Interview With a Spammer

Auto-reply by John+Seminal · 2003-09-27 05:06 · Score: 2, Interesting

The software monitors which e-mails are returned and tabulates their status. When an ''out of the office'' auto-reply comes back on one e-mail message, Colbert says: ''Oh, we love those. They confirm that the address is active.'' Within six minutes, on a single computer, running through a regular phone line, I have fired off 1,000 e-mail messages.

This sucks, for a spammer to take a tool that we use for work, and find a way to misuse it.

Is there any way to set auto-reply's to only send notices to emails on a specific domain, and not respond to any others?

--

Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."

I've gotta hand it to this guy... by rwven · 2003-09-27 05:11 · Score: 5, Interesting

LOL, i got a few good laughs out of his story. one of my favorite parts:

'"I was thrown off more BellSouth accounts than half the state of Florida,'' Colbert says. His name was known, and he was a marked and wanted man. But he found a way around the heat. ''Do you remember when American Express came out with temporary credit cards?'' he recalls happily. ''You could go to the 7-11 convenience store and buy a $25 credit card -- sort of like you buy a $25 phone card, only it was good for just $25 worth of credit."

Armed with a dozen of these cards, Colbert would go to the BellSouth Web site and create numerous e-mail accounts from which to send spam, each account with a fictitious name and address. Since the credit card couldn't be connected to him in any way, he could spam away until BellSouth finally got around to canceling that particular account. ''They were great, totally untraceable,'' he says of the credit cards. ''They don't sell them anymore. I think it's because of me.'' '

pretty smart feller ;)

Re:"a second hard drive"? by KillerHamster · 2003-09-27 05:18 · Score: 3, Interesting

"...the nine hard drives bound together with a superfast connection speed..."

Man, I wish I had a RAID setup like that!

Helpless? by dougmc · 2003-09-27 05:24 · Score: 2, Interesting

(A good method for avoiding spam, then, is to always type your e-mail address on the Web this way: Arnie at hotmail.com or ArnieREMOVETHIS@hotmail.com. Humans can look at either and figure out what to do; software -- so far -- is helpless.)

Helpless? I don't buy that for a minute.

With perl, in 15 minutes I can make a program that automatically (and correctly) de-spamproofs about 90% of the spamproofed addresses out there. In another hour I can probably get another 5%. The remaining 5% are a lot harder, but they can easily be ignored. (Of course, many humans (think of grandma) have a hard time deciphering much of that remaining 5% as well.)

Spammers are stupid, yes, but when there's money on the line, they can certainly figure out simple things like this, or if not, they can pay somebody else to figure them out for them. True `hackers' may have their scruples, and may hate spam, but if they're out of a job and a spammer offers them $1000 for an hour's work ... guess what's gonna happen?

I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet, but just wait -- those who use user@NOSPAMdomain.com are going to find their `spamproofed' addresses getting more and more spam.

Re:Helpless? by dubiousmike · 2003-09-27 07:09 · Score: 2, Interesting

one of my best friends, the guy who got me into Linux, PHP, MYSQL, now does side work for one of the big spammers. If the email you get sent gets bounced back to them, they automatically take you off their list. The feature found in some email clients that lets you bounce the email back AFTER reading it, is one of the best ways to get yourself removed from lists.

I personally got a separate domain JUST for email. Every time I have to enter my email address somewhere new, I would submit site_name.specific_info_if_necessary@mydomain.com. Then if I start getting spam from someone using that new address, I know who sold me out. I have a catch all for the domain so all email goes to one place. It really lets you know who you can trust. Its also easy to block a specific address that you would never use again anyway to decrease your amount of spam you'd get period, never mind with spam assasin.

I also decided to get all of my family's names .com so that in 4 years, when my grandmother goes to Google my sister's name, some one hasn't decided to start buying people's name's.com and parking them on porn sites. Grandma will be shocked if my sister's name returns a video of a dirty sanchez.

Also, as my family members become more aclimated to the idea of utilizing a domain (for a site or just email) they can do so. They will thank me later.

Re:Why I love the times by 1u3hr · 2003-09-27 05:27 · Score: 4, Interesting

Note at the end of the article:

He points under his desk to a recent arrival, a second hard drive, precisely what he would need to begin a new network.
''It's a Dell Pentium 233,'' he says. ''I got it for $15, plus $23.95 shipping.''

