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A couple of tricky questions


_richard_

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1. Are you required to forward messages from the account which they were delivered to? (I'm writing a scri_pt which reports messages in bulk and it would be easier to complete if it posted all messages from a single account. :))

2. Does Symantec Brightmail utilise the reports or statistics collected by SpamCop?

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1. Are you required to forward messages from the account which they were delivered to? (I'm writing a scri_pt which reports messages in bulk and it would be easier to complete if it posted all messages from a single account. :))

No I don't believe so.

Can't answer your second question.

Andrew

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1. Are you required to forward messages from the account which they were delivered to? (I'm writing a scri_pt which reports messages in bulk and it would be easier to complete if it posted all messages from a single account. :))

As Andrew has replied, no, it does not matter what account you forward them from. Just be sure that any hosts the message travels through under your control are listed in your mailhosts configuration just to be safe.

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... 2. Does Symantec Brightmail utilise the reports or statistics collected by SpamCop?
You would need to ask them to be sure but I do not think so. Stuff from my attglobal account supposedly goes through Brightmail and has always included a goodly percentage of spam from IPs on the SCBL at that time. There are some heuristics/training facilities provided for Brightmail**1 which wouldn't rule out post filtering using external lists as well but I think the emphasis is firmly in the area of content.

**1Which I gave up "feeding", in the AT&T implementation, fairly quickly - if the process is algorithmic it is very conservative, slow-learning to the point of being exasperating. If it is "human" (not actually implied anywhere AFAICR) the poor little devil is grossly overworked.

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1. Are you required to forward messages from the account which they were delivered to?

Yes. You can't move your spam from one account to another before you report it because moving it alters the headers. You'll end up reporting your own service provider.

Forwarding your mail from one account to another at the server level is OK because the forwarding system simply adds its headers to the mix rather than replacing them like would happen if you move your spam around with your mail client.

You only need one SpamCop account to report all your spam. SpamCop doesn't care where the spam comes from, it only wants to know where to send our system email.

2. Does Symantec Brightmail utilise the reports or statistics collected by SpamCop?

No.

- Don D'Minion - SpamCop Admin -

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Yes. You can't move your spam from one account to another before you report it because moving it alters the headers. You'll end up reporting your own service provider.

Forwarding your mail from one account to another at the server level is OK because the forwarding system simply adds its headers to the mix rather than replacing them like would happen if you move your spam around with your mail client.

Don, could you explain your answer in greater detail? From my perspective you have open up a big can of worms with this simplistic answer to a fundamental question.

No where in this topic as the term "Move" been defined.

I "move" messages from Outlook Express which come from multiple accounts to my SpamCop Held mail account using IMAP and report from there. I do not see how such "moving" alters the headers.

The original question

Are you required to forward messages from the account which they were delivered to?
does not clearly define was is meant by "forward messages" but your reply
You can't move your spam from one account to another
would seem to me to state that the replies from both agsteele and StevenUnderwood are incorrect but with out specifically stating so. Yet maybe that is not what you are saying as you expand your answer by saying
Forwarding your mail from one account to another at the server level is OK ....
So what do you mean by "move"?

I can envision problems with moving mail using IMAP and then forwarding it on to SpamCop, but I do not see how the IMAP move alters the headers. Rather I would see the problem of IMAP not adding anything to the headers resulting in a break in the chain of custody when headers are added during the "forwarding" process (if any are added at all) as the method used to "forward" was not defined.

What would the problem be it the messages were forwarded as an attachment in which case the original message headers should remain intact regardless of where they came from.

So the question from my point of view would be:

1) How are the messages merged into a single account? and

2) How are they forwarded to SpamCop?

Without first answering those questions one has no way of knowing how the headers are affected.

And as we all do know, it is the complete headers that SpamCop cares about and that the Parser uses.

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Don:

My answer above was assuming automatic forwarding to the final location. I have several different accounts where the spam is delivered to, which all are transferred automatically to my spamcop account where they are reported. This automatic transfer is accomplished both by forwards setup at some accounts and POPping of a couple accounts by spamcop.

THinking about it more, I can also see where a user would collect email from several accounts, then forward them from one (their ISP for instance).

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