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Reporting problems today?


mrmaxx

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For those of you getting suspension notices....

That's caused by SpamCop going berserk. Not your fault.

We'll get you back in operation soon.

Spammers are using our own service against us by signing up for accounts and then flooding them with mail in hopes of bringing down the system from overload.

The 50,000 spams per day limit is our defense against that.

- Don D'Minion - SpamCop Admin -

service[at]admin.spamcop.net

.

Login to spamcop popmail reported an incorrect password and Login to web reporting gave notice that my account had been suspended, web site notices drew me here and I spent the morning reading the most recent threads about the most recent problems only to be misled into thinking I was not at fault.

Then it occurred to me to try spamcop webmail, where I saw the fist sign that my account had actually expired during the recent problems, once renewed all was well again. I discovered that the reminder notices were received but misfiled and marked as read due to a malformed rule, therefore it was my fault :)

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One thing I have noticed:

During the problems with the timeouts, etc., I have also been unable to get to

other sections of the SpamCop website.

For example, I cannot access the "Help" pages, but, even more importantly, I cannot

access the "Mailhosts" pages.

Now, even though the reporting service seems to be working OK at the moment, I just

tried to access the "Mailhosts" pages, and got the dreaded "Gateway Timeout!" :(

Obviously, not everything is back up working yet.

EDIT: Reporting seems to have gone down again, too! :(

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It's bacvk to timeouts again so we are still going through cycles of total chaos and breakdown...You would think they already know the root causes, so it is becoming more and more bizzare.. Well, if this scenario takes the course of the Fly movie, the sleezy fly being spammers of course, the only thing that will save us will be the fly shooting itself dead!

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Just checked mailhosts and I find myself being asked to add my first mailhost again, etc. I'm sure that's not normal behaviour following renewal.

/edit no reports history either, all gone :( Acting as-if a new account, but on the mail side whitelist etc all appears intact.

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Have tried following to save myself time and frustration;

keep an eye on the Reporting Server Status on the SpamCop.net Forum Portal page

as soon as the graph shows a strong uptick start reporting spam

Then everything goes through normally

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Good strategy...but doesn't always work..watch for the blue line (reports being sent) vs green, they have to exceed the green graph, otherwise it means people are unable to sent reports which as a rule should exceed the no of submitals...

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Thanks,

I see what you mean. On that basis the back slope is best where there is a big gap between green and blue - in fact that seems to be the case at the minute and certainly my reports have gone through easily in the last 20 minutes

Good strategy...but doesn't always work..watch for the blue line (reports being sent) vs green, they have to exceed the green graph, otherwise it means people are unable to sent reports which as a rule should exceed the no of submitals...

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Well I just read the last few pages, it was working, now it's not. This morning I'm not even able to get it to process then get the time out. It's just not doing anything.

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Seriously, Cisco, do you have to lie about it?

From the spamcop.net home page:

The results of this investigation have allowed Cisco to improve on the industry-leading anti-spam solution to our customers. SpamCop.net is instrumental in collecting message samples for our ongoing investigation, and as a result some SpamCop.net users looking to submit their spam samples have experienced delays with the service. We apologize for these intermittent delays and will do everything possible to minimize these.

In fact, the service is not improved and the delays are not intermittent.

Errors and failures I can forgive once they're fixed, but only a fool will continue to support a liar. I'm outta here.

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Operational Issues:

Over the past week Cisco has been actively investigating increased spam volumes as a result of increased

botnet activity. The results of this investigation have allowed Cisco to improve on the industry-leading

anti-spam solution to our customers. SpamCop.net is instrumental in collecting message samples for our ongoing

investigation, and as a result some SpamCop.net users looking to submit their spam samples have experienced delays

with the service. We apologize for these intermittent delays and will do everything possible to minimize these

I've been trying to hold my tongue on the bashing, but it kind of seems like all those Cisco resources were busy writing the above marketing-spin-blurb. "Industry-leading anti-spam solution?" That's been dead in the water for weeks. S"ome users have experienced delays?" As in EVERY user, where 'delays' equals dead in the water for weeks. And finally, the term "intermittent" doesn't mean dead in the water for weeks. It means sporadic, occasional.

Thanks to whoever is working on actually SOLVING whatever mystery problems ails you. As for whoever is feverishly creating propaganda PR's like the one above... please roll up your sleeves and actually help solve the problem instead... or at least sit quietly.

/2 cents

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I've been trying to hold my tongue on the bashing, but it kind of seems like all those Cisco resources were busy writing the above marketing-spin-blurb. "Industry-leading anti-spam solution?" That's been dead in the water for weeks. S"ome users have experienced delays?" As in EVERY user, where 'delays' equals dead in the water for weeks. And finally, the term "intermittent" doesn't mean dead in the water for weeks. It means sporadic, occasional.

Thanks to whoever is working on actually SOLVING whatever mystery problems ails you. As for whoever is feverishly creating propaganda PR's like the one above... please roll up your sleeves and actually help solve the problem instead... or at least sit quietly.

