Mole v. Active Reporting

[northchurch37]

I've been in 'mole status' for about 3 months, reporting spam via the webmail options each time i log in. spam volume is roughly the same, averaging around 200 messages per day. I suspect my earlier use of a Spamfilter product (McAfee) which sent out bounces and reports to ISPs actually resulted in higher volume. Your help files note that some spammers can detect valid email addresses even through Spamcop's mudging process.

Appreciate any suggestions here.

Thanks,

David

[WB8TYW]

which sent out bounces

It is not possible for an end-user product to bounce spam back to the sender as undeliverable.

All it can do is send out obviously fake non-delivery notices with forged headers to make it look like it came from a role account for your network.

Such address spoofing is against the terms of service for every ISP that I am aware of.

Some ISPs have put in blocks to prevent their customers from using this abusive feature.

In addition, such bounces are not going to the spammer in most cases, they are going to innocent victims, whom the spammer has stolen their e-mail address.

And I and others will report any that we receive back to the sending ISP. And others are encouraged to also do this.

In the rare case that the fake bounce actually went to the spammer, all it does is verify that you have a network that accepts their spam, and your e-mail address is valid.

How a non-delivery report usually works is that the receiving mail server terminates the transaction with a 5xx code, and the sending mail server generates a bounce. So if a spammer gets a bounce from another source, they can be pretty sure it is fake, or some sort of content filter that they can easily get around.

Any end user anti-spam product that claims it can bounce spam back to the spammer is making a fraudulant claim. If the vendor of the product does not know that it it fraudulant, then they are not qualified to produce an anti-spam product.

The FTC should be investigating the vendors that are making this false claim.

-John

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