click through" then, while my all-time number of click-throughs of spam email to date totals 0.

good incremental approach

[rossjudson]

I like the idea; the problem is getting uptake on it. You need to encourage a lot of people. The way to do this is to get the "big" ISPs in on the scheme immediately. Participants should alter their mail transfer programs to tag the SUBJECT line of the messages with the word Untrusted. This will cause receivers to know, and significant embarrassment for those not participating...which will cause their mail system to be upgraded to participating status.

Unless the bad effects of not participating are directly visible (as in subject line), it's gonna take too long.

inevitable

[falsification]

It's inevitable. E-mail as we know it is going away.

Spam is now the enemy. It must be destroyed. Here comes the IETF to solve the problem.

SMTP Next Generation is on its way. The only question is the exact design. The general outline is already known. First, there will be real-world verification of identity tied to every account capable of sending SMTP NG e-mail. There will be a transition period where people can sign up for "upgraded" (NG) e-mail accounts; then, a period where these "upgraded" accounts can receive e-mail from other NG accounts as well as from old, potentially anonymous accounts. Business and government users will transition to NG.

Then, there will be an Internet-wide deadline, upon which all NG e-mail addresses will be unable to receive e-mail except from other NG addresses. All SMTP old generation traffic will be blocked. The old base of mail users will be forced to transition to SMTP NG. At this point, if there is ever a complaint about spam, the spammer can be tracked down and booted off Internet e-mail forever. As a result, spam will cease to exist.

The day the Internet died. Sure, it will be more "efficient" then. No spam. But it won't be free.

Don't cry about it. It happens to all technology. Those who need anonymous communications will just move to something else. Maybe web-based discussion, for example. Just no more truly private, truly anonymous, or truly free e-mail.

Coming soon to your neighborhood.

Short lived phenomenon

[ObviousGuy]

Spam is simply not profitable enough to last much longer. It is the last of a dying breed of pioneering Internet money-making schemes like the pyramid scheme emails and banner ads. Eventually the spammers will move on to other means of money making because their revenue is guaranteed to drop off as their tactics turn more and more people off.

Instead of fighting the good fight here, the best thing to do is let this dying ember peter out on its own. Forcing spammers to use more drastic tactics just results in them doing more harm in the long run. If there had been no resistance at all, we'd probably be seeing a much more mature and respectable online advertising industry instead of the random, haphazard, and very annoying multitude of spam king wannabes downloading their spam kits and setting up shop.

RMX sounds kewl, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's your fly in the soup:

It only works when receiving mail with an forged and uncooperative sender-address. Nothing will prevent a spammer listing 0.0.0.0/0 as authorized sender addresses provided he controls the DNS for the envelope-sender. /me sees domains like a cat walking on your keyboard being used as throw-away domain for spamming. (lkjshret.com IN RMX 0/0)

It will increase the cost of a spam-run, and that's good news. On second thought: I like it.

Pay a deposit to send a spam.

[rice_burners_suck]

Here is what I think. Forget all the complicated stuff. At the ISP, give every email account a whitelist, containing email addresses to be let through. Each email that is sent is checked against the whitelist. If the sender is not included on the whitelist, the email is automatically rejected. Users can optionally set up their account to accept any emails.

But here's the fun part: As a recipient, each user sets up their account with a "deposit price" for bypassing the whitelist. You can set that price to any amount in your currency of choice. As a sender, you can set the maximum amount that you're willing to pay, so that you don't suddenly get billed/debited/charged some outrageous fee. If someone who is not on your whitelist needs to send you an email, they pay a deposit. When you receive the email, you either accept it or reject it. If you accept it, you do not get paid; the sender keeps the deposit. If you reject it (meaning you've read the email and decided it was spam), the deposit paid by the sender is paid to you. It's enough to set the deposit to something like 50 cents. You'll probably get highly targeted emails at this price. I wouldn't mind risking 50 cents to send someone an email that I think they'll accept. You could set it to a few dollars to reduce the noise even further. But you could set it to any price you want. If you REALLY don't want email from sources not included in your whitelist, you could set the deposit to thousands of dollars. With this system, you'll be HAPPY to receive spam! And spammers either won't be able to afford it, or recipients will start making some money.