17 Oct
2010
17 Oct
'10
noon
I see there still are a few folks on Erik's VC forum trying unsuccessfully
to sign up on cctalk; wasn't there some talk recently about taking some of
the load off Jay's plate and giving approval authority to one or two other
people?
Or are new members intentionally being discouraged to keep down the volume,
etc., as some folks are speculating?
mike
17 Oct
17 Oct
12:14 p.m.
On Sun, 17 Oct 2010, MikeS wrote:
I see there still are a few folks on Erik's VC
forum trying unsuccessfully to
sign up on cctalk; wasn't there some talk recently about taking some of the
load off Jay's plate and giving approval authority to one or two other
people?
From what Jay has told me, the spammers applying to the list is what
locked it down
in the first place and he's unable to keep up with the
number of sub requests. Essentially, legitimate users are being drowned
out by the volume of spammers trying to subscribe to the list.
I suggested that he ask the subscriber to email him a "reason" to
subscribe to the list - this would cut down on the spammers effectively -
if the reason isn't classic computer oriented, they're likely a spammer.
:)
This request could be added to the template file that MailMan uses to send
out the subscription confirmation link. Just include an email address
that would receive these "request reason" emails.
This system works really well for the 80sBBS list I work with at Yahoo!.
You can tell the spam requests because the reason falls into one of three
categories - random text, telling me how nice my "pic" is, or an offer to
help me improve my ability to bisect some unsuspecting female.
Or are new members intentionally being discouraged to
keep down the volume,
etc., as some folks are speculating?
Now THAT is utter nonsense. :)
g.
--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project
ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_!
18 Oct
18 Oct
1:53 a.m.
Captchas can also be attacked, but I am pretty sure that requiring a captcha
before going to a real person for final verification would significantly
reduce the volume of work.
Regards
Rob
-----Original Message-----
From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-
bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Evan Koblentz
Sent: 18 October 2010 02:07
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Re: Joining the list
>> legitimate users are being drowned out by
the volume of spammers
trying to subscribe to the list.
Can't that be solved by putting a human verification method (i.e.
Captcha) on the subscription page?
10:04 a.m.
On Mon, 18 Oct 2010, Christian Corti wrote:
On Sun, 17 Oct 2010, Evan Koblentz wrote:
WTF? Seriously? Having a "properly configured" email system has f*ck
all
to do with CAPTCHAs.
Are you hard of comprehending or something?
g.
--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project
ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_!
Can't that be solved by putting a human
verification method (i.e. Captcha)
on the subscription page?
Only clueless people use something like Captcha. You don't need this if you
have a properly configured mail system.
9:35 a.m.
On Sun, 17 Oct 2010, Evan Koblentz wrote:
As far as I know, MailMan doesn't support CAPTCHA.
g.
--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project
ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_!
>>
legitimate users are being drowned out by the volume of spammers trying
to
subscribe to the list.
Can't that be solved by putting a human verification method (i.e. Captcha) on
the subscription page?
2:49 a.m.
On 10/17/10 12:14 PM, Gene Buckle wrote:
This system works really well for the 80sBBS list I
work with at Yahoo!.
Urr? 80sBBS list? What sort of stuff is covered there? I mean,
sure, "80's BBSs of course", but...reunions with other former BBSers,
discussions about software, recreations, what? I was a HUGE BBSer back
in those days; I ran a small RCP/M system in NJ and was all over the
place with the fat phone bill.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL
9:55 a.m.
On Mon, 18 Oct 2010, Dave McGuire wrote:
On 10/17/10 12:14 PM, Gene Buckle wrote:
Here you go Dave:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/80sBBS/
g.
--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project
ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_!
This system works really well for the 80sBBS list
I work with at Yahoo!.
Urr? 80sBBS list? What sort of stuff is covered there? I mean, sure,
"80's BBSs of course", but...reunions with other former BBSers, discussions
about software, recreations, what? I was a HUGE BBSer back in those days; I
ran a small RCP/M system in NJ and was all over the place with the fat phone
bill.
10:04 a.m.
Can't we just have 2 current members vouch for the applicant to get them on
(kind of like how some BBS used to operate)?
10:11 a.m.
On 18/10/2010 15:04, Teo Zenios wrote:
Can't we just have 2 current members vouch for the
applicant to get
them on (kind of like how some BBS used to operate)?
There is one other mailing
list I know of which is 'closed' - all the
rest are open, and there are archives all over the place.
Trying to stop spammers harvesting addresses by making this list
'closed' is futile - all it takes is somebody with Outlook and malware
on their Windows box, and suddenly you have a whole load of email
addresses from the list harvested anyway :(
Peter
3:55 p.m.
On Monday, October 18, 2010, Teo Zenios wrote:
Can't we just have 2 current members vouch for the
applicant to get
them on (kind of like how some BBS used to operate)?
If someone posts to the list about someone that's having trouble
subscribing, the new person tends to get added pretty quickly.
Pat
--
Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org
4:37 a.m.
On Sun, 17 Oct 2010, Gene Buckle wrote:
From what Jay has told me, the spammers applying to
the list is what
locked it down in the first place and he's unable to keep up with the number
of sub requests. Essentially, legitimate users are being drowned out by the
volume of spammers trying to subscribe to the list.
That's nonsense, since there are free and very good solutions against spam
since many years now. If you run your site with Postfix configured to
reject mails from unresolvable and inexistant client and from addresses,
this will bring down your spam volume to about the half. And then add
SpamAssassin to scan the other mails, you can practically forget the spam
issue. Just add ClamAV, and you don't even have to bother about viruses.
You would be surprised. I've never undestood why site maintainers complain
about these issues despite the available means to fight against them.
Christian
8:53 a.m.
