Secret Spam Summit Held in Washington DC

CuriousGeorge113 writes "Apparently The Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail (Cauce) held a secret meeting in Washington with the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) to try and convince the DMA to stop spamming. It's a pretty interesting Article at Salon." The DMA seems to like spam and thinks you should too, just like you love all the junk dead-treee mail its members send you. Such a surprise!

Comments

Don't know about spam, but for junk mail...

[bgfay]

...I've found that almost all junk mail comes with a business reply envelope. That envelope guarantees that the company sending you the mail will pay postage on any mail sent back to them using the envelope. (That's step one.)

The USPS will send any package that weighs up to or under 70 pounds. (Step two)

Any brand of tape or glue will allow you to stick the business reply envelope to a large cardboard box which can then be filled with rubbish--my personal favorite is scraps of sheetrock--just keep it under 70 pounds. (Step three)

Remember to make sure that you name appears prominently on the package. This lets them know to whom they should send the next invitation for pounds of rubbish. Sadly, most of the folks I've done this to have neglected to send me a second invitation. (Step four)

Try this at home, but be sure to ask for Mom's and Dad's permission.

(A slighly less arduous version has me ripping up whatever was sent and mailing that back inside the envelope. It's easier but nowhere near as fun.)

Unfortunately, spam works

[wowbagger]

The reason spam continues to happen is because it works. A spammer sends out a million messages, and gets 20 live ones. That is STILL enough to make money on.

We have to make it unprofitable to spam. Here are my suggestions:

ISPs:

1. Block all access to other peoples SMTP ports. Force your customers to go through YOUR mailer. Red flag any account that tries to access somebody else's SMTP port.
   
2. Limit your customers to 100 mails a day. Red flag any account that hits its limit, and look into it in more detail.
   
3. Allow customers to ask for the priviledge of sending more than 100 mails a day, but then scrutinize the customer. Perhaps you should charge more for a higher limit.
   
4. Put a line in the contract that says that a customer who uses his account to spam owes you $10000 (adjust the currency symbol as needed). If a customer spams, bill them. If they don't pay, hand it off to a collection agency.
   
5. Secure YOUR SMTP ports. Why should you let spammers make money?
   
6. Educate your customers! Make them READ and SIGN a form about spamming, including the bit about NOT RESPONDING!
   

These steps would prevent the small time spammers from "whack-a-mole" spamming. Those 20 bites I mentioned wouldn't begin to pay for $10000, the hassle of bill collectors hammering on your door, etc.

Linux/BSD distro makers:

1. Don't install sendmail by default! Ideally, installing sendmail should require the sysadmin to go through a detailed setup on sendmail.
   
2. Install a good set of firewall rules by default. This helps secure people's systems and prevent h4x0z and script-kiddies from hijacking the systems.
   

Much of the spam I get is relayed through poorly configured Linux/BSD setups.

My fellow Geeks:

NAIL THE SPAMMERS!

1. Forward spam to spamrecycle@chooseyourmail.com.
   
2. Read the headers. Find the relay, and politely tell them they need to check their settings.
   
3. If the spammer is foolish enough to put an e-mail or URL into the mail, traceroute it and get it shut down!
   

If the spammers find that "send spam, lose website" it the law of the land, then it becomes costly to send spam, and the spam will dry up.

Now, I know what many of you are saying: if ISPs start requiring you to use their mailer, how will all of us Unixen use our local sendmail to handle mail. Simple: configure your mailer to forward the mail to your ISP!

Laws are not the way to end spam, we have to make it not worth the spammers while. We can do this (just look at how effective the RBL is, and how well Spamford Wallace was forced to change his tactics.)

Now, if you will excuse me, I must put on my Nomex firesuit.

Flame on!