The reporter seems unable to distinguish between a "hard drive" and an entire computer; one wonders if his grasp of other details is as weak.

Re:Spammers vs. Virus Engineers by ComputerSlicer23 · 2003-09-27 05:44 · Score: 2, Interesting

If the accounting was done, I'd be pretty surprised if in an accurate accoutning Spammers don't do more harm to the economy then they do good themselves. That is, they are a net loser for the economy. (Maybe not, if I account for all the money the ISP's are charging, but that should be relatively zero sum game there). I know we have extra bandwidth around at work because of the sheer volume of junk mail we get. I'd be surprised if the drain spammers create isn't at least as much as virus and worm writers create. Granted on a per capita basis, that means spammers are better, but in aggregate they sure aren't. However, because they make a living at it they don't go away.

People who construct a virus and a worm are generally bad people. However, they have a positive side affect. They bring security to the forefront, and get people to update patches, and keep other maintience on there machines done. Things like backups. Updates to anti-virus software. Patches to the OS. Those are all good things. Other then the Anti-virus software, those should be done even assuming viruses and worms didn't exist (hardware failure and bugs exist so you need patches, and backups).

Who knows, maybe Spammers do for bandwith and internet infrastructure what Pornography and gamers do for home theater and personal computer equipment. They are a driving force to create more and better innovation. They drive costs down, and move things from low production runs into high volume production runs. I've heard the conjecture that most of the early adopters of VHS, DVD, big screen TV's, flat screen TV's, projector TV's, home theaters, rental stores, CD burners, DVD Burners, and digital video, and home video cameras are all pretty much either pornography creators or consumers. That a lot of the drive to bring out newer faster home computers, computer CD players, and almost the entire consumer 3D video card market was driven by early adopters from the gaming community.

It's weird to think that Pornography and Gamers have driven a *LOT* of the technology development for at least the past 20 years (gamers didn't start until later, but they've done their part). If it really is true that half of all internet traffic is SPAM (I find it hard to believe, but I suppose it it possible), then maybe spammers are doing us a favor in terms of driving the backbone of the internet providers to give us more cost effective bandwidth. Unfortuantely, spammers keep using up a great deal of the innovation they helped to create.

Kirby

Spamming doesn't pay by mabu · 2003-09-27 05:51 · Score: 3, Interesting

This freak has a NOC in a mobile home. He buys his clothes off of ebay. Yea, more evidence of how lucrative spamming really is. That's another myth that needs to be busted: that spamming is profitable. It is not. Spammers can't build a successful business when the business is built around violating the law and stealing computer resources. The people that spam today are the same losers who would be running around slapping illegal signs up on telephone poles promoting Ponzi schemes.

Harness Daytime TV for the powers of good by MattGWU · 2003-09-27 06:09 · Score: 2, Interesting

One thing that I've always wondered is why no groups have embarked on a public education campaign against spam? These days, there are public service announcements for everything. How much could a 20 second spot between a Metamucil ad and a personal injury lawyer be during some Judge Shrill Crackpot at 2:30 on a Tuesday?

Hit the bootleg Viagra and weight loss crowd where they live: glued to their couches during prime soap and talk time when the rest of us are at work.

The only question is how long would 'the industry' sit on their laurls while we badmouth their fine, economy-stimulating trade. Do Not Call List, the fine folks at the DMA, and Federal judges, I'm looking in your direction.

Food for thought. I'm not sure who would be producing these ads, but I'd kick them some money...

--
"These people look deep within my soul and assign me a number based on the order in which I joined" --Homer re:

Re:Eh? by MrLint · 2003-09-27 06:17 · Score: 2, Interesting

Reminds me of the AOL for broadband commercial "Blocks unwanted spam"

I was unaware that were was 'wanted' spam. Perhaps just wanted spammers, Dead or alive.

Worse - Nigerians abusing Internet Deaf Relay by billstewart · 2003-09-27 06:55 · Score: 2, Interesting

A couple of months ago I got a call on my cellphone from the AT&T-run deaf relay service, which has expanded from relaying TDDs to relaying from some Internet interface (I think web?). It was, as near as I could tell, a Nigerian scammer. It was obviously not an American, because they were calling me on a Sunday evening on Memorial Day weekend to talk about a business opportunity, and I asked what time zone they were in and it was compatible with being daytime in Nigeria... I asked the operator if she could trace the call but apparently she couldn't.

