Spamnophobic
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Popular Virus progam AVAST was spying on you?
Spamnophobic replied to petzl's topic in SpamCop Lounge
Joke: my Android 'phone still wants me to agree to McAfee, ho ho ho! -
Popular Virus progam AVAST was spying on you?
Spamnophobic replied to petzl's topic in SpamCop Lounge
My experience as a European user is that poorly secured websites of organisations get turned over (as American gangsters say) on a regular basis. Thus so for Avast. So much for Internet security! Everyone everywhere should ditch their Avast! account, delete and remove the software, block all communications from Avast! and migrate to a safe AV platform. For all websites and software I always fill in as little name, address etc. information as possible, fake otherwise, plus an e-mail address that I really want spammers to use. Because that is what I use to see where the spammers got it, once the spam starts to come in. Then I can block that address and start reporting it. Plus send a once-off warning e-mail to the mail administrator, if ever they should heed the warning. Usually they don't because they're clueless. Avast was of course particularly ironic as they claimed themselves as an Internet security outfit. However others have form, such as McAfee, whose operatives were being prosecuted at least several years ago. Spamnophobic -
Popular Virus progam AVAST was spying on you?
Spamnophobic replied to petzl's topic in SpamCop Lounge
I used to use avast. Something over a year ago I noticed spam was beginning to come in on the e-mail address I had given to avast. I immediately cancelled my subscription, uninstalled avast, removed any trace of it from my computer and bought and installed new software. Since then spam has continued to arrive on the "avast address" (spammers never learn, and apparently neither do PC mag or trust pilot). Of course I report any spam "younger" than 8 hours. -
I fear that around the US election we will see maximum spamming from USSR-friendly spam farms, trying every trick in the book. Presently the tide seems to be receding, perhaps in preparation for this. Like when the tide pulled back before the tsunami. Of course there will be other, more advanced attacks, but spamming will certainly have a rĂ´le as a reliable background blitz. Any gullible e-mail address will be fair game, and will probably be lamblasted with extortion spam, etc., if only to create an atmosphere of fear and hopelessness. Can we at SpamCop do anything to forestall this coming storm? Obviously we can post stuff (as I am doing) but this is not going to reach a wider audience. Can SpamCop still offer resistance?
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Apparently not, as I have had no feedback from admins or deputies. If, as suggested, it never worked and was given up on, why is it still available and apparently calculated for reports, generating a false sense that reporting is helping in proportion to the rapidity of reports? Any reaction, admins or deputies? I will keep reporting, but should I also report "older" spams, which until now I have been discarding? I still note that the reported relays / proxies are different every time, giving me a sense that I can clobber these at any "age" of spams. I still hope that one day we will get them all. And still hope that people will stop falling for the terrifying extortion spams.
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I have always striven to keep this as low as possible, by reporting spam with a "yum this spam is fresh" label (under 3 hours). This is a very sensible measure to encourage reporting as early as possible as a more heavily weighted spam report can stop the spammer while the spam run is still going on, if only the mail admin is alert and honest enough, and sc_rew the spammer's whole "business model". I notice that the reported servers are always different, so the spammer is trying to do "snowshoe spam", trying to spread reports across multiple compromised mail servers, so that reports do not build up far enough to land the server on the SC blacklist, used by many mail admins to configure their spam filtering settings. Testimony to the effectivity of the SC blacklist. In trying to keep my "average reporting time" low to help feed this effort, I only report spams "younger" than my average reporting time, so that it should theoretically keep going down. I cancel spam reports older than my latest "average". However I notice that my "average", even with such care for statistics, seldom goes below "9 hours" and seems to take no account whatever of the many, many spams I have reported within sometimes "0 hours" and certainly less than 3. Obviously we are dealing with an algorithm here. Calculating an "average" using a value of 0 hours is obviously going to lead to the fraught question of dividing by zero. The BBC series "More or less" has dealt with this issue at length (though not in the context of spam). https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0022l16 However I would have hoped that my many scores of 3 hours or less would have slotted into the algorithm perfectly well and would seem to reduce my average. This however stubbornly remains at 9 hours. This is of course a minor issue against the more important background of fighting spam as hard as possible, but it would be nice if I could see my efforts to report as much spam as early as possible rewarded by a more accurate application of the algorithms. Can I expect any help from admins or deputies?
