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Is Eccentric Sven Olaf Kamphius To Blame For Spamhaus DDoS?
RougeFemme writes "Sven Olaf Kamphius, self-described 'Internet freedom fighter,' is reportedly at the center of the investigation into this week's alleged cyber-attack against Spamhaus, a group that fights Internet spam. Mr. Kamphius became incensed when Spamhaus blacklisted two companies that he runs, including Cyberbunker, a company that, earlier this week, claimed be under attack from Dutch swat teams. Though he initially solicited support for a DDoS against Spamhaus, he now disavows any direct role in the cyberattack, which threatened to slow some web traffic to a crawl."
Yeah, I know, dutch double vowels are confusing...
I heard an interview with this guy on the dutch radio and he is obviously a moron. He managed to contradict himself three times in as many sentences and obviously has no idea about how SH works. His servers are on our blacklists too and with good reason...
For those who can't read Dutch, and thus rely on second hand sources:
http://www.automatiseringgids.nl/nieuws/2013/13/cyberbunker-niet-meer-in-bunker-kloetinge
Claims Cyberbunker hasn't used the bunker location since 2010. I guess that explains why the claimed SWAT thing wasn't reported in Dutch news (and also why they waited to pose so nicely on the picture). The bunker location is currently property of http://www.bunkerinfra.com/ which apparently has several such locations and has nothing to do with the old occupant.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
They never said once they were under attack by SWAT teams, their website merely states they have in the past successfully slept-through an attempted SWAT raid that failed at the blast doors. Whether or not this is even true is questionable. It was most certainly not recent however.
"Hi Spamhaus, despite allowing your crap to be back up for a day or so, i see our demands still have not been met. stand by for more.".
When you cant win, ad hominem.
From TFA:
"He describes himself in his own Web postings as an Internet freedom fighter, along the lines of Julian Assange of WikiLeaks, with political views that range from eccentric to offensive. His likes: German heavy metal music, "Beavis and Butt-head" and the campaign to legalize medicinal marijuana. His dislikes: Jews, Luddites and authority."
Anyone want to put that profile on a dating site to see if it garners interest?
I know. It's not fair to blame robbers -- locks are too easy to fix.
It sounds like you are suggesting...spam filters, hashcash, and greylisting. Oh, wait, we do that already.
The reason SMTP endures despite numerous attempts to replace it is that it does one thing and it does it well. Spam exists because SMTP is so good at delivering messages, and because it does so cheaply. I will not be parting with email any time soon.
Much as I dislike Spamhaus, it is hard to side with someone whose grievances include "Jew lies."
Palm trees and 8
No pancake is so thin that it has only one side.
You haven't tried my Mobius pancake recipe.
Mr. Kamphuis’s current nemesis is Spamhaus, a group based in Geneva that fights Internet spam by publishing blacklists of alleged offenders. Clients of Spamhaus use the information to block annoying e-mails offering discount Viagra or financial windfalls. But Mr. Kamphuis and other critics call Spamhaus a censor that judges what is or isn’t spam. Spamhaus acted, he wrote, “without any court verdict, just by blackmail of suppliers and Jew lies.”
What about the idea that Spamhaus, by being a blacklist, is denying service to all sorts of websites itself? Why is a DDOS attack that much different from what they do every day?
I mean, sure, they block a lot of spam, but what about all the times someone's domain gets blacklisted and it's not spam? And yeah, I realize domain admins opt in to use their blacklists.
I don't think you really understand what you're talking about. First of all, Spamhaus isn't denying service to web sites; they're listing IP addresses of known spam sources. Mail administrators use the list to block email - not web sites - from those IPs. Spamhaus is just one of many such services, but Spamhaus happens to be the best. Why is that? Exactly because they keep the false positives to a minimum. What you're talking about theoretically COULD happen, and certainly does happen with other blacklists, but the reason we mail admins use the Spamhaus SBL-XBL lists instead of the other blacklists is because we DON'T see legitimate servers getting blocked. Believe me, if we were blocking legitimate mail, our users would complain. It's not happening.
It still does not change the fact it's a denial of service, coming from a self-appointed body that is in no better position to judge what is and is not spam than anyone else.
They are in a better position. I don't know how they do it, I don't know how they got into that position, but they've managed to pull it off.
A real common tactic with political campaigns is to sign up for the opponents mailing list on an AOL account, wait for them to send you an email, then complain you are receiving spam. AOL turns around and gets that domain blacklisted. Then it takes time and resources to resolve the issue.
I just don't see much of a difference.
The difference is that while this happens all the time with AOL's internal blacklist, Spamhaus doesn't work this way.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;