add14pw
join:2004-01-26
| reply to ojing
Re: Blocklisting? Ho hum
If he's sending directly from his computer (not via the Optimum Online SMTP server) much of his email is going to be blocked by me, AOL and many other places. Mail direct from dynamic addresses is routinely blocked these days because of spam from machines which are compromised by security problems.
Also, if a spamming attack does get a machine on the OO network, that machine's IP address is rapidly added to the spam source blacklists and gets blocked by lots of other people. That sort of blacklist will often be used to block the email if it was from the IP address at any point, even if it was sent via the legitimate SMTP server ultimately.
Some blacklists are also not very well handled and may block the whole domain instead of just the compromised machines. These are probably mostly the places which haven't yet discovered that blocking mail coming directly from dynamic addresses is less disruptive. This is particularly problematic when some exploits and spam uses bogus from addresses.
Spamming software can also use the legitimate SMTP server of OO once it gets on the machine, so that can end up with the legitimate OO outgoing SMTP server blocked for a while (hopefully only for a while).
The best he can do is send via the OO SMTP server instead of directly (if he's sending directly) and suffer when OO takes too long to catch abuse of that SMTP server. |
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ojing
join:2004-03-09
Norwalk, CT
| reply to Rhobite
His machine is clean. Latest AV, router and Macintosh help with that. But the IPs are dynamic and he gets allocated addresses that are on black lists. Curious, I was looking to see which ones but could not find any, I was hoping that BBR could shed some light on this. Was the Optimumonline rep spewing? Do they run open proxys or relays? Seems unlikely in this day and age but perhaps the only obstacle to spam on their system is via MAC addresses.
Don't know. Would be interesting to find out. Give us DSL users something to fling back into the face of the superfast optimumonline crowd (other than reliable mail and free dial-up accounts). |
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Rhobite
Premium
join:2002-02-24
Cambridge, MA
clubs:
| reply to ojing
Well does he have any spam trojans? That would be my first question. My second question would be, what blocklists did he make it onto? Is his IP on the Spamcop spam sources list? Does he change IP often?
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Jimmysquid.com - I take pictures. |
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