On Monday, October 18, 2010, Christian Corti wrote:
On Sun, 17 Oct 2010, Gene Buckle wrote:
That's not the entire problem. Part of it is people [spammers]
subscribing to the list to try to harvest email addresses from the mail
sent out by the list. How is spamassassin going to help with that?
Pat
--
Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org
From what Jay has told me, the spammers applying
to the list is
what locked it down in the first place and he's unable to keep up
with the number of sub requests. Essentially, legitimate users
are being drowned out by the volume of spammers trying to
subscribe to the list.
That's nonsense, since there are free and very good solutions against
spam since many years now. If you run your site with Postfix
configured to reject mails from unresolvable and inexistant client
and from addresses, this will bring down your spam volume to about
the half. And then add SpamAssassin to scan the other mails, you can
practically forget the spam issue. Just add ClamAV, and you don't
even have to bother about viruses. You would be surprised. I've
never undestood why site maintainers complain about these issues
despite the available means to fight against them. 
9:13 a.m.
On Oct 18, 2010, at 7:53 AM, Patrick Finnegan wrote:
On Monday, October 18, 2010, Christian Corti wrote:
News Flash: They're harvesting all our addresses already simply by crawling the
web-based archives. Their address harvesters are smart enough to read addresses obfuscated
by typing the word "at" instead of @ or "dot" instead of a period.
They can even read emails stored as images by simply OCRing the image. They have
million-node botnets that do this 24/7. CAPTCHAs are no problem for spammers either. They
simply set of "free porn" sites where unsuspecting humans solve them in exchange
for porn. Other spammers simply hire cheap labor and have the workers solve them for a few
pennies an hour. There is no technical measure you can take that they can't defeat.
Spam makes up over 75% of all email sent worldwide. As long as spam remains profitable,
they will continue to do it. Spamming is a multi-trillion dollar industry. There are
Chinese spam farms that make profits comparable to the GDP of a small country. They are
organized, highly skilled, and highly motivated.
On Sun, 17 Oct 2010, Gene Buckle wrote:
That's not the entire problem. Part of it is people [spammers]
subscribing to the list to try to harvest email addresses from the mail
sent out by the list. How is spamassassin going to help with that? From what Jay has told me, the spammers applying
to the list is
what locked it down in the first place and he's unable to keep up
with the number of sub requests. Essentially, legitimate users
are being drowned out by the volume of spammers trying to
subscribe to the list.
That's nonsense, since there are free and very good solutions against
spam since many years now. If you run your site with Postfix
configured to reject mails from unresolvable and inexistant client
and from addresses, this will bring down your spam volume to about
the half. And then add SpamAssassin to scan the other mails, you can
practically forget the spam issue. Just add ClamAV, and you don't
even have to bother about viruses. You would be surprised. I've
never undestood why site maintainers complain about these issues
despite the available means to fight against them.
10:06 a.m.
On Mon, 18 Oct 2010, Patrick Finnegan wrote:
On Monday, October 18, 2010, Christian Corti wrote:
It won't. Essentially, we're talking about runway maintenance while
he's
yammering on about the airplane. *sigh*
g.
--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project
ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_!
On Sun, 17 Oct 2010, Gene Buckle wrote:
That's not the entire problem. Part of it is people [spammers]
subscribing to the list to try to harvest email addresses from the mail
sent out by the list. How is spamassassin going to help with that?
From what Jay has told me, the spammers applying
to the list is
what locked it down in the first place and he's unable to keep up
with the number of sub requests. Essentially, legitimate users
are being drowned out by the volume of spammers trying to
subscribe to the list.
That's nonsense, since there are free and very good solutions against
spam since many years now. If you run your site with Postfix
configured to reject mails from unresolvable and inexistant client
and from addresses, this will bring down your spam volume to about
the half. And then add SpamAssassin to scan the other mails, you can
practically forget the spam issue. Just add ClamAV, and you don't
even have to bother about viruses. You would be surprised. I've
never undestood why site maintainers complain about these issues
despite the available means to fight against them.
10:02 a.m.
On Mon, 18 Oct 2010, Christian Corti wrote:
On Sun, 17 Oct 2010, Gene Buckle wrote:
To think it was only a short time ago when we discussed trying to teach
ones grandmother how to steal sheep.....
At any rate, the issue isn't blocking incoming email, it's spammers
subscribing to the list via the MailMan web interface. When you
subscribe, it sends a verification link to the address you subscribed.
Those happy little spammers have software that will happily go to the
enclosed URL in order to "verify" that the requestor actually wanted to
be subscribed to the list.
Of course, if you WANT spammers subscribing to your mailing list so you
have to play whack-a-mole with them....
g.
--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project
ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_!
From what Jay has told me, the spammers applying
to the list is what locked
it down in the first place and he's unable to keep up with the number of
sub requests. Essentially, legitimate users are being drowned out by the
volume of spammers trying to subscribe to the list.
That's nonsense, since there are free and very good solutions against spam
since many years now. If you run your site with Postfix configured to reject
mails from unresolvable and inexistant client and from addresses, this will
bring down your spam volume to about the half. And then add SpamAssassin to
scan the other mails, you can practically forget the spam issue. Just add
ClamAV, and you don't even have to bother about viruses. You would be
surprised. I've never undestood why site maintainers complain about these
issues despite the available means to fight against them.
5002
days inactive
5004
days old
17 comments
10 participants
participants (10)
-
cc＠informatik.uni-stuttgart.de -
dm561＠torfree.net -
dseagrav＠lunar-tokyo.net -
evan＠snarc.net -
geneb＠deltasoft.com -
mcguire＠neurotica.com -
pat＠computer-refuge.org -
peter.hicks＠poggs.co.uk -
robert.jarratt＠ntlworld.com -
teoz＠neo.rr.com