--

Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks

This may mark the decline of free WiFi.... by Chuqmystr · 2003-09-27 07:07 · Score: 2, Interesting

I was hoping to read a little more about the WiFi quip. I'm assuming that the notion of a "drive-by spamming" has evolved to a reality.

I can't wait until I see the first 1975 rusted-out Chevy van festooned with soup, floppy disk and pringles can antennas galore, cabin lit by the pale glow of an LCD, go creeping through the neigborhood.

Oh great, I just realized something else. All the telcos and cable co's will finally be able to have their congressional butt-pupets legislate all of we pesky home WiFi users out of existence now. After all, we're too iresponsible/stupid/ignorant/lazy to do anything about security on our APs and so, can't be trusted with them. With all those unsecured APs out there on the user end of those thousands of DSL and cable connections acting as virtual spam-spots instead of hot-spots the internet will become an instant disaster! Oh the HUMANITY!

Anyway, soon after the telcos/cable co's save us all, yet again, from our own self inflicted demise we will be lining up at the retail outlets of [insert wireless carrier name of choice here] to sign up for service. It will be quite reasonable at ~$75/month for all you can eat or ~$20/month for say, a generous 500KB/month and then $5.00/minute after allowance usage. Oh, and it will be secure and guaranteed to work with Windoze. Only Windoze. So it can be secure...

Re:Reality Check by SmurfButcher+Bob · 2003-09-27 09:54 · Score: 1, Interesting

Well, yes and no.

a) The spammer's speech isn't free; it costs me money to receive it. Period.
b) You're suggesting that DOS attacks should be legal, provided that the packets contain something "speech-like".
c) The right to swing your fist is terminated where my nose begins. My network, MY property, my terms. No spam.
d) Please, do move them all out of country. Blacklists would be much, much smaller that way... I will never, in my entire life, receive a legit "cold-call" email from a server in Mexico, Canada, Europe, Africa, tw, ch, ur...

This type of banning would not be a sacrifice of liberty. It'd be an acknowlegement of CURTILEGE, which is one @#$load more important than speech, any day. If I am ACCOUNTABLE for my property, then I will have AUTHORITY over it. Anything less is pure suicide.

Food for thought, at least.
Cheers,

--

help me i've cloned myself and can't remember which one I am

Think yourself lucky by IIH · 2003-09-27 11:05 · Score: 3, Interesting

I've never endorsed vigilante action against spammers, but the instant I get a text message on my phone from a Nigerian businessman, I'm changing my mind.

I've lost track of the junk text messages I've got, advertising free holidays, premimum rate lines, and the latest one this morning was from a phone number "important" telling me to go to a certain url for a surpise prize.

Unfortunatly, I live in the UK, where despite this being illegal (my cell phone is registered with TPS), trying to get these people fined, never mind shut down, is next to impossible. Hell, I can't even find what company sent it to lodge the iniital complaint!

As an aside, does anyone know if you can get any info from your phone provider on thses "anonymous" text messages, Also, can you do a reverse lookup on premium rate lines? (I know if you register a PO box, your information must be available, is the same for premium rate lines?)

--
Exigo spamos et dona ferentes

Re:All-time favorite interaction with a spammer by LordKane · 2003-09-27 11:55 · Score: 2, Interesting

Yea, the funny thing about this particular first person interaction with a live spammer is I also know the guy too. Richard Cobert was trying to set my company up with a marketing campaign, buy some of the customer database software we sell, and I had to deal with him. I still have his purchase info for what he did buy. :-)

This guy is a total sleaze. I felt slimy just talking to the guy. It's spammers like this guy that cause all the problems. I mean, he has no qualms about how he makes a buck. He even tried to get chummy with me in order to land the deal. He told the most whacked stories about his "old" golf career as a potential pro and how he knew Bill Gates (another reason he's a moron) and could have been rich with him. If he really did know Gates, I can see where he gets his "do anything to make $$$" mentality from. A little later, we found out he was working for Keith Taubb and America Int., another shady list dealer.

He was just to slimy and we decided he was probably lying that his campaign was totally "opt-in." I cut him loose as soon as possible, and it was so funny to hear about him the next year as one of the biggest spammers on our little rock. This was over 2 years ago now, but even now thinking about talking to him makes me shiver. For once, I understand why tigers eat their young...

--
"Victims, aren't we all?"

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