Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: What To Do With Spammers You Know?
courteaudotbiz writes "For years, a business named Compu-Finder has been sending spam all around the province of Quebec, Canada. In their emails, there is a phone number where we can reach them, and an unsubscribe link that you can click and seems to work, but even after asking them on the phone, by email or with their unsubscribe link, to unsubscribe me, I still receive 10 — 15 spams a week coming from this company. Many bloggers, journalists and radio chroniclers talked about them, but they seem to be untouchable. Still, it is easy to find the names, addresses and phone numbers of the shareholders and administrators of the company. How can we, collectively, take action to make them understand that we do not like their mass mailing practice?"
Document it thoroughly and submit a report to the authorities. If that doesn't work, go to their offices and switch off the main power panel a few times until they get the hint.
The determined Real Programmer can write Fortran programs in any language.
How can we, collectively, take action to make them understand that we do not like their mass mailing practice?
Are you under the impression that spam continues because people think we like it? That if they only understood how much we don't like it, they would stop?
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
Usually having a phone number is great!... for the spammers. It now gives them another reference for you and more info to sell and abuse. as for unsubscribing, well, that just shows them that a live human actually is at that address and reading email from spammers.. Goldstrike if you called and unsubscribed.
"Computers are a lot like Air Conditioners" "They both work great until you start opening Windows"
with pitchforks and torches
Really, it's the only way to get through to some people.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
Add a entry in your mail server to drop everything from their netblock. Better yet, block them at your DNS, too.
[RIAA] says its concern is artists. That's true, in just the sense that a cattle rancher is concerned about its cattle.
Subscribe their phone and their email to another very spammy website. The more goastier, the better.
Just click report spam
Publicise the names and personal details of their CEO and board of directors.
Subscribe their email addresses to every spam product and service you can find.
Take no prisoners!
Could a script be written that whenever it receives a spam email from them, it sends a copy to Compu-Finder's email addresses with a tag saying "I received this from you. Please take me off of your list." ?
And/or have a robo caller that calls the company and tells them that you received an email from them and please take you off of their list?
They contacted you. And if they keep contacting you, I don't see what you can't return the favor.
Have you considered contacting your ISP and asking them to filter that sender domain?
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
I can speak on this company from a first hand account. I work for an ESP, I actually manage all our mail servers and work closely with ISPs and mail vendors to help out GOOD CLIENTS. I say this because Compu-Finder (although they have an official name that is different) was a client of ours. They were a BAD-CLIENT. We have many tools that are in place to help our clients ensure that best practices are followed as well as easily available to contacts of the client, e.g opt-outs and suppressing those contacts from future emails. Compu-Finder did everything they could to get around built in mechanisms to keep "contacts" subscribed. Well Finally after battling with them on changing their practices we finally fired them. They are the kind of company that makes me cringe because I know there are real, legitimate, marketers out there that do use email to engage clients and keep them up-to-date but they are the ones that make it bad for any sender.
Have you considered taking them to court?
Or you could just filter or even tarpit their mail servers and forget about it. If you use free webmail just click the spam button on each mail and sooner or later they will get blocked.
I think there are a few companies like that. I get constant spam from a bunch of jokers calling themselves clubline football.
Wrong "we'.
Naturally, you want to use the CAN-SPAM act, and send it to spam@uce.gov.
Oh, wait, you wanted something effective, didn't you?
If you want to fight spam effectively you need to focus on the prime motivation behind spam - money. Spam is sent out because people make money sending it out. Ordinarily spam is sent out by a company other than the spamvertised company, which gives you a few more avenues to explore. There are, however, a few things you can still look into.
First, who is the registrar behind the domain? Most registrars have AUP's that prohibit spamming from domains they sell. You can try to report the spam to that registrar and if they are truly vigilant about spam they could essentially de-register the domain from its address, which would prevent all return traffic to it. No email, no web, no anything else going to their domain. The registrar would still have the rights to the domain, hence the customer (your spammer) wouldn't be able to do anything with their established domain until they clear up the situation with the registrar.