/2 cents

According to the Cisco website, Cisco had over 65,000 employees in 2009. It is time they allocate a few to its "industry-leading anti-spam solution" so that it actually works. Right now Spamcop is not the "industry-leading anti-spam solution".

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The current situation is a pain but after being with SpamCop for a year all my Viagra and related spam dried up. Now all I get are West African bank managers and lottery winnings which are a tiny fraction of what I used to get.

For the current situation I have put up a tab in my browser http://members.spamcop.net/spamgraph.shtml?spamstats and refresh it every hour or so. Every time there is clear space between the blue line on top and the green histogram - such as there was between 04.00 and 10.00 today - I report my collected spam no problem

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Operational Issues:

Over the past week Cisco has been actively investigating increased spam volumes as a result of increased

botnet activity. The results of this investigation have allowed Cisco to improve on the industry-leading

anti-spam solution to our customers. SpamCop.net is instrumental in collecting message samples for our ongoing

investigation, and as a result some SpamCop.net users looking to submit their spam samples have experienced delays

with the service. We apologize for these intermittent delays and will do everything possible to minimize these

Maybe I'm misreading, but the quote above does NOT sound to me like the "industry-leading

anti-spam solution" that Cisco is talking about is sc. The fact that they mention that sc is "is instrumental in collecting message samples for our ongoing

investigation" sounds more like sc is a "tool" for assisting in making their solution better. It seems to imply the following:

1: Cisco has a commercial anti spam product (they do, and it isn't spamcop: http://www.cisco.com/web/about/ac49/ac0/ac.../ironport.html)

2: This solution utilizes spamcop for part of how it functions (most likely the spam traps, and to a much lesser extent, user reports)

3: Cisco has decided to sacrifice spamcop performance to increase the performance of their proprietary Ironport solution, apologizing to us spamcop users for this inconvenience.

That a lot of analysis for one paragraph of update, but IMHO it's an accurate one. If you consider the financial importance of Ironport devices for cisco over the importance of spamcop.net as a service, it even makes sense.

But, as I said in my original post, it still means that we, the sc community, are being deliberately inconvenienced by the shepherd of our community, Cisco, to ensure that their proprietary enterprise product line operates at peak efficiency.

That's not a small deal at all. It's a breach of trust with the very community supporting your underlying business, Cisco.

Shame.

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If what seems to be happening is indeed the case, and Cisco would not make SC again as good as it was, then maybe we SC users could be made to know somehow at which time we can report spam, in a way that is more easy than having to check that graph with green and blue. I can't figure that one out so far. And to have to start using that checking method every time if it is a good time to report is asking a lot. Many of us will not want to go through that hassle.

SC for that reason better remain user friendly. Especially to the paying customers.

Or is SC now only a supportive tool for this, and we the supportive "guinea pigs"? In that case all accounts should be free:

http://www.cisco.com/web/about/ac49/ac0/ac...9/ironport.html

I hope I got it wrong, SC will get back to normal.

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Seriously, Cisco, do you have to lie about it?

<snip>

Errors and failures I can forgive once they're fixed, but only a fool will continue to support a liar. I'm outta here.

I've been trying to hold my tongue on the bashing, but it kind of seems like all those Cisco resources were busy writing the above marketing-spin-blurb. "Industry-leading anti-spam solution?" That's been dead in the water for weeks.

<snip>

<snip>

It is time they allocate a few to its "industry-leading anti-spam solution" so that it actually works. Right now Spamcop is not the "industry-leading anti-spam solution".

Maybe I'm misreading, but the quote above does NOT sound to me like the "industry-leading anti-spam solution" that Cisco is talking about is sc. The fact that they mention that sc is "is instrumental in collecting message samples for our ongoing investigation" sounds more like sc is a "tool" for assisting in making their solution better.

<snip>

That's not a small deal at all. It's a breach of trust with the very community supporting your underlying business, Cisco.

<snip>

This is the most unpleasant situation yet...I have no idea what they wish to accomplish by totally compromizing SC and its relationship with a fairly loyal group of supporters?
...Of the above comments, orenwolf's starting words seem consistent with what I would say. However, while the conclusions in that post might be correct, I prefer to withhold judgment until a SpamCop representative has an opportunity to reply -- I am certainly not outta here! And my view is that even if Cisco is in some sense sacrificing us SpamCop users' convenience in reporting our own spam (which in only very rare circumstances actually benefits us directly), I am okay with that, as I do not pay anything to use the parsing and reporting service. Even if I were contributing by purchasing fuel or the $30 per year e-mail and reporting service, I would be waiting to see whether I would be somehow compensated for the lost time or funds before being upset by all this. And if I decided I could no longer support the SpamCop service, I would still understand their decision to sacrifice my meager business for what they see as their real services.
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so, we're being *used*?

nice. now imagine all the Cisco employees referring to all sc users as 'lusers' instead.

