I have been reporting many spam messages recently [last 3 weeks]. I found our Exchange IP address was added to a black list, Hmm curious . I changed IP addresses for the Exchange server and continued to report spam. We were black listed again . Using Remote Desktop I connected to my personal PC at home and reported spam messages from there and now that IP address is black listed too . We have another T1 that doesn't have port 25 traffic or http email on it at work. I used hotmail to report spam messages through this T1 and it is now black listed and hotmail does not accept connections from my hotmail login .

So my question is this "Why am I getting black listed after reporting spam?"

Thanks in advance for any advice you can provide.

The fact that your incoming mail host keeps getting blocklisted is a sure symptom that you did not complete the "mailhost configuration" process before beginning to report via SpamCop. To make a long story short, failing to do mailhost configuration can often make your own mail host or provider look like the spammer. I would suggest reading http://www.spamcop.net/fom-serve/cache/397.html, also you will find other info here on this forum and in the Wiki.

P.S., Even now I can hear a board admin running over to move this post to a more appropriate forum, so don't be surprised if your post is somewhere else when you come by to read replies.

-- rick

...And also that you failed to notice that the parser was offering to report your servers as the source of the spam! Please always bear in mind that the SpamCop parser is a tool that is just doing some drudgery for you and sending reports to abuse addresses on your behalf....Done, with this post. For information of others: this was originally posted to the "FAQ Under Construction" Forum.

Oops I should have paid attention to the forum and to the mail host settings.

Thanks for the responses. I'm working the mail host setups now. Tools are great but when you have to be a rocket scientist to use them, not so much.

This is high tech stuff we are doing here and I don't have anyone to blame but myself for not putting in the work/time to understand how this all works.

...Thank you for not getting bent out of shape due to what you might have considered our less-than-welcoming replies. And you probably got an answer much faster by asking your question than you would have by searching around the forum for the answer, unless you used one of the search tools and just happened to hit on the right search key words! .... <g>

I tend to agree. You can thank the spammers for making all this kind of stuff necessary. They can be slippery customers.

-- rick

I'm pleased others have helped so rapidly. But please note that once you have your Mailhosts configured you should avoid changing things without also reconfiguring Mailhosts. This includes connecting via your home computer.

That said, I'm not sure why your home IP was reported when the messages weren't actually passing through that IP address.

I would give very close attention to your reports for a week or two to ensure that reports are working correctly. If necessary limit your reporting to just one or two items a day to avoid the frustrations involved with manually checking all the spam. Just delete those you don't have time/inclination to report.

Andrew