Of course, most registrars are in on the take and won't take such action. Your next option is the hosting company (or ISP if they are hosting their own website). Contact them about it as well, most hosting providers and ISPs frown heavily on their traffic being used for spamming or for spamvertised sites. Same thing could happen here; their domain could become unreachable. Only downside of this avenue versus getting the registrar to do it is it wouldn't take nearly as long for the spammer to get their domain back up afterwards.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
cosumer rights here are shit. Get some signs, friends and park your ass at their door. Piitch forks could be used if not enough sings are available.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
Small claims courts are easier if you're a local. There's no way I could sue them, but you could.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
... shutting down all domains that have a non-responsive/non-working abuse@ handler in their whois?
I'm tired of Korean/Chinese/Pakistanese/South America spam sources these days. Is there a way to get a rather complete list of IP blocks per country?
I do not have business with these countries, the net impact on my activities would be close to 0.
I wind up sending all my spam to SpamCop.net which is owned by Cisco. They in turn send email to abuse departments at the company and ISP level. It's a free service.
http://spamcop.net/anonsignup.shtml
this is /., no one on here has ever had sex, much less more than once, unless your partners were your hands
Just block their domain and get on with your life. If you value your time at, say, $20/hr, how much are you willing to spend in order to get nothing in return?
When you have nothing left to burn you must set yourself on fire
Take a baseball bat. You gotta hit him in the knees, before you hit him in the head.
I heard on IRC that they use pirated software to spam, although I have no first hand knowledge or documentation. Are there not paramilitary heavily armed SWAT team like organizations that break down doors, like we have in the land-of-the-unfree to your south?
Also CP is sold by spammers, and they are spammers, so they probably traffic in CP, correct? The legal system loves to bust CP distributors.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
He had 30 hands? O.o
So which "something" should one "do[...] in real life rather than whinging on slashdot" in order to shut down an identified spammer?
Sign them up for their own list
And as many other lists as you can, let them enjoy the fruit of their "Labors"
Especially include the Sales department, the CEO / CFO, accounting staff
Leave out the Sysadmin staff, after all, they may slow down the tide
Let them start paying the human cost of so much junk
After all, "it only takes a second to remove it"
Times 50-60 different addresses, and 50-60 different "opt-in"
While you are at it, fill in some of the drop cards out of magazines
The weirder the better
Again, figure what, 2-3 out of every magazine? How many do you get? Get from Doctor's offices, any other waiting room, and send em all to the company / staff
Not sure which law(s), if any, would be broken by this in the US. But if you have a buddy outside the US, they aren't likely to get em
Even in the US, the "victimless crime" unit doesn't care. After all, look at how aggressively Identity theft is pursued
I've had the issues as the original poster. So, about 6 years ago, when I was about to change email addresses anyway, I signed up for an account at Spamgourmet.com. I hoped that I would never need to worry about unsubscribing again.
It works perfectly. I place unique characters in every address that I give out online. The first 'n' messages to a particular address get forwarded to my main address. After that, they get eaten by spamgourmet. I have to manually increase the limit or designate an exclusive sender if I want more than the first 'n' messages to go through.
You can set 'n' to be anything from 1 to 20. I use 5 typically.
Free unix account: freeshell.org
There is a simple and SUPER fun way to combat this. Get the google toolbar with auto fill for forms, and sign up for every free thing on the market you can with their address. This was done to a spammer a couple years back in the US and I guess once your postal mail volume reaches a certain ammount they stop delivering it, and bill you if you dont pick it up. If 10000 people sign them up for 1000 deliveries of junk real mail, they might get the picture. Maybe....
WTF? Can't you think for yourself?
dun dun duh.....
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Right here.
I got a call from a telemarketer on my cell phone at 3AM one day. I called the number back and found that it was a standard voice/prompt setup. I randomly dialed buttons until I got to a dial by extension choice. I then dialed every extension I could think of, leaving voicemails on every line, stating that the next time I get called on my cell phone at 3AM I would sue the company out of existence. Where I live the law is on my side on this, it is illegal to call before 9AM or after 7PM here. It must have gotten through to one of the people I left a voicemail for, because they never called again. Harass them more than they harassed you by wasting their time, and they'll find a way to stay out of contact with you.
And never, ever, ever click unsubscribe from anyone but the most reputable companies. It lets the spammers know that someone at that address actually reads those emails, and they don't mind sharing it with their sister companies.
Most ignorance is vincible ignorance. We don't know because we don't want to know. --Aldous Huxley
I like the approach of Lieutenant Worf, on an edition of Deep Space Nine:
"FIND HIM AND KILL HIM!"
