Greetings,

Since very recently, Spamcom is blocking e-mails that I sent to a very good friend in South Africa. I myself live in Belgium and my ISP is "Belgacom Skynet" (Skynet being broadband ADSL).

Is Spamcom insane?

They block a whole, national Internet Service Provider because, maybe, one fool does not keep his computer virus-free, and as a result no single customer of that ISP can send emails (to a certain receiver)?

This is the most idiotic way to block unwanted emails!

Spamcop is "punishing" people who are absolutely not involved in any illegal/illegitimate actions at all. I have a Mac (as in "Macintosh"), so I don't even have any viruses.

Spamcop's way of working is an unacceptable way to stop spam. It is unacceptable, because their actions "punish" hundreds, thousands of ISP customers - and I do not mean services like Yahoo or Hotmail, but large ISP's like my own, Belgium's national ISP Belgacom Skynet.

I will file a complaint with the ISP of my South African friend (which seemingly use Spamcop's "services"), with Spamcop itself and forward it to my own ISP, Belgacom/Skynet.

Spamcop blocking a WHOLE ISP is an unacceptable way of doing business!

Sincerely,

Kris Dee,
angry Belgian

First, spamcop blocks nothing, the simply publish a list of IP addresses that have been seen recently sending a certain percentage of spam versus legitimate email.

Second, spamcop does not list entire ISPs, they simply list individual IP addresses that have sent spam.

Third, the misconception that there are no viruses for Macs is just that, a misconception. While not as prevelant in Macs, there are still plenty of viruses out there that would be happy to attack your computer and turn it into a spam spewing zombie.

If you would like to provide the IP address of the mail server you are having problems with, we would be more than happy to help you troubleshoot the issue, however, if all you came here to do is rant, please let us know so that we don't waste any of our time trying to be helpful.

Content of my blocked e-mails:


*******************************
Query bl.spamcop.net - 195.238.4.49

(Help) (Trace IP) (Senderbase lookup)

195.238.4.49 listed in bl.spamcop.net (127.0.0.2)

If there are no reports of ongoing objectionable email from this system it will be delisted automatically in approximately 12 hours.


Causes of listing

* System has sent mail to SpamCop spam traps in the past week (spam traps are secret, no reports or evidence are provided by SpamCop)
* It appears this listing is caused by misdirected bounces. We have a FAQ which covers this topic: Why auto-responses are bad (Misdirected bounces). Please read this FAQ and heed the advice contained in it.


Automatic delisting

If you are the administrator of outmx025.isp.belgacom.be and you are sure it will not be the subject of any more reports of spam, you may cause the system to be delisted without waiting for us to review the issue.

You may only do this once per IP! So please be sure that the problem is really and truly resolved. If you delist your system and we get more spam reports about it, you will not be allowed to expedite delisting again. Delisting normally occurs 24 hours after spam reports have ceased.

You must be able to receive mail at one of the addresses below. Until you have received and confirmed your request, it will not take effect.

Looking for potential administrative email addresses for 195.238.4.49:

cannot find an mx for outmx025.isp.belgacom.be
195.238.5.129 is an mx ( 10 ) for isp.belgacom.be
195.13.11.167 is an mx ( 10 ) for belgacom.be


Listing History

System has been listed for less than 24 hours.
Other hosts in this "neighborhood" with spam reports
195.238.4.69 195.238.4.87 195.238.4.91 195.238.4.99 195.238.4.100 195.238.4.102 195.238.4.106 195.238.4.115 195.238.4.116 195.238.4.117 195.238.4.128 195.238.4.200 195.238.4.201 195.238.4.204 195.238.4.208 195.238.4.216 195.238.4.217 195.238.5.3


Dispute Listing

If you are the administrator of this system and you are sure this listing is erroneous, you may request that we review the listing. Because everyone wants to dispute their listing, regardless of merit, we reserve the right to ignore meritless disputes.

Dispute listing of 195.238.4.49

*******************************
So, what are you going to do about this, Spamcop?

That means that I am sending spam. I can assure you in all honesty that I am doing no such thing.


You must be mistaking the MacOS with the M$ OS. But this is beyond the range of this messageboard, so I will not get into that.


If I sound like I was ranting, then I apologize. I "only" feel victimized, because my friend does not receive my emails that I sent to her. We have been friends for years, but my emails to her are being blocked only since very recently. I am not an IT specialist, just an experienced amateur when it comes to computers (wo wonders why this quote-thingie does not work here), and someone with too much honesty to just do nothing when my emails are blocked unjustly.

[Moderator edit - missing /quote tag inserted]

Hi, Kris:
...First: you are not addressing SpamCop. Almost all of us here are users of SpamCop who volunteer our time to try to help people who have a question about using SpamCop or who are interested in fixing a problem identified by SpamCop.
...Second: there is nothing that SpamCop is going to or can do about this problem. It seems to be caused entirely by either bad programs running on belgacom.be customers' machines or a misconfigured e-mail service. Only the e-mail provider or ISP and its customers will be able to do anything about the fact that spam is being sent from or through the belgacom.be server.
...Third: you could contact the folks whose providers are blocking your e-mails (by phone, snail mail or another e-mail address, for example hotmail) and ask them to ask their provider if they would whitelist your e-mail address. But it's their resources, so they may not wish to do this -- it's their right to refuse to receive traffic from belgacom.be, if they wish.

