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NtrLpr7
join:2014-09-01

NtrLpr7

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Strange FIOS App Spam Overseas vs US Observation

Can someone explain the following experience?

I ma a Verizon FIOS customer and have been for over a decade. Since the beginning of this year I have been inundated by SPAM. I have maxed out the number of allowed SPAM filter rules (50) and as a result I get multiple spam messages every day. I access my email messages either from my home computer via the Verizon Webmail interface or on my iPhone via the Verizon FIOS app when I am away from home or at work (normal over the air LTE signal). Regardless, I get multiple spam EVERY day.

Recently while vacationing overseas I had no webmail access via computer and had to rely solely on the FIOS app on my iPhone. ATT is my iPhone provider not Verizon. To avoid international roaming charges I put my iPhone in airplane mode and turned on WiFi at the airport before my departure. The hotel I stayed at had free Wifi access for 1 hour per day. Every evening on the way to dinner I stopped in the lobby, connected to the hotel Wifi and launched the FIOS app to check my email. I noticed that unlike when I am on US soil, even though I could successfully log into the FIOS app, the only panel that was available was the email panel. I could not see the billing panel, the DVR panel, the home phone caller ID log panel or the home phone voicemail panel. Even more strangely, there was no SPAM. ZIp, zero, none, everyday for the entire length of my vacation. I logged on once per day in the evening before dinner every day and ZERO SPAM.

Once I landed back on US soil, at the airport I turned off airplane mode on my iPhone, got an ATT LTE over the air signal and launched the FIOS app. I was immediately able to see all the regular information panes on the app that I could not see overseas but more interestingly, once I checked my email, there was the usual spam there. The spam was only for that day that I logged on in the airport here in the US. I checked my mail history and no spam was there for each day that I was overseas and used the FIOS app from the hotel lobby.

Can anyone explain this? I have always been under the impression that Verizon cannot control SPAM at the server level. I'm no techie but the easy explanation is that the spam was either being blocked by the overseas server or Verizon recognized it as spam and refused to forward it to the overseas server (possibly due to the cost to them). But that doesn't make sense because my email is delivered to the Verizon server and sits there in my box until I retrieve it. The overseas server should not come into play? Is this behavior akin to the observation by some that when they retrieve their Verizon email via Yahoo or Google, they don't get the same volume of spam as they get when they get the email directly from Verizon? I never quite understood that? Verizon is just as deep pocketed as Google and more deep pocketed than Yahoo, neither of which is a monopoly, so why can't they provide even half way decent spam protection?

The only other possibly pertinent info I can add is that I the hotel I stayed at was Spanish owned but in an English speaking country. The provider of the Wifi is based in Spain.

Thoughts?

And yes, I have gotten the usual daily dose of SPAM, every single day since I returned to the US.
tlbepson
Premium Member
join:2002-02-09
dc metro

tlbepson

Premium Member

I've never used my verizon email account but I do check it every once in a while and I do get some spam--very little really. I have no idea why the spam ceased while you were overseas and then started again when you were back in the US and it is weird--perhaps you should go overseas more often??? '-}}

Basically it seems to me that your email address has gotten on some list that is passed around by spammers--I get weird spam from India on one of my email accounts and I have yet to figure out where/how I got on such a list since the last time I was in India was many eons ago well before email existed...
thetick
join:2009-06-22
White Plains, NY

thetick to NtrLpr7

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to NtrLpr7
I noticed the Verizon Spam Detector seems to work well or I just don't get any spam. Anyway login to your wen email account and at the top pick Settings -->Email Settings --> Spam Detector

Enable it.
tlbepson
Premium Member
join:2002-02-09
dc metro

tlbepson to NtrLpr7

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I had another thought (always dangerous...'-}})...you didn't really say what sort of spam you are gettting but if what you are seeing are bounce messages that would indicate that your email address is being used (spoofing). It may not help but...

Change the password on your verizon email account just in case...
Carnivore
join:2003-01-06

Carnivore to thetick

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to thetick
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Oh yeah, Verizon Spam detector works great. Here's mine -- 11 spams caught and nearly 400 spams in my IN Box.