I realize that this is probably naive but... Since spammers rely on the very few percent of people who respond, couldn't people just set up a special SpamFolder that responded to these emails 100 times with random text? If enough people did this, the spammers inboxes would be so clogged with mail that they wouldn't be able to find the few valid responses thereby making it financially infeasible.
Give their address to the wonderful people at 4chan.
Nuke it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is usually crucified.
I had a similar issue with a company that makes industrial plasma etching equipment. After eight months of trying to get off their mailing list I was able to find the CEO's personal phone extension, and started left him a choice voicemail. I got a phone apology each from their PR and marketing heads within the hour, and haven't heard from them since. This may not work if the whole company is in on it though.
Give a list of their IP's and contact information to Spamhaus http://www.spamhaus.org/.
If it's bad enough they will hold the ISP's IP's hostage until they get rid of the customer. If they decide not to stop, they could contend for a spot on their "ROKSO".
It still won't stop them, but it will at least cost them time and money to get new servers and ips.
Also send samples of the emails you receive to their ISP's abuse department. If nothing else you'll make them unhappy for awhile.
Instead of using their personal email addresses to sign up for spam, just use spam-trap emails to sign up for their own crap. If that doesn't put them on the radar, you could always resort to weeping in a dark corner somewhere.
Has Spamhaus never heard of these people? How about other spam blockers? If you ISP isn't subscribing to blocklists then maybe your issue is with them.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
But doing something in real life rather than whinging on slashdot is a good stay.
How about if the OP posted the details on 4chan?
Within a week after I had been contacted by one drug spammer that I sued, my spam load went down by 50%.
Another Spammer I sued, put in place a strong anti-spam policy and apparently quite effective.
When I went after Avtech Direct (Arlene Sediqzad and Gary Hunziker ) for spamming, I also helped arrange 21 lawsuits against them. After this was over, Sediqzad told me she wish she never heard of e-mail, and had not heard of it until Gary Hunziker got her into using it. Another spammer, Robert Smoley, stopped, only because he was charged, pled guilty, and sentenced to 40 months. They also seized over $40M of money and property from him. I think that is one of my most productive 45 minute phone calls with an IRS agent ever.
But this company you talk to is like Smoley, or Ralsky who needs to be sued multiple times or imprisoned for a while before they stop spamming.
Fight Spammers!
DDOS
These are the laws that can be used currently in Canada.
Theft of a Telecommunication Service (Section 326)
(1) Every one commits theft who fraudulently, maliciously, or without colour of right,
(a) abstracts, consumes or uses electricity or gas or causes it to be wasted or diverted; or
(b) uses any telecommunication facility or obtains any telecommunication service.
Definition of “telecommunication”
(2) In this section and section 327, “telecommunication” means any transmission, emission or reception of signs, signals, writing, images or sounds or intelligence
of any nature by wire, radio, visual or other electromagnetic system.
Mischief (Section 430 (1)(c) and Section 430(1)(d))
(1) Every one commits mischief who wilfully
(c) obstructs, interrupts or interferes with the lawful use, enjoyment or operation of property; or
(d) obstructs, interrupts or interferes with any person in the lawful use, enjoyment or operation of property.
Mischief in relation to data (Section 430 (1.1)(c))
(1.1) Every one commits mischief who wilfully
(c) obstructs, interrupts or interferes with the lawful use of data; or
(d) obstructs, interrupts or interferes with any person in the lawful use of data or denies access to data to any person who is entitled to access thereto.
I personally have started a site called callspamout.com. I find the worse offenders of my spambox and I put their toll free number into the system. A cronjob then creates a .call file for my asterisk box every hour to call them and plays a recording stating I just want removed and then the phone calls will stop.
There are stats and estimates of hour much just *I* myself have cost these people already.
Put in a ticket to Anonymous...?
Make sure every Spammer and their dog knows their business email address. And keep an eye open for changes to follow suit.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Personally, I have a GMail filter setup to handle this. I mean, besides that GMail's SPAM filtering seems to catch 99% off it in the first place (so I guess the best answer is just "use GMail"). I have a canned response email saved with a 10MB attachment (I'd do 25MB but often the spammers themselves have a 10Mb limit). It's actually a PDF scanned at incredibly high resolution telling them to take me off their list. Any time I get a SPAM email, GMail automatically sends them the 10MB automatic response. If enough people did this, their servers would simply run out of room and we wouldn't have this problem.
