Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Yahoo! Develops Anti-Spam Architecture

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the webs-of-trust dept.

prostoalex writes "Yahoo!, the owner of one of the largest e-mail systems in the world, is said to be developing a cryptographic product that will be offered freely to mail servers. 'Domain Keys,' according to the Reuters article, would require the message sender to authenticate in order for message to come across a trusted e-mail network. The idea has been around for ages, however, it required someone from the big league like Yahoo! to step in." While Yahoo! isn't the first name that comes to mind when I think of trusted email, it's still a step in the right direction.

2 of 283 comments (clear)

  1. Re:OS? by swb · · Score: 3, Informative

    $ telnet mx1.mail.yahoo.com 25
    Trying 64.157.4.78...
    Connected to mx1.mail.yahoo.com.
    Escape character is '^]'.
    220 YSmtp mta108.mail.sc5.yahoo.com ESMTP service ready

    It looks like they run YSmtp, just like everyone else I know. In all seriousness, I'd imagine there isn't much of Yahoo's infrastructure that isn't highly optimized for Yahoo's own use. I think that Yahoo did a lot with FreeBSD at one time, but I'd presume whatever they have isn't just an out of the box app.

  2. Re:Why? by santiag0 · · Score: 3, Informative
    I've used yahoo e-mail for 4 years now. I have 2 accounts, a "main" one I forward all my other e-mail accounts to, and a "throw-away" account I use for posting on yahoo finance message boards, and also for instances where an e-mail address is required but don't want extra spam (ex. online shopping).
    My experience over-all has been excellent, with on minor exception:
    Yahoo! sneaks in yet more spam
    YAHOO! GRANTED ITSELF PERMISSION to spam by creating a new "marketing preferences" page that lets users pick "yes or no" to specific categories of marketing pitches. The problem is, Yahoo! set every users' option to "yes" -- even if long ago, they indicated they never wanted any Yahoo! spam.
    Yahoo! started e-mailing the privacy policy change to users Thursday. In the notice, the company suggested the marketing policy changes were made for users so they could more easily control the amount of e-mail offers they receive.
    "It is designed to make it easier for you to manage the marketing communications you receive from Yahoo! and ensure you get the latest relevant information to meet your needs," the notice says. It also says that marketing preferences have been "reset," and unless users actively follow a sequence of steps to change these preferences "you may begin receiving marketing messages from Yahoo! about ways to enhance your Yahoo! experience, including special offers and new features."
    But some Yahoo! users don't see the change as an enhancement, but rather a tactic to trick users into accepting more spam -- and a betrayal of their initial registration agreements.
    "I checked and they had changed all my settings!" writes one irate poster to an Internet mailing group devoted to privacy. "This means that you may well be inundated with even more junk mail than you are already receiving. In order to change your settings back to whatever you had them at before, you will need to log in to your account and physically change them," the poster adds.
    A Yahoo! spokesperson said no company officials were available to comment on the change, but offered an e-mail statement explaining the company's position.
    "We have created a new marketing preferences page which allows users to choose how Yahoo! communicates with them about Yahoo! products and services. Yahoo!'s products and services have changed and grown over the years and many were not available when users registered in the past," the e-mail says. "We are notifying users proactively via e-mail of this change, after which they have 60 days after the date of the mailing to edit those marketing preferences, giving users plenty of time to decide how they want Yahoo! to communicate with them."
    This was from a google search on "yahoo marketing preferences", and pretty well sums up what happened. They basically reset user marketing preferences, twice in about 4 years if I remember correctly.
    It was a bad decision IMHO, but easy enough to reset your preferences, here is yahoo's page on privacy, with links to reset your marketing preferences:
    http://privacy.yahoo.com/
    Other than this one issue, I've been very happy with Yahoo. Being able to check all my e-mail on one Web site for free is great. Never have lost any e-mails, no problems at all.