OT question: Question re spam & Pishing

  • Thread starter Thread starter Ron Cliborn
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R

Ron Cliborn

I'm sure that everyone else must be getting inundated with Spam in
their email boxes. I get stuff from banks, for drugs to enhance my
sex life, something to make my package bigger and requests for $ from
young nubile college girls needing money for tuition.

I don't know how to look up the web sites hosting these abominations
so I figured I'd go to the sites and mess with them a little bit.
But most of the times I click on their links they are dead.
Any idea why?
Any idea how to look up information to see who is providing web
service to the people when they DO have a valid link?
Even suggestions on tracing Spam.

I consider myself to be pretty next savvy but I am amazed at the
amount of information these Spammers have obtained on me. I never use
real information except when I am making a purchase from a reputable
business - the same with all my demographic info. Yet these Spammers
have put together my name, address and tele#. Either the companies I
deal with release this info in violation of there TERMS OF USE and
USER POLCIES or these Spammers are good.

Thanks for listening.
I just think Spam sucks.

Ron
 
Ron Cliborn said:
I'm sure that everyone else must be getting inundated with Spam in
their email boxes. I get stuff from banks, for drugs to enhance my
sex life, something to make my package bigger and requests for $ from
young nubile college girls needing money for tuition.

I don't know how to look up the web sites hosting these abominations
so I figured I'd go to the sites and mess with them a little bit.
But most of the times I click on their links they are dead.
Any idea why?
Any idea how to look up information to see who is providing web
service to the people when they DO have a valid link?
Even suggestions on tracing Spam.

I consider myself to be pretty next savvy but I am amazed at the
amount of information these Spammers have obtained on me. I never use
real information except when I am making a purchase from a reputable
business - the same with all my demographic info. Yet these Spammers
have put together my name, address and tele#. Either the companies I
deal with release this info in violation of there TERMS OF USE and
USER POLCIES or these Spammers are good.

Thanks for listening.
I just think Spam sucks.

Ron
Click to expand...

Hi Ron,

There are to many idiots on this world to get rid of spam.

You could try to investigate the header of the message (e-mail or newsgroup)
and check where the message originated from.
Then send a message to 'abuse @ whatever the origin was'.
Problems doing this: the information could be incorrect (spoofed?) or the
owner of the sending server is from the spammer, is willingly helping
spammers or simply doesn't want to do anything about it.

You could also try to check the provider of the web-site they are refering
to by using a whois search (for example using www.dnsstuff.com) and send an
abuse mail to that provider.
Problems doing this: see first list of problems.

And, even if you find the correct provider AND the provider is willing to do
something about it, the spammer has probably already moved to another
address and so they can't do anything about it anymore.

Spammers frequently mention using paypal to pay for their 'services' so you
could try to mail a message to paypal about it.
Again, a problem: as far as I know, those fellows at paypal don't even
listen to you if you don't have a paypal account yourself... so they are not
willing.
And ofcourse there are the zombie networks, hijacked mail servers, trojans,
all computers remotely taken over by spammers to deliver all this nonsense.

There are people who are actually scanning all ip adresses looking for
'open' mailservers so they can hijack them.
Really sad people...
If you want to experience how bad things really are:
Setup a mailserver (ms-exchange for example), register a domain name and
plug your mailserver on 'the net' without looking at security settings.
Within five or six hours, your mailserver will have sent hundreds of
thousands e-mail message to adresses all over the world including people
from your personal contact lists... so now they think *you* are the spammer
and you will get into several anti-spam blacklists or even worse: get
disconnected by your own provider

Sorry to ruin your day a little :)

regards,
Marcel
 
I'm sure that everyone else must be getting inundated with Spam in
their email boxes. I get stuff from banks, for drugs to enhance my
sex life, something to make my package bigger and requests for $ from
young nubile college girls needing money for tuition.
Click to expand...

You'd probably benefit from adopting the practice of maintaining one
email address for friends and family... Another for trusted business
associates (your bank, brokerage firm, Amazon, American Express, etc.)
.... And another for online purchases, newsgroup posting, surveys,
rebate offers, etc.

To keep your Inbox uncluttered, the first two get accessed with your
primary email client, the third through a webmail page.

The third gets junked once or twice a year, as this type of online
activity is a virtual SPAM magnet. The second will probably bring in
minimal in any SPAM if you're careful about not signing up for
newsletters and such. Most reputable businesses will respect your
opt-out preferences. The first is virtually permanent, as it's most
unlikely your friends and family will SPAM you. Just instruct them to
NEVER give your address to third parties, especially things like
online greeting cards.
I don't know how to look up the web sites hosting these abominations
so I figured I'd go to the sites and mess with them a little bit.
But most of the times I click on their links they are dead.
Any idea why?
Any idea how to look up information to see who is providing web
service to the people when they DO have a valid link?
Even suggestions on tracing Spam.
Click to expand...

Don't bother. You're fighting a machine much bigger than you and in
most cases, your ISP has already blocked the sites.
I consider myself to be pretty next savvy but I am amazed at the
amount of information these Spammers have obtained on me. I never use
real information except when I am making a purchase from a reputable
business - the same with all my demographic info. Yet these Spammers
have put together my name, address and tele#. Either the companies I
deal with release this info in violation of there TERMS OF USE and
USER POLCIES or these Spammers are good.
Click to expand...

Probably not. I'll bet you a dollar if you could somehow identify the
party that passed on your personal information, you'd find something
buried in the TOS that allows them to do it. This is a favorite tool
of SPAMMERS; the 'opt-in' manipulation. It's never apparent.

A_C
 
I'm sure that everyone else must be getting inundated with Spam in
their email boxes. I get stuff from banks, for drugs to enhance my
sex life, something to make my package bigger and requests for $ from
young nubile college girls needing money for tuition.
Click to expand...
If your e-mail address is actually "(e-mail address removed)", then
this Usenet posting (or anything similar, such as the ones about your
air conditioning filter, or your fresh water aquarium) has assured you
of a lifetime of spam. (above information thru Google).
 
The only sensible thing to do is to run a reputable
( not free kiddie stuff ) spam filter on your box ..
McAfee is a good one. It will examine each email
before it is downloaded, and reject the spam. If
your ISP provides spam filtering ( again a very good
idea ), any spam that is blocked will be removed from
the server every week or so. Both McAfee and Postini
use Anti-virus checking, and will block those stupid
attachments that are garanteed to wreck your system.
I use both ... I never get spam at all. My favorite thing
about that is realizing that the spammers are wasting
their money and time, and the ISPs and other
providers who let it through, are losing customers
because their networks run so slow due to the
heavy traffic. Many, if not most, ISPs are themselves
spammers. So you need to run at least 2 levels of
anti-spam filtering. If anything does get through, keep
note of who is appending your email address to the
spam, and where it is occurring ... generally it will
be your ISP. If they continue to do it, post an ad
in your local newspaper, and dare them to continue
doing it :-)

johns
 
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