Sadly they often use hijacked proxies so this has the downside of hitting a lot of innocent people. Sorry for anyone who ends up collateral damage, but in that case, you should have secured your system better to begin with.
GTFO my /./
err... uhmm.... yeah.
See if they have a way to *change* your email address. If so, sign up for a service that offers temporary emails, like sneakemail. Replace your real email with the temporary one. Respond to any email you get verifying it. Then delete the email address.
Then the harassment will stop.
We need a few examples made.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Or, even better, if you can get their fax number how about full-color Goatse in the mail or by fax? By email too, but Goatse coming out of a fax machine seems like it would be a nice gift to send them.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
If you can get their e-mail addresses, why not sign them up with those doing the spamming? This way they can gain a first hand understanding.
Do a complaint.
CAUCE http://www.cauce.org has done exceptional work in Canada in order to fight spam and to pave the way for proper legislation.
So if you have already made clear to the sender that you do not want to receive any further bulk mail ( you used the unsubscribe link, you have sent an email to their support) the sender is accountable by law to stop sending you emails.
Canada is building a Spam Reporting Centre. However it is not in action yest: See here http://fightspam.gc.ca/eic/site/030.nsf/eng/home
The best way is to contact the following people:
1. Your own ISP. Either contact their support desk or see if there is a http://postmaster.ISPNAME.CA or http://abuse.ISPNAME.ca an email to abuse@ISPNAME.ca should also do the trick
2. If applicable the owner of the sending mailserver (most of the senders use third party services which will send the emails on their behalf) These Senders are dependant on the reputation they have at the end use (you and your ISP). They usually act fast. Look in the email headers of the spammail and check the domain name of the IP address. A decent sender will kick out their customers (content providers) if they see that their reputation is in danger.
3. The ISP of the sender. Do a whois lookup on the sending IP address. This should be the hoster of the sender and they should either relay your message to the sender or shut him off
4. The content provider. In this case compu-finder
5. Post on Slashdot
If you have trouble finding the proper abuse contact address for an IP you can use The Abuse Contact DB from Abusix: http://abusix.org/service/abuse-contact-db-beta.
I read about someone who responded to them with a carefully written contract, saying that they have the email address for business purposes, and by emailing him at that address, they were entering into a business relationship with him. In doing so, they were liable for his billing purposes, and that every email would be billed at his normal billing, in hour increments.
And that continuing to email him was considered an agreement of terms. And ask them to kindly provide their billing address.... and legal service address.
So, 15 of those spam - surely you value yourself at $60 or $100US/hr, if it's consulting on your own time - should be worth a pleasant $900 or $1500US/week for you.
mark
The reasonable thing to do is just block everything from their domain or that includes their name.
However that's no fun. What is fun is whipping up a python script and using a service like Tropo to respond to every single message with a phone call to tell them that the email is unwanted. Of course, to ensure that they can effectively identify the offending mail, the script should read it to them in it's entirety and ask them to press a button to acknowledge that they've understood and will stop. If the call gets... disconnected for any reason, it should call back and start over until it gets it's acknowledgement.
What does this button d$#%* NO CARRIER
1. Get them reported on spamhaus.
2. Find out their ISP, find their spam policy and file a complaint. Getting their internet service shut off due to spam will get their attention much quicker than an email, phone call, letter, or firebomb.
End Transmission....
It rhymes with "shmashmit shmurder".
You can report them to the state attorney general. I've heard of auto-dialer companies that were shut down recently by the attorney general's office.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
The legislation hasn't been passed yet, but it's on the table.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
....but I've never been above some good ole DDoS.
One spammer kept getting signed up for more and more catalogs. The semi-pornographic ones work particularly well. Amazingly, somebody actually talked to him about this and he said:
"I don't understand why people keep sending me all this junk mail when I've made it clear I don't want it!"
"So, isn't that what you are doing sending people spam when they've said they didn't want it?"
"...."
He just didn't get it, but it did royally piss him off. That is what I would do.
/b/ not /.
I had the same problem with some of those "product news" type emails. What I do is go to their website and get their sales email, send a test email to it, just to check for auto responders. Then, create a forwarding rule to forward all their email they send me, to their sales department email (making sure to exclude any auto responders) and delete the original email. Gives you a warm feeling.
We are the people our parents warned us about.
anyone ?
