Automating the submission process

[jknacnud]

I use the email program PINE on a freeBSD Unix box. I had this idea that if I moved all spam that I get into a folder/file I could setup a cronjob to automatically forward spam in that file to spamcop using my special spamcop spam submission email address.

Therefore, I made a folder in PINE called "spam" and moved tons of spam into it. Then I went to test the process to see if it would actually work with a file with 3 spam messages in it.

From my command line I ran this:

# cat spammailfile | formail -i "X-Anti-spam-Header: SpamCop" -s procmail

In my procmailrc file I put this:

# Reprocessed mail to be sent to SpamCop

:0

* ^X-Anti-spam-Header: SpamCop

!submit.NtNi9mungedlYhDQ[at]spam.spamcop.net

I check my spamcop account and didn't see any link to process the spam, nor did I get a link in my email to process. I changed the procmailrc recipe to send to one of my junkmail email addresses and ran the command again and all three message got sent there just fine. However, I noticed that the headers had my information all over it now, like it came from me. I also noticed that the return-path is a different email address and it may be that mail submitted to my special spamcop submission address needs to be from my spamcop registered email address.

QUESTIONS:

1) Is this an idea that I should continue to pursue, or is the fact that the headers being sent are now going to show that they came from me cause a problem for me, like showing me as the spammer?

2) If this is a bad idea, or approach to the idea, what other ways are there of automating the submission process so that I don't have to forward each and every spam email message to that address?

Thanks,

Jonathan Duncan

[StevenUnderwood]

What you are attempting has gotten many people to report themselves. Please be sure to complete and test your mailhost configuation to minimize that possibility.

Ultimately, you need to "forward as attachment" or equivalent, not just forward. I don't know any of the programs you are using well enough to give you specifics, but the message spamcop receives should have as the DATA portion of the message: the full headers as they are when you see them, a blank line to indicate the body of the spam is starting and the body of the spam. This would be for a single spam submission. I don't know exactly what kind of separator would exist in a multiple message submit.

Your test to receive what you were sending is a good one. If you wish to PM me with an email address to test with, I could forward 3 spam messages in one message so you could inspect the format as the spamcop email system formats them for submission. If you get it working, I would test the messages both ways (submitting only one) to be sure it is working properly.

The address a message comes from does not affect where the results are sent to. I can send my spam from work to my paid (I have both) account and the confirmations go to my home account (which is why I have both).

[jknacnud]

Steve, thanks for your response. What you are saying makes sense.

After my original post I did some research on PINE and found that it in fact has the ability to select multiple email messages and then forward them as "as a MIME digest" attachments or even bounce them to different email addresses in bulk.

Having the option to forward many messages at once is ideal and it actually works. So that may be my solution.

However, if someone knows of an easier way I would be interested to hear it. If someone familiar with "formail" and "procmail" could tell me if forwarding message that way would work, I would appreciate it. Otherwise, I think I will abandon the idea for the multiple forward schema.

Thanks,

Jonathan Duncan

[Wazoo]

Due to the technical nature of your query, you may be better served by hitting news://news.spamcop.net/spamcop.geeks ... there have been a number of folks in the past doing the "automated" thing ... some going a bit too far and running into other issues ... or hitting the Help page at www.spamcop.net and doing a search from there (you pick the terms)

[jknacnud]

Thanks for the tips. I will check those options out.

Jonathan