...The conclusion that you are being accused of sending spam is not warranted. Please see the SpamCop FAQ, especially article labeled "Why am I Blocked?"...No need to apologize, you are welcome to rant. Although we set up a different Forum for that: SpamCop Lounge. You are right to be upset, you are just directing it to the wrong party -- it is belgacom.be that needs to address this....Only you (and your fellow users of belgacom.be) can put pressure on belgacom.be to provide you the service for which you are paying them -- that means that they must take measures to identify the source of and stop the spam coming from their network. If they are unwilling or unable to do that, take your business elsewhere (assuming you have that choice).
...Good luck!

If email is important to you it would pay to get a competent email provider (do not mindlessly accept the email address an ISP forces on you)

195.238.4.49 is an email server? SpamCop only tries to list the IP that the spam comes from . Then tries to send an abuse report to that provider abuse[at]skynet.be bounces (99 sent : 99 bounces)

This email server [195.238.4.49] is not stamping the source IP of spam sent through it meaning as it hits spam traps of other blocklists aside from SpamCops Block List (SCBL), this email server will be listed elsewhere also (because mail server "195.238.4.49" is unacceptably misconfigured)

Belgacom is one of the two major ISP and telephone companies in Belgium. For many years I have used its services, and have done so without any problems. Only since very very recently, I am having this email issue with spamcop. I see no reason to change providers ("If it ain't broken, don't fix it", as the saying goes).


Ripe.net result clearly shows:

-snip-
inetnum: 195.238.0.0 - 195.238.31.255
netname: SKYNET-B
descr: Belgacom SA/NV
descr: Internet access provider
country: BE
-snap-

195.238.4.49 is not _my_ IP address. Belgacom is my ISP, though.


I have informed my ISP about the issue. I am waiting for their answer.

Kris,
I hope you have understood what some of the users here have been trying to tell you. Specifically, the *real* problem lies with the server that is handling your outbound emails. I looked up the IP address in the reporting database and found multiple reports of misdirected bounces. Those bounced messages are spewing out to specially designated "spam trap" email addresses, which are secret, and are NEVER used to send any email, so they should NEVER be receiving any bounces back. However, the IP address you gave us is responsible for sending multiple messages to those spam traps, so you should direct the Skynet (belgacom.be) admins to the following information about published on the SpamCop website about such bounces:

http://www.spamcop.net/fom-serve/cache/329.html#bounces

If they properly configure their servers, your problem will disappear. Furthermore, anyone who wants to receive your emails should be able to "whitelist" your email address, bypassing any blacklist/blocklist checking done by their ISP. Your South African friend should check with their ISP about this, because if they are using the SpamCop SCBL to block mail (which is *not* recommended...SpamCop recommends that it be used to "tag" or quarrantine suspicious mail), and they don't offer their users the ability to specifically allow the mail from desired senders through using a "whitelist," then they too are part of the problem.

DT

The official abuse address listed by RIPE for IP 195.238.4.49 is abuse[at]skynet.be (which bounces)

They do however have in "remarks" (which needs fixing) the correct abuse address of abuse[at]belgacom.be which would not show in most look-ups

Your IP (or source) if sending spam then going through mail server 195.238.4.49 is what would be blocked. Belgacom is concealing the source of problem naming its own mail server (or Skynets) as the Spam Source!
As a great many common users of this mail server some sending spam or bounces/vacation notices means it gets listed not only the SCBL but most other blocklists as well (Most blocklists use spamtraps for listing)

Belgacom also need to fix their abuse address listing having it in remarks means it is not picked up

By the way I'm in Sydney Australia and have no connection to SpamCop other than being a customer
I were not talking about shifting providers just email service (The one you have is broken)(SpamCop Email Sevice is 2nd to none)

Petzl, I'm not understanding what you're claiming. I looked up the stuff attributed to the IP and it was almost entirely UUBE, which wouldn't be coming from a given user's PC/connection, but rather generated by a misbehaving email server.

DT

At present yes? although spam, as well as UUBE (bouncing to spamtraps) has been sent through that email server as well.
The fact that the email server is not stamping the email source means it is stating 195.238.4.49 is the source of spam (UUBE is as bad if not worse than spam)
Any spam and or UUBE problem from this rogue server will alternate as one to other, and or combine to form both types of abuse

Not having email server [195.238.4.49] configured correctly will mean much of this ISP's users will get blocked not only by our SCBL. Which lists and delists quicker than most.
Other blocklists are slow to list and take longer to delist if they ever do

This provider also needs to correct their abuse address with ripe

Spam samples 195.238.4.49
***
Submitted: Wednesday, 6 September 2006 10:33:19 PM +1000:
[SPAM] Uitnoodiging - Invitation !
1909594724 ( http://www.worldway.be/septembre/print.html ) To: abuse[at]mactelecom.com
1909594643 ( 195.238.4.49 ) To: spamcop[at]imaphost.com
1909594642 ( 195.238.4.49 ) To: abuse#skynet.be[at]devnull.spamcop.net

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Submitted: Friday, 1 September 2006 6:10:49 AM +1000:
Para Profesionales Interesados
1900919877 ( 195.238.4.49 ) To: abuse#skynet.be[at]devnull.spamcop.net

SPam coming from the server you use and spam coming from you are 2 different things.
Perhaps you should open your mind a bit: http://antivirus.about.com/od/macintoshresource/


http://www.symantec.com/outbreak/macoutbreak.html

Edited to provide a better, link

Hi angy Belgian!

In fact it is the ISP in South Africa that is blocking your Emails - not SpamCop. Your friend needs to raise the problem with his ISP.

The ISP is using the SpamCop list and has chosen, against, advice, to reject Emails from any mail server listed in the SCBL.

ISPs often do this because they find it an effective and reliable way of reducing the volume of spam they receive. At times as much as 80% of all Email traffic is now reckoned to be UCE or UBE.

Andrew