Axe or a power-saw (all well insulated), go to their building's (shack's) rear road and disable all cables incoming to meter boxes of their premises. It may not take out their internet lines, but will certainly take out their power to dissubscribe. Be prepared to run away fast, as such premises are usually well lit. Unless... you do it at night (now is the good time of the year), and do your ninja disable of the back street lightning (if any) as well. Usually, there's a flimsy box/pole nearby with a central fuse inside, unscrewing it out will prove sufficient and decidedly non-leathal. PS: Do not cut off your fingers in the up brought darkness afterdards doing... ;-)
Here's a link to an informational website about the Government of Canada's new anti-spam legislation.
I'm going to the casino. Don't gamble.
Sue them! That's the American way! Or do Le Québécois not think they are in North America?
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
I do not recommend posting their mailbox address on Slashdot. And if someone were to do so, I do not recommend subscribing their office to all sorts of catalogs and junk mail subscriptions. That would be irresponsible!
Battlemaster--Game with friends in medival realms
We use mailchimp, but after adding all of our customers to it and sending them an email apparently 5 out of 1,000 unsubscribed (0.5% according to the email they sent us) and mailchimp got mad and blocked us. I don't want to SPAM anyone, but I would like to send emails out to customers, any suggestions for a mailing list company that won't freak out every time someone unsubscribes?
Their profile from Industry Canada, complete with contact info: http://www.ic.gc.ca/app/ccc/srch/nvgt.do?sbPrtl=&prtl=1&estblmntNo=234567104828&profile=cmpltPrfl&profileId=501&app=sold&lang=eng
You can rate them as an employer: http://www.ratemyemployer.ca/employer/employer.aspx?l=en&empID=3231
Or just let people know how you feel on Google: http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&complete=0&q=707%2C%20rue%20du%20Village%20suite%20202%20Morin-Heights&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&biw=1280&bih=898&wrapid=tljp132077464029230&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wl
At first glance we see this is the personally efficient way to handle the situation. Block their mail and move on. But then we might wonder if we're being a little selfish, not engaging our computer skills to help out others, the many others who are negatively affected by this spam. A little altruism is generally recognized as a noble thing...
This could lead us to thinking about the systems that have been developed for reporting spam, how individuals have been empowered to spend little effort in reporting, and how, when summed, that individually trivial effort, of thousands and thousands of people, collectively makes powerful anti-spam effect.
Then maybe we complete the circle, realizing that we are the beneficiaries of these powerful anti-spam systems, that our time is greatly saved by these systems, and that we are not just being altruistic in our contributions, we are helping ourselves.
The personally efficient way to handle many things is this way, being helpful to the larger community that you are by nature a member of, and personally capitalizing on the beneficial effects of the economies of scale and other mass dynamics/synergistic effects.
This is where selfishness meets altruism. So, why not help others, when you are really helping yourself?
complete dumbass if you actually think spam doesn't work (as in pay for itself many times over). Ok, maybe you're not a dumbass, so much as you're divorced from reality; totally out of connect with the type of persons who are the majority users of the internet and email.
Next time you send them an email or letter, be sure to CC your Attorney General.
Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.
An anonymous tip that their licenses aren't up to date while not stopping the flow of spam, could at least serve a little justice.
precision orbital strike come to mind... but in all seriousness, as i work at a hosting company, just give theirs a call and detail the problem.
heres a little snip from the mx for the domain...
220-crescent.web-dns1.com ESMTP Exim 4.69 #1 Tue, 08 Nov 2011 13:15:43 -0500
220-We do not authorize the use of this system to transport unsolicited,
220 and/or bulk e-mail.
Good people go to bed earlier.
buy a horse head from a slaughter, send it as a package to their snail mail address. Append a letter asking them to delete you from the mail-list...
As an AC I can admit I've had less :\
I'd suggest spamming their office, this time with paper ads (a few metric tons of them). Contact as many affected people as possible and tell them to gather paper ads for a few months. Wait until you have a few thousand people each with a few kilos of paper spam and then do a coordinated drop-and-run delivery on their front yard.
to all of the contact emails you have for the company. When they call you to complain, tell them it's their own system.
We are the 198 proof..
Maybe they don't understand. But their clients will. Known Spammer like compu.finder prides themselves with a "our clients'" page. Just don't do business with companies on this page and let them know why.