That doesn't even factor in the most obvious ones that used to sail right through before I set up manual filters to block them.
NtrLpr7
join:2014-09-01

NtrLpr7 to thetick

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to thetick
I don't mean to come across as snarky but do you honestly think I would go through the trouble of providing detailed information and soliciting advice on a knowledgeable technical forum such as this without having the spam detector turned on first?

The reason for using the maximum 50 allowed individual spam filters is that the spam detector by itself catches very little spam. It only seems to catch spam with my username in the subject line of spam hawking male enhancement medications. No matter how many times I forward missed spam to spamdetector.notcaught@verizon.net after marking it as spam, the same spam shows up days later being sent from a new source. The only thing that works is to set up key word filters.

For example, on 8-23-14 I received spam from "LifeLock". I labeled it as spam and forwarded it to the Verizon spam not caught email address. I received identical spam on 8-27-14. I did the same thing. I received the same spam again on 8-30-14. I did the same thing. If I have marked something as spam 3 times and the spam detector still lets it through, I have found that the only was to stop it is to set up a filter that deletes incoming email if the from field contains LifeLock.

On 8-25-14 I received spam from "Miracle Smoke". I labeled it as spam and forwarded it to the Verizon spam not caught email address. I received identical spam on 8-28-14. I did the same thing. I received the same spam again on 8-31-14. I did the same thing. I have found that the only was to stop it is to set up a filter that deletes incoming email if the from field contains Miracle or Smoke.

The problem is that Verizon only allows their users to set manually set up 50 such filters and I have already used up my allotment of 50 to trap the top 50 spam I regularly get which is a drop in the bucket. I don't see why Verizon can't do the same thing or allow me unlimited filters. Unlimited filters won't stop spam but at least it will get rid of the repetitive spam.

And just to clarify, all spam emails that have "LifeLock" in the from field were sent from different email addresses. Same for all repetitive emails. No surprise there. I never set up filters based on email addresses. I set them up based on key words and the filters work. The spam detector does not.
NtrLpr7

NtrLpr7 to tlbepson

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to tlbepson
I am seeing regular garden variety spam that hawks everything under the sun. I know what mailer-daemon bounced emails look like when ones email address has been spoofed. I was one of those whose email address at another large well known email provider was hacked last year. In that case they spoofed my email address so they didn't actually need my password. All they needed was my email address and the entire contents of my address book. From what I read online, the hackers got that info directly from the servers of the email provider. I did change my password then.
Carnivore
join:2003-01-06

1 recommendation

Carnivore

Member

I honestly don't think Verizon gives a flying you-know-what about controlling spam. In fact they probably let it through deliberately, hoping all their customers will switch to Gmail so they can save money on providing email services.
NtrLpr7
join:2014-09-01

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An additional note. From the screen grabs provided by Carnivore, I can attest that I have some of the same key word filters and some of the same spam in my inbox. The only difference is that I set my filters to delete as opposed to automatically sending them to Verizon (which now that I see it done makes more sense than how I've been doing it). If we are independently reporting the same spam to Verizon it would be fair to assume that 1000s of other spam overwhelmed Verizon customers are doing the same thing and yet the SPAM Detector does diddly squat.

I just don't get how I get swamped with spam every single day except for when I am outside the country for a continuous period with limited web access.
tlbepson
Premium Member
join:2002-02-09
dc metro

1 edit

tlbepson to NtrLpr7

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>>ntrlpr7: I am seeing regular garden variety spam that hawks everything under the sun.

I figured that's the type you were probably getting but also figured it was worth a shot to ask about the other--I had one of my email accounts hacked last year which was really annoying and I had a huge volume of bounce messages.

I use Thunderbird to retrieve my mail (for most of my email accounts) and I don't use the standard Tbird address book but created my own and I don't know if that's what protected my addresses from being swiped but fortunately it didn't get hit. I also never keep any contact/address info within the web-portal for any of my email addresses. I don't have a mobile phone (my hearing loss precludes the use of one) so I don't know how address books/contact lists work in that environment.
tlbepson

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>>ntrlpr7: I just don't get how I get swamped with spam every single day except for when I am outside the country for a continuous period with limited web access.