Shame on Cisco, indeed.

The real shame is that we are *still* here, *still* supporting this absolute mess of a spam reporting tool.

and now it would seem that spamcop users are the real 'tools' here

so, shame on all of us for allowing this complete and total breach of trust.

oh, yeah;

Gateway Timeout

The proxy server did not receive a timely response from the upstream server.

Reference #1.1e55ee3f.1342033363.357498

...Of the above comments, orenwolf's starting words seem consistent with what I would say. However, while the conclusions in that post might be correct, I prefer to withhold judgment until a SpamCop representative has an opportunity to reply -- I am certainly not outta here! And my view is that even if Cisco is in some sense sacrificing us SpamCop users' convenience in reporting our own spam (which in only very rare circumstances actually benefits us directly), I am okay with that, as I do not pay anything to use the parsing and reporting service. Even if I were contributing by purchasing fuel or the $30 per year e-mail and reporting service, I would be waiting to see whether I would be somehow compensated for the lost time or funds before being upset by all this. And if I decided I could no longer support the SpamCop service, I would still understand their decision to sacrifice my meager business for what they see as their real services.

i pay

i'm still here

twitter stream has some fairly interesting comments about spamcop being 'borked' since June 14th.

it appears we are witnessing the death of spamcop

what a shame

I just tweeted;

Shame on you $CSCO [at]CiscoSystems The end of #Spamcop? forum.spamcop.net/forums/index.p… Is Cisco sacrificing it's users for IronPort? #StayTuned

in response to their tweet;

It's a beautiful day at Cisco headquarters in San Jose! Where are you working today? http://lockerz.com/s/224160462

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As of Wed Jul 11 14:05:58 2012 -0400

SpamCop writes on it's webpage "We are pleased to report that at the time of writing, the SpamCop service is fully operational. "

So far, this is not my experience. I have only been able to report two spam. The rest of the reporting efforts are either non-responsive or I receive:

"Gateway Timeout

The proxy server did not receive a timely response from the upstream server.

Reference #1.aef64317.1342035286.7ef3b9 "

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...

i pay

i'm still here

twitter stream has some fairly interesting comments about spamcop being 'borked' since June 14th.

it appears we are witnessing the death of spamcop

what a shame

What you pay for is the e-mail service.

It is true that part of the SpamCop e-mail service is quick and easy reporting, but the e-mail service is separate from the SpamCop parsing and reporting service. Cisco does not own or operate the e-mail service.

I have no idea who thinks SpamCop has had problems since June 14th. I certainly didn't notice any problems until maybe two days ago.

I have only spot-checked, but I have the impression that the spam I report via the webmail service is being processed eventually.

I am having problems, as everyone else seems to be, with the SpamCop parser (i.e., when I forward spam to the SpamCop reporting address or paste it into the reporting page).

So it doesn't seem like such a terrible situation. Nothing like when the e-mail service died and was offline for almost a week. :(

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Well, SC seems to be operational at the moment, but all my queued spam was more than 40 hours old, and all my not yet reported spam was more than 20 hours old. Of course I "cancelled" them all. Call me lucky, that I get so few spam these days, that I had nothing fresh to contribute to "Cisco's investigations" :-/

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What you pay for is the e-mail service.

It is true that part of the SpamCop e-mail service is quick and easy reporting, but the e-mail service is separate from the SpamCop parsing and reporting service. Cisco does not own or operate the e-mail service.

I have no idea who thinks SpamCop has had problems since June 14th. I certainly didn't notice any problems until maybe two days ago.

I have only spot-checked, but I have the impression that the spam I report via the webmail service is being processed eventually.

I am having problems, as everyone else seems to be, with the SpamCop parser (i.e., when I forward spam to the SpamCop reporting address or paste it into the reporting page).

So it doesn't seem like such a terrible situation. Nothing like when the e-mail service died and was offline for almost a week. :(

This thread was started on June 14. Then there was more posts about two weeks later. It is now July 11 and the problems continue.

The message I get now is:

Parsing header:

got sigalarm, taking too long to process, aborted.

Perhaps you can wait a few minutes and reload?

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<snip>

it appears we are witnessing the death of spamcop

<snip>

The sad thing is that the SCBL is not getting populated with new stuff during the downtime. I would think that would hurt ironport more than it would help their own software.

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What you pay for is the e-mail service.

<snip>

...Well, maybe, but (much as I hate to say anything that supports the "I'm being victimized" position) part of the $30 per year could be seen as purchasing the e-mail service's use of the parser, as if the subscriber had paid for an unlimited amount of reporting "fuel."
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I have been paying a few years as a matter of principle and as a supporter, I dont use the e-mail service, nor do I benefit from SCBL as I use mostly academic services that prevent you from using your own filters/block lists. We will get over this somehow, but the prospects of SC regaining credibility seems deemer by every minute we waste wandering what is going on and feeling powerless about it. I am repeating myself, but this is not the way you treat a loyal following!

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