Flag as spam? Seriously, it's not like I bother looking through my spam folder, and gmail has a pretty good filter.
subscribe all their known email addresses to their own mailing list and any other mailing list you can find.
create as many free public email accounts as you can and have them all forward their email to the company.
post their email info on every forum you can find so that other spammers add it to their own spam list.
Or create a bot that will auto-reply to any email from them with a "Yes, I'd love to know more about your products". For bonus points, hook it up to cleverbot and have their sales people waste time emailing a bot.
Nuke them from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Problem solved.
Canada, arguably, has an opt-in regime, pursuant to the requirements of PIPEDA, which requires commercial bulk emailers who establish or acquire lists of email addresses to ensure that their recipients have given some form of consent to receive commercial solicitation. Email addresses can only be used for the purpose for which they are collected, and can only be put to secondary uses if the owners of these email addresses consent. While PIPEDA was not designed to address spam, it has, this way, effectively established an opt-in regime in Canada. Furthermore, PIPEDA requires that unsubscribe functions be operative and respected in such emails.
Source: http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/ecic-ceac.nsf/eng/gv00342.html
I've always maintained there is nothing like the taste of a twenty year old girl's asshole.
If you know who they are, block them and be done with it. Also, don't shop there.
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
He's secretly Vishnu, Preserver of the Universe, but off-duty he secretly pretends to be Tom Cruise, a secret homosexual. You should get a gander at his threesomes with Brahman and Shiva. Hubba hubba!
What I think would be nice, is if you could blacklist specific senders at the level of your mail server such that when any message arrives from that address or domain, it automatically sends back a bounce message, as if the intended recipient doesn't exist. The spammer wouldn't have any way of knowing if the bounce message was legitimate or not, and would have to choose between continuing to send spam to addresses that may or may not actually exist, or remove that address from their list.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
http://shitsenders.com/
In order to keep the spam out of my in box I would be willing to have to pay for each email I send and also have the spammers do the same; say 4 or 5 cents each to: address. It seems to me that spam would no longer be as profitable and would be greatly reduced by stopping those that are getting one hit per million. The problem is who should get the money? Not the ISPs, definitely not governments. Maybe set up some sort of corporation that would fund the set up of mail relays that check for some sort of prepaid encrypted "reciept" attached to every email and just drop any without it, Have the corporation go after the few spammers left that were willing to pay by refusing to sell them any more email. Then maybe the corporation could use the money to give grants for open source project development or maybe inovation awards kind of like a techie nobel prize. Whatever we can come up with that would contribute to the common good within the computing / networking world.
1. Report them via Spam Cop. Spamming may be a TOS violation with their provider.
2. If their Whois records are inaccurate (most spammers register their domain with fake or incomplete contact information), report it to ICANN using their on-line form. The domain will be terminated if the inaccuracies are not corrected.
3. Report them to their domain registrar. Many domain registrars prohibit spamming on domains that they register. If this is the case, the spammer's TOS violation will get his domain terminated.
Take these actions against the spammer and their spamvertised domains. I have been very successful using this approach. Hundreds of spam domains have been terminated because of me (usually 1 or 2 spammers with hundreds of domains). They may still be in business, but I'm no longer on their lists.
Do what some hackers did to a spam king, put them on every junk mailing list you can find.
I once had a "reputable" company doing that to me (unsubscribe did not work, phone calls, etc.). So, I found e-mail address for about fifteen higher ups in the company, and set up a filter that would auto-forward anything I got from their domain them to all fifteen of them (with "Please unsubscribe me" added). Their e-mail was then automatically deleted. It must have worked, because a couple of years later I changed e-mail systems, and I've never had to recreate that filter.
Blacklist 69.61.81.116 stille@dns-lamp:~$ dig mx compufc.com ;; ANSWER SECTION:
compufc.com. 14400 IN MX 0 compufc.com. ;; ADDITIONAL SECTION:
compufc.com. 14400 IN A 69.61.81.116
Though their mailserver isn't located in Quebec:
stille@dns-lamp:~$ whois 69.61.81.116
Cyber Wurx LLC NET-GLOBAL-COMPASS (NET-69-61-0-0-1) 69.61.0.0 - 69.61.127.255
TIP Networks Inc TRUSTED-IP-NETWORKS-69-61-81-0-24 (NET-69-61-81-0-1) 69.61.81.0 - 69.61.81.255
Well, looks as though yellowpages.com has this address for them:
http://www.yellowpages.com/beaverton-or/mip/tip-networks-inc-464616168
14525 SW Millikan #56056 Beaverton, OR 97005
(866) 365-6442
Yellow pages links us to this URL, which has the same address as TIP Networks:
http://www.idologic.com/
Looking thru their page, there is a link for abuse:
http://www.idologic.com/contact.php
abuse@idologic.com
How about if Everyone here sends them an email about it?