It's actually sort of creepy as though you/your systems are being followed. I'm guessing that you run antivirus and anti-malware on your systems?

Might be interesting to see what happens if (and if it's not too much of a pain in the ass) you were to not to have your systems on/online for a day or two--obviously while you are here in the US--to see what would happen.

My thought is that while you are out of the country your pc/mac systems are shut down and you are only using your phone/other people's systems to get mail?
NtrLpr7
join:2014-09-01

NtrLpr7

Member

said by tlbepson:

Might be interesting to see what happens if (and if it's not too much of a pain in the ass) you were to not to have your systems on/online for a day or two--obviously while you are here in the US--to see what would happen.

My thought is that while you are out of the country your pc/mac systems are shut down and you are only using your phone/other people's systems to get mail?

Correct, I shut down my computer but kept the router turned on when I left the country. However, spam was delivered to my iphone once I landed back on US soil and turned on my iphone inside the airport terminal. My computer at home was still shut down as it was while I was overseas.

While I cannot explain it and no one here has, I am going to assume that different networks have different SPAM filters. Like one contributor said, Verizon clearly has no interest in combating SPAM since it in no way affects their profitability. A small overseas ISP that provides Wifi services to hotels has a much greater vested interest in combating SPAM since if they don't, their clients will go elsewhere and they cannot absorb the financial hit. A US telco monopoly doesn't have to worry about losing customers.
NtrLpr7

NtrLpr7 to Carnivore

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Even though I came up empty here, I've continued to Google around the SPAM issue and I at least now have some understanding of why manual filters succeed where the Verizon spam detector fails.

I noticed that ALL the SPAM that gets through to my inbox has one thing in common. Regardless of what the subject line or FROM line text says (i.e. no matter what they are hawking Auto Warranty, Term Life Insurance, or High Quality Printer Ink, etc. or whether the SPAM is from "Auto Protection", "Metlife Term Life", "1ink", etc.) when I am in the process of forwarding the uncaught spam to Verizon, the FROM always shows up as:

From: "=?ISO-8859-1? followed by a long string of symbols

or

From: "=?UTF-8? also followed by a long string of symbols

instead of what shows in my inbox.

I don't understand the technicals, but apparently this is some sort of encoding that the email system can read and translate into the text we as spam victims see but the Verizon spam detector cannot. A manual spam filter is applied after SPAM is delivered not before and it only sees the translated text and thus can catch it.

Another characteristic of the SPAM I get is that it all gets sent in mass blocks typically over a short time frame.....say 5:34 am to 5:46 am one day or some completely different time block the next day.

One more thing. All the spam I get that does not get caught by the Verizon SPAM detector, no matter what it is hawking or who it is from, always has a green box at the bottom that says:

To manage your subscriptions please click here or write us at: PO Box 660675 #26548 Dallas, Texas 75266-0675

Just above that is always an "unsubscribe" link which as everyone knows is really a "verify that your email address is valid and current so that we can sell it to other spammers" link.

Rattler
join:2001-04-13
Havertown, PA

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to thetick
said by thetick:

I noticed the Verizon Spam Detector seems to work well or I just don't get any spam. Anyway login to your wen email account and at the top pick Settings -->Email Settings --> Spam Detector

Enable it.

I have my main account and 5 sub-accounts that I use for various email contact points. My main account and one sub-account get inundated with SPAM from a bunch of spoofed senders - the rest of my accounts are SPAM free. Both accounts get the same crap at the same time. The two accounts are used for widely different contact bases and there is no commonality between them. I have filters set in my email client to only allow certain emails into its inbox. The rest are directed to a SPAM folder.

That's not really satisfactory since if I want to add a new, acceptable sender, I have to put them on the acceptable list. If I mess up, then the wanted email goes to the SPAM folder. The "from" header and the IPs are all different, even with multiple emails of the same subject so I can't flag a particular source as SPAM.

