Examining an Automated Spam Tool

Saint Aardvark writes "SecurityFocus has published an excellent column detailing how spammers r00ted an Apache server, and used it to send spam. The tool they used is (I hate to admit it) pretty sophisticated: it has macro capabilities, picks up email addresses from and reports success or failure to the master server. It's a very frightening read...and so is this: Message Labs reports that they now intercept 27 spam emails per second, up from 2 per second this time last year. Virus-created proxies are mainly to blame."

Comments

SpamAssassin makes me not care

[jbs0902]

I know it is selfish, but SpamAssassin does such a good job of killing of my spam, especially with Bayan (sp?) filtering, that I no longer care about spam. It eats up some bandwidth, but I have so few email addresses and emails are so small, I'll accept it.

Now my main concern is not getting rooted (or the equiv').

Why don't we take advantage of all those...

[Anonymous Coward]

...Amber/Whitney/Tiffni/Brandee laws that get passed every time some whacked-out drifter attacks someone's kid? People are getting the shit beaten out of them on a weekly basis because of sex offender databases and mistaken identity. All we have to do is r00t the "Misti's Law" server, post a picture of Alan Ralsky as pubic enemy #1, and then tell a hysterical soccer mom how she can use the intarweb to make the neighborhood safer. With any luck, we'll get to see Ralsky stomped to death in a cell like a few of those baby-poking priests.