All this is public information.... using dig, whois, standard net searches etc.
Enjoy :)
Both at my old school and my new one when I emailed my advisers suddenly my spam amount went way up. The first one was computer science so I thought maybe she was knowingly selling students emails but my new adviser is for graphic design and i got spammed there too. I don't mean like "legal spam" either, i mean russian viagra and philipino hooker spam. Pisses me off man.
On 2 pieces of black construction paper taped in a loop.
Send them back a certified letter to the mailing address of the company containing a contract offering to read their e-mails for $50 per e-mail. In your letter indicate that in order to agree to the services, they need do nothing more than send you an e-mail to be read. once you receive the e-mail, start sending invoices. if they don't pay, take them to court and file a bad debt report with the credit agencies.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Once I was unable to unsubscribe for ads from a company who annoyed me with their bad product support. Requests to be removed from the distribution list were unsuccessful. So I googled for email addresses of this company. Every time I got junk mail from them I forwarded it to all the about 40 email addresses I had found with the request to be unsubscribed. After two times, I received no further junk mail.
" In their emails, there is a phone number where we can reach them, and an unsubscribe link that you can click and seems to work, but even after asking them on the phone, by email or with their unsubscribe link, to unsubscribe me, I still receive 10 â" 15 spams a week coming from this company." ... How do you imagine an unsubscribe link "seems to work" if after using it you still receive 10-15 spams every week from them?
I'd describe that as "definitely doesn't work." Just sayin'.
TFA is from Feb 2010.
Now, I can understand whining, but why people like to go around whinging their genitals online I just do not get. ... see the difference? Also, get your ass back to 4chan, that speak isn't welcome here.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
Well, I'd say whining would be a much better start than whinging, but that's just me.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
Setup your fax machine to dial their voice phone number(s) with automatic redial and endless retries; add *67 to the beginning of the number to block your caller id. Although it may not stop the spam, it will make you feel better everytime your hear the fax tone and someone screaming "STOP IT!" in response.
Call the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
I am working on a patent for a special product just for this purpose. It is a blend of Polyurethane and feces packaged tightly into your typical courier parcel. When the receiver cuts through the thick outer packaging tape it will be virtually impossible to avoid perforating the interior bag of contents. With only the slightest nick the contents begin to expand as it makes contact with air, forcing the rest of the bag to open further, which exposes more air to the contents, thus forcing almost all of the contents to expand rapidly to a size several times larger than the parcel it arrived in.
Even if the person opening the package drops the box and jumps back quickly, in all likelihood the area where the box lands will be a complete mess. And if we're lucky this will include their mouse and keyboard.
If you have a moral conviction against sending poo in the mail then maybe you could ship them a boxed hive of Africanized bees.
Good question. Nowadays, there isn't a tv show in prime time that doesn't imply (if not show, obscured by blanket) a man eating pussy. And to think that in 1990, Uncle Buck (the tv show) was controversial for the line "Miles, you suck!". And now with Glee showing man-on-man kissing, it's only a matter of time until anilingus, shrimping, playing the rusty trombone, etc are a staple of the Thursday night boob tube schedule. [Side note - Oz showed surprise butt-sex in the late 90s, but that was on HBO which is a few years ahead of the curve].
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
I bet their spam would stop if their board members and top level execs were to start dying, say, one every other day for a couple of weeks.
Worth a try. :)
Get everyone (including these media guys saying bad things about them) to write letters/emails to the company saying "unless you stop sending the SPAM, we will boycott your company"
Of course that assumes the company is the kind of company where a boycott would actually work.
I once had a similar problem; endless spam coming from a trying-to-be-legitimate business despite numerous requests for them to stop it.
Ultimately I emailed every administrative contact I could find for the company with something along the lines of:
"Thank you for trying the Robot Monster Unsolicited Email Processing Service.
