| The Best
Ways to Stop Spam
Your office mailbox may feature a bit less
spam and your personal one is likely better at
moving spam to the junk folder than it was, say,
five years ago, but spam isn't dead. Complacency
means the problem will only creep its way back
to your main mailbox slowly. PCMag analyst Neil
Rubenking has found nine ways to stay ahead of
spam. Some of them are quite effective. Read
Rubenking's roundup for all the details on the
state of spam detection in 2008.
Time to Keep Your Mailbox Clean
http://ct2.eletters.whatsnewnow.com/rd/cts?d=42-930-1-464-735586-239769-0-0-0-1-3-118
Junk E-mail or "SPAM"
While industry analysts are still trying to
figure out how to make money on the Internet,
the spam artists think they've found the answer,
and are busy churning out junk e-mail. So the
bad news is that junk e-mail or spam is a
growing problem, but the good news is that the
Internet community is rising to the challenge.
We hope that the following information may help
you answer any questions you may have had
regarding spam.
Prevention Information can be found at:
http://www.onguardonline.gov
http://www.getnetwise.org/.
Frequently Ask Questions regarding SPAM
Why am I getting e-mail not addressed to
me?
It is an unfortunate circumstance that the
"From" header of an e-mail message is so easily
faked that it is usually not reliable in tracing
its true source.
However, spammers often forge the "To" header
of an e-mail message, which is an attempt to
confuse the true recipient of the message. One
of the problems with the way e-mail works is the
"To" header on messages (the line that normally
contains your e-mail address, assuming it's a
legitimate message) does not really determine
where the message gets delivered. What does
determine the recipient of the message is a
command (or commands, if there are multiple
recipients) sent to the mail server telling it
where to send the mail. Unfortunately, these
commands are ultimately hidden from the
recipient's view, and do not show up anywhere in
the mail headers once the message is finally
delivered. (A sender can make use of this
feature with a "Bcc", or "Blind Carbon Copy," to
his or her recipients.)
Blind carbon copying can be useful if you are
creating a mailing list, and you wish to ensure
that the address of each of your recipients is
kept private from the others. (These days, it is
an unfortunate circumstance that the publication
of your e-mail address will almost inevitably
mean you become the target of unsolicited junk
mailers. So a mailer can set the "To" header to
be anything he or she wishes; for example, "To:
Mailing List Recipients." He or she can then
silently tell the mail server, by using the
"Bcc," who the actual recipients are.
Unfortunately, this feature can also be used
for illegitimate purposes —for example, in cases
of spammers using bogus "To" and "From" headers
to disguise their identities. This enables them
to send out spam to numerous recipients and
protect their anonymity. In cases like these,
only a thorough examination of the message's
full headers will reveal the source of the
message . . . and even then, this will only
reveal the source network or Internet provider.
It will not reveal the specific identity of the
spammer.
Where did the spammer get my email address?
Does ComSouth Services sell my e-mail address?
In the interest of ensuring your privacy,
ComSouth does not, in any way, publicize
your e-mail address or any other subscriber
information -- all such data is kept strictly
confidential. This is not only our own internal
policy, but a requirement of federal law as
well.
I got spam that's targeting an
alphabetical list of ComSouth.net & Cstel.net
customers. If I don't publicize my Comsouth.net
& Cstel.net addresses, why do I still get spam?
There is a variety of software that permits a
bulk mailer to send messages to a large number
of recipients on a particular Internet provider,
even if they do not know their specific
addresses. The software attempts to send a
message to every address on that domain
(starting with aaa, aab, aac, etc.), not caring
about the number of "undeliverable" messages
that will be generated from all the incorrect
guesses. We believe some spammers may then track
which addresses came back as undeliverable, and
remove those addresses from their lists. These
mailing lists are then sold to other spammers.
This may explain why sometimes you see spam
which appears to be targeted at an alphabetical
list of customers, or why you receive spam at an
address which you may not have publicized.
We do have systems in place which catch a
great deal of these attempts as they arrive,
before the messages reach any valid addresses;
however, no system such as this is 100%
effective, and we are constantly working on
improving the "intelligence" of our spam
prevention methods.
Is there a security problem with your mail
server?
The security problem extends, unfortunately,
to the e-mail protocol itself. Mail
administrators are required to return, as
undeliverable, any messages addressed to an
invalid address on a particular network. This
opens up the possibility for abuse by spammers
running software that attempts to send messages
to as many different addresses as possible.
Is there a security problem with my web
browser?
There have been some security issues
identified in the two most popular web browsers,
Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer. In one
case, a problem with Javascript was identified
as potentially allowing websites to capture a
visitor's e-mail address without their
knowledge.
You may also want to visit these links for
more security information about:
Do cookies have something to do with this?
Cookies are short pieces of text, stored on
your computer, which are placed there by
websites you may have visited, so that those
websites can remember who you are (or
preferences you may have selected) the next time
you visit. Although this can be convenient when
making frequent trips to the same site, there
are also well-known concerns regarding their
use.
What is ComSouth doing to stop this? Can't
you filter this stuff?
Some service providers have attempted to
address the spam problem by blocking mail from
other providers who are known to distribute
spam. Although this method is somewhat
effective, it eliminates only a fraction of
spam. For example, many network abusers will set
up an account with a reputable provider such as
America Online or AT&T. No one blocks these
providers because there is a great deal of
legitimate mail coming from those systems.
