Can I publically disown one of my addresses?

[cliffski]

Hi, I own positech.co.uk, and get a lot of crappy attempts at viruses spams and such from 'admin[at]positech.co.uk' that are obviously spoofed.

I NEVER use admin[at]positech.coi.uk myself, so I am all in favour of this address being totally blocked by everyone everywhere. Obviously I dont want my domain on a blacklist!, but as I know 100% that this address is ALWAYS spam, isn't there anything I can do to help people by listing this?

Im getting maybe 300 spams in the held mail per day, and its sad because they are such obvious spam thats its a miracle they get past a single router on their way to me, let alone get delivered as far as spamcop ;(

[StevenUnderwood]

Hi, I own positech.co.uk, and get a lot of crappy attempts at viruses spams and such from 'admin<at>positech.co.uk' that are obviously spoofed.

I NEVER use admin[at]positech.coi.uk myself, so I am all in favour of this address being totally blocked by everyone everywhere.

29539[/snapback]

Except it is likely that your site is the only ones getting those virus/spam attempts. The virus puts the admin[at] before the domain it is sending to in order to make the mesage appear valid. If I received a spam/virus from admin<at>positech.co.uk, it would be no different than seeing asdfghjkl<at>xyz.com.

Im getting maybe 300 spams in the held mail per day, and its sad because they are such obvious spam thats its a miracle they get past a single router on their way to me, let alone get delivered as far as spamcop ;(

29539[/snapback]

Routers do not detect spam...they only move packets of data. What systems are you using to try and detect spam in your email messages?

[cliffski]

Routers do not detect spam...they only move packets of data.  What systems are you using to try and detect spam in your email messages?

I understand, but its insane surely given the number of different networks and ISPs involved in a spammer spamming me, that its only the very last point, the client end that the spam is identified? surely the senders ISP, or some earlier link in the chain can at the very least spot really obvious spam like "get cheap viagra now!" and nuke it before it clogs up bandwidth elsewhere?

it seems like we only spot spam at the end of its journey, not the start. For borderline cases thats desirable, but for real obvious heavily reported spams? surely it can be blocked earlier?

[Wazoo]

it seems like we only spot spam at the end of its journey, not the start. For borderline cases thats desirable, but for real obvious heavily reported spams? surely it can be blocked earlier?

Actually, yes it can, and boy, does this cause problems also. There is in fact, a FAQ entry dealing with some of those issues ... spam is received, a spam complaint submittal is attempted to report it through the SpamCop system, ISP deletes that outgoing e-mail as looking "spammy" ....??? And of course, that FAQ entry was created after having to go through the SpamCop sucks bit and actually identifying why the user's spam complaints weren't being acted on (SpamCop never saw them) ....

[turetzsr]

<snip>

surely the senders ISP, or some earlier link in the chain can at the very least spot really obvious spam like "get cheap viagra now!" and nuke it before it clogs up bandwidth elsewhere?

<snip>

29565[/snapback]

...While I appreciate the idea here, I guess there might be those who actually want to receive information about cheap sources of viagra and would not want it to be blocked. So your idea may be a lot simpler to state than it would be to put into effect without doing any unintentional harm.

[StevenUnderwood]

Isurely the senders ISP, or some earlier link in the chain can at the very least spot really obvious spam like "get cheap viagra now!" and nuke it before it clogs up bandwidth elsewhere?

it seems like we only spot spam at the end of its journey, not the start. For borderline cases thats desirable, but for real obvious heavily reported spams? surely it can be blocked earlier?

29565[/snapback]

Except that the way email generally works these days, there is only a sender end and a receiver end. In days gone past (when many machines were not connected 24/7) there were intermediary machines to accept messages and forward when they had a connection. But you still run into the case where the receiver wants the message (for whatever reason).

[Jeff G.]

you still run into the case where the receiver wants the message (for whatever reason).

29588[/snapback]

For instance, SpamCop's submit sistem wants the messages containing spam so that they may be submitted for reporting.

[Miss Betsy]

Controlling spam based on the conTent is dangerous because it opens the door to censorship.

Controlling spam has to be done as conSent by the receiver. Most ISPs do have anti-spam rules so that if they do receive a complaint, they will stop the sender. Often, today, it is an infected machine where the owner is not aware that it is being used to send spam.

You can certainly block the IP addresses where those annoying spam come from. blocking based on the spoofed address doesn't work very well for a number of reasons. If you block those IP addresses, then you will not get email from legitimate users of those IP addresses. If you block the IP addresses and return them to the sender, then the sender will know why it is blocked. The legitimate users then can complain to the sending ISP about lax attention to spam reports and not stopping spam and how they (the legitimate users) are getting poor service.

As you point out, it is the *sender* of email who can actually *do* something. The receiver should never have to *do* anything except keep an up to date blocklist.

Miss Betsy