While your first email is processed for free, any additional emails are processed at a fee of $1000.
A 10% discount is available if payment is received prior to the email.
Any additional emails sent to this email address will be interpretted as an acceptance of these charges."
I was kinda disappointed I never heard from them again -- was looking forward to sending them invoices.
That ought to take care of it.
Unless they are vampires :-)
If they weren't alive they couldn't spam.
1. Spam them - ring them every half an hour. A good trick is mapping a PABX, working out the numeric range that covers their company, after a few calls its not hard and there are online hints you can look up. Then call random numbers in their office. This wont stop them but man its FUN!
2. Authorities, like the other guy said. They HAVE to be violating some statutes somewhere, its a matter of making the beauroids put down their coffee mugs and do some work.
3. Firebomb their offices. Seriously. Firebomb their offices. Death threats dont work, minor inconveniences dont work. Making them fear for their very lives actually seems to work.
Whenever someone is doing something you don't like, the most effective method of getting them to stop is usually the same...lawyer up. This is especially true when whatever they are doing is illegal or legally questionable. People tend to do what they think they can get away with. If you suddenly make them think they're about to get sued and incur a lot of costs, they will probably take you off their lists.
Send them an email, carboned to every email address for everybody in the company you can find. That email says something along the lines of:
I am getting a large amount of spam emails from your company. I have tried normal channels to get them to stop, but they have actually gotten worse. I am appealing to you to put a halt to these emails. I will forward you examples of the emails I have received.
Then set up an auto-forward rule that forwards every single spam to that same list, with the text:
Here is an example of the spam I am receiving from your company. As I acquire more examples, I will forward them on as well.
I bet they'll stop in a few days.
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Ever try MIPSPACE? Known for some time that several operators from Quebec, (and the new Canadian Anti-spam legislation, you can drive a truck through) have been very active.. the idea of opt-in is very loose, and not what end users would consider opting in for
Choose one, go there, smash shit up. That is the ONLY thing that will get your point across. If their life isn't in danger, they don't give a shit about what you want. Thankfully in america we aren't disarmed. If I found a local spammer here in portland, I would arrive there with a rifle and begin shooting people.
At the moment I am getting very little spam, except a from a "Lousie McGlashan", ostensibly from some outfit in Plainsboro Illinois, sending me chirpy personalised emails as frequently as 3 times a day urging me to sign up for TOGAF training (whatever that is). At first I thought they were legit and I tried to unsubscribe. Strangely, they just keep sending me the same email, for the same product, over and over.
Sometimes I just wish I had a battlefield nuke..........
...I'm going to cut the chase here. KILLS ZEM ALL!!!!!! man, this is a tough room.
I signed up for a gametrailers.com account because I had a product video to upload. Viacom proceeded to spread my e-mail to every single company in their control. MTV, CMT, etc. (I know because I give every place I give an e-mail address to a different e-mail account. The joy of running one's own mail server...) Unsubscribe links were ineffective. I forwarded a couple to spam@uce.gov, but I don't know that they had any effect. I think I just ended up blocking all incoming mail to that address. It amazes me that a giant company like Viacom can get away with flagrant violations of the law like that. Shows just how toothless "CAN-SPAM" is...
Tell the guys in Mexico, they're Anoymous!
In many cases its time to raise the bar.
Kill them and Eat them. There can only be one.
Check your spam folder for the services of professional killers, and have one of them take care of that company's management.
cpghost at Cordula's Web.
Yeah, and Al Capone was not a gangster, he just cheated on his taxes.
Fight Spammers!
1. Add the domain to your spam fillter!
2. if you have a return email address that works , sign it up to every porn site, pill ad site and forum you can. if all the people that hate the spam did this it may over load there email server and kill it for a few hrs, or at least give their admin's a fun time adding all the email to their own spam fillters.
3. just ignore it like everyone else.
Not sure it is relevant, but shouldn't it go through the Commission d'accès à l'information [0]? They seem to be in a position to be dealing with these types of repeat spam-offenders.
[0] http://www.cai.gouv.qc.ca/
the thievesguild manual of citizen survival clearly states you can only rat on paedophiles, rapists and sociopaths who kill for personal pleasure or cos they cant get it up otherwise, any other case it's done at own risk (its been a while since i read the manual tho might have been adapted but i guess not)
Free speech was meant to be free for all... how can anyone grow up in a nanny state ?