However, as part of ComSouth's commitment to
providing first-class service to its customers,
we continue to filter incoming mail from domains
known to harbor spammers. Copies of complaints
sent to
abuse@comsouth.net will be taken into
consideration as we update our antispam filters.
This will give both ComSouth and our customers
greater control over the mail entering our
system and our customers' mailboxes.
We have also configured our mail servers to
automatically notify our mail administrators
whenever certain "patterns" are recognized in
any large number of incoming mail messages. For
example, a large number of messages with
substantially the same Subject header, or of the
same length, or numerous groups of messages all
sent to the same number of recipients... all are
flagged as potentially "spam" and are either
accepted or rejected based on their content. By
allowing the server to watch for such patterns,
we hope to be able to stop a good deal of
unwanted e-mail from reaching our customers.
Can you block all messages not addressed
to me?
Conceivably, ComSouth could prevent any mail
without a legitimate "To" header from reaching
our customers at all. We have actually debated
this idea seriously for quite some time.
However, the downside of this plan is that there
is a potential for much legitimate mail (i.e.,
mailing list messages addressed to "mailing list
recipients" rather than a specific comsouth.net
address) being blocked. Furthermore, to program
our mail servers to scan through every incoming
mail message and verify that its "To" header
matches that of its intended recipient would
significantly degrade the overall performance of
those servers.
Therefore, while we have a mail software
upgrade planned for the near future, the
unfortunate cost of having to wait is that much
illegitimate mail will reach our customers for
the time being. Our top priority, though, is
that none of our customers legitimate mail be
bounced simply because some automated process we
were running mistook it for spam.
I want to stop this . . . Should I "reply to
remove"? I've tried to reply but the message is
returned to me.
As you may have noticed with much of the spam
messages you receive, the "From", "Reply-To",
and "To" headers point to addresses that are
obviously fake. In many cases, trying to respond
to the address in the "From" header results in
your message being "bounced" back to you as
undeliverable.
In other cases, you may discover that you are
able to reply to an unwanted message. In fact,
the message may actually give you "removal
instructions" or invite you to "reply to be
removed" from the spammers' mailing list.
However, replying to spam, or even following the
sender's instructions for "removal," may
actually increase the amount of spam you
get in the long run. By letting the spammer know
that you've received the message, even though
you are expressing disapproval at receiving it,
you are confirming for them that your e-mail
address is valid and that you read messages sent
to that address. Unfortunately, many spammers do
track which addresses write them back
(regardless of the content of the reply) and use
this information to update their mailing lists.
Some even then turn around and sell these lists
to other spammers.
In short, avoid attempting to reply to or
contact the spammer by e-mail.
I want to report this to its origin.
ComSouth also recommends reporting the
receipt of spam to the Internet provider at
which it originates. Your best bet in
determining the true source of an e-mail message
is to look at its "Received" headers (you may
have to set your e-mail client to "Show all
headers" to be able to see them). As stated
above, the spammer will have often forged the
"From" and "Reply-To" headers, making them
largely unreliable in determining the true
source of the message.
Can I filter this stuff from my inbox?
Depending on your e-mail program, you should
also be able to control which messages are
visible in your Inbox through the use of
"filters." The most recent version of Netscape
Communicator offers filtering capability, as do
Eudora, Pegasus and Microsoft Outlook.
Unfortunately, Netscape Navigator 3.0 and
earlier versions do not have filtering features,
so you must upgrade to Netscape Communicator if
you want to use Netscape Mail and take advantage
of filtering.
We recommend you create a filtering rule in
your e-mail program which deletes (or sends to
the "Trash") any e-mail message not specifically
addressed to you in the "To" or "Cc" headers.
Fortunately, ComSouth provides technical
support for setting up filters; with our "Glitch
Guys" .
I thought this was illegal, but I got spam
that says it "complies with federal
requirements." What does this mean?
Currently there is no federal legislation
either supporting or prohibiting the sending of
unsolicited e-mail messages. However, you may
have noticed that some spam messages include the
following language (or something similar):
This message complies with the
proposed United States Federal requirements
for commercial e-mail. For additional
information see:
http://www.senate.gov/
Current information on the status, text,
and summary of Title 3 of S. 1618 and H.R.
3888, its companion bill, can be found by
using Thomas, the legislative information
system run by the Library of Congress.
Or:
This message complies with the
proposed United States Federal requirements
for commercial e-mail bill, Section 301. Per
Section 301, Paragraph (a)(2)(C) of S.1618,
further transmissions to you by the sender
of this e-mail may be stopped at no cost to
you by sending a reply to this e-mail
address with the word "remove" in the
subject line. For additional info, see:
http://www.senate.gov/
Although this all sounds rather intimidating,
it is also misleading in that it strongly
implies that the spammer has acted within
federal law in sending you their message. The
bill to which these spammers refer (commonly
called the "Murkowski bill") would have
legalized the sending of unsolicited commercial
e-mail provided certain requirements were met.
However, although this bill passed the Senate,
it died in conference committee and never passed
the House. Therefore, it never became law.
In Conclusion...
As you can see, there are no simple solutions
to the problem of spam. In any event, ComSouth
hopes that some of the information and resources
contained in this page will help you reduce the
number of unwelcome messages in your inbox.
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