I have V's spam filter turned on for all my accounts and it intercepts only a few if these pieces of crap mail (30 - 40 per day get through). V's spam filter catches maybe one or two per day. For that matter, V's spam filter flags more of the emails I want than it does the bad ones. So, I have to log into webmail and STILL scan through the SPAM folder to weed out the good emails.

Bottom line is that V's spam filter is very INEFFECTIVE at catching the bulk of the crap emails the OP is talking about.

I've also noticed that there is no "To" header in any of the SPAM emails and the "From" headers are all over the place, even on repeated emails.
tlbepson
Premium Member
join:2002-02-09
dc metro

tlbepson to NtrLpr7

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to NtrLpr7
>>ntrlpr7: From: "=?ISO-8859-1? followed by a long string of symbols or From: "=?UTF-8? also followed by a long string of symbols

Yes...those are encodings for which font-set to use and it very well may be that is what is allowing the emails to get through the spam filters.




>> However, spam was delivered to my iphone once I landed back on US soil and turned on my iphone inside the airport terminal. My computer at home was still shut down as it was while I was overseas.

Ahhh...see I forgot that you'd mentioned that.




>>I am going to assume that different networks have different SPAM filters.

Yes, I think that's accurate and given your experience, I think that is probably the likely explanation.
thetick
join:2009-06-22
White Plains, NY

thetick to Carnivore

Member

to Carnivore
said by Carnivore:

Oh yeah, Verizon Spam detector works great. Here's mine -- 11 spams caught and nearly 400 spams in my IN Box.

That doesn't even factor in the most obvious ones that used to sail right through before I set up manual filters to block them.

Works fine for me as I disabled the spam filter for a day and got lots of Viagra / male enlargement emails. Then the next day I enabled the spam detector and all the Viagra / male enlargement emails are gone.

I suspect your definition of SPAM is much more broad then Verizon's definition.
Carnivore
join:2003-01-06

Carnivore

Member

Good for you. You're going to argue the definition of SPAM? What are you, a Verizon CSR rep?

Forged headers, ISO characters obscuring the subject line, fake text accompanied by an embedded image carrying the spam message from a fraudulent seller I've never done business with, for products like credit repair, dating sites, health scams etc. Yes, it's all spam.

Gary A
join:2008-03-02
Odessa, FL

Gary A to NtrLpr7

Member

to NtrLpr7
said by NtrLpr7:

Even though I came up empty here, I've continued to Google around the SPAM issue and I at least now have some understanding of why manual filters succeed where the Verizon spam detector fails.

I noticed that ALL the SPAM that gets through to my inbox has one thing in common. Regardless of what the subject line or FROM line text says (i.e. no matter what they are hawking Auto Warranty, Term Life Insurance, or High Quality Printer Ink, etc. or whether the SPAM is from "Auto Protection", "Metlife Term Life", "1ink", etc.) when I am in the process of forwarding the uncaught spam to Verizon, the FROM always shows up as:

From: "=?ISO-8859-1? followed by a long string of symbols

or

From: "=?UTF-8? also followed by a long string of symbols

instead of what shows in my inbox.

I don't understand the technicals, but apparently this is some sort of encoding that the email system can read and translate into the text we as spam victims see but the Verizon spam detector cannot. A manual spam filter is applied after SPAM is delivered not before and it only sees the translated text and thus can catch it.

Another characteristic of the SPAM I get is that it all gets sent in mass blocks typically over a short time frame.....say 5:34 am to 5:46 am one day or some completely different time block the next day.

One more thing. All the spam I get that does not get caught by the Verizon SPAM detector, no matter what it is hawking or who it is from, always has a green box at the bottom that says:

To manage your subscriptions please click here or write us at: PO Box 660675 #26548 Dallas, Texas 75266-0675

Just above that is always an "unsubscribe" link which as everyone knows is really a "verify that your email address is valid and current so that we can sell it to other spammers" link.

I am experiencing the same type of spam and have yet to be able to stop it before it gets downloaded to my PC --> »Vz Email Spam Detector Not Catching ISO Encoded Messages