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Internal spamcop handling: (bondedsender)
Spamnophobic replied to captkirk's topic in SpamCop Reporting Help
What actually happens if you report a spam correctly goes like this. A report is sent to the registered administrator of the server which forwarded the spam telling them that their server is being used for spamming. If they want to do something about this they can (a) block further spam from being forwarded, (b) take further steps to avoid their server being put on the SpamCop blacklist. This blacklist is used by very many other mailserver administrators to tune their "spambox" settings. Ie. users getting mail from that address will see that the mail has been placed in their spambox so that they can discard it or not at their choosing. Some mail administrators just delete such mails, so the user never even gets the choice. This policy is not recommended by SpamCop but is the choice of the relevant mail administrator. Some users get very worked up about this, but it is really and always simply the choice of their own mail administrator. More importantly, reported spam via a mail server on the SpamCop list, if the administrator be conscientious (whitehat) will lead to the administrator taking swift action to block the "spamrun" (early blocking puts a spanner in their works) and thereafter better defend their server against spam relaying. Spamming can be as "innocent" as saying "buy more viagra" or as criminal as persuading people that their account has been "hacked" and they have to pay extortion to get it unhacked. It's not innocent. The trick is always the same: send a victim mail that looks like it is sent from their own mail address, or any other address, which can easily be forged. And that via a scri_pt on a DVD times x million or more. I hope some posts could redirect to this explanation, as I don't have time to keep repeating it. JonDaley I hope I have helped you feel less futile fighting spam. Spamnophobic -
I seem to remember a discussion about this on this forum back in the mists of time, the upshot of which, if I remember correctly was, if you didn't ask for it, then it's spam, so report. I have always been doing this since, although, touch wood, my address hasn't been 'flavour of the month' for quite a while!
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Could a Dutch min. of defense come on here and explain how it was absolutely not an attack?
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It was "a software glitch" says Dutch min. of defense. Trying yet again not to acknowledge?
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And another (Dutch) one" Landelijke computerstoring gevolg van IT-problemen bij Defensie - NRC
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Given the various reports of "glitches" affecting worldwide Internet connections: Eindhoven airport closed (is also military base) https://www.luchtvaartnieuws.nl/nieuws/categorie/3/airports/grote-storing-eindhoven-airport-geen-vliegverkeer-mogelijk Dutch national weather bureau https://allestoringen.nl/storing/knmi/ "Nigerian" maffia - where did I hear mention of that country before in spam context? https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c984w8jr1glo are there any reports of increased 419 Nigerian spam yet? Or have they just got cleverer? see map of worldwide "down": looks like an attack against "the west". I think it is reasonable to assume that there is presently a Russian-based cyber attack underway against the west which "the west" is trying not to acknowledge. I had recently seen a marked surge in attempted extortion spams, against every e-mail address I have ever given them, and also of spams containing malware, which my intermediary e-mail provider unfortunately will not allow me to forward to SpamCop.
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Internal spamcop handling: (bondedsender)
Spamnophobic replied to captkirk's topic in SpamCop Reporting Help
Yes, reporting now working normally. The mysterious "bonded sender" seems to have disappeared. We will never know what this really meant, but that is part of the mystique of SpamCop. -
Internal spamcop handling: (bondedsender)
Spamnophobic replied to captkirk's topic in SpamCop Reporting Help
All our thanks to Richard and the SpamCop admins and deputies. As soon as the gentlemen spammers are so kind as to send me another spam, I will test it. -
Internal spamcop handling: (bondedsender)
Spamnophobic replied to captkirk's topic in SpamCop Reporting Help
By "hacked", do you mean that your client's account's name and password have become known to criminals? In that case they should immediately change their password and if possible, account name, block any credit card etc. details which may have been on the website, notify their bank and keep the account under close scrutiny. This is very serious but fortunately not very common. Criminals don't usually get that far. On the other hand, if it is the case, such "hacking" is done when a user has been tricked into giving criminals their username and password, and the account has sufficient privileges to let a criminal using it further pervert the site. Usually this will be via a ransomware attack. But please be aware that there are many, many spams about whose senders claim that their victim's account has been "hacked", but that the victim should not be spooked by this and just report the mails as spam. As they're spamming there will be a compromised or criminal-controlled mail server involved, and this will help get anything coming from that server blacklisted. I send many such reports almost every day and I have never been really "hacked", colourful though the language is in these spams. Unfortunately the term "hacked" is bandied about far too much these days which only benefits criminals. Real hacking is a complex skill which few possess. Then, re "pump out spam". It would be very unusual for criminals to use a victim's account to "pump out spam". The pumping is done via a compromised or criminal-controlled mailserver using a forged sender's address. If you report such a spam, you will see that server listed in the report, and if the report is made quickly, the server stands a good chance of getting on to the SpamCop blacklist, which will effectively stop the "spam run".