Forty Percent of All Email is Spam 625
PCOL writes "There's an interesting article on spam in today's Washington Post which includes an inside look at AOL's spam control center in Northern Virginia. The story reports that roughly 40 percent of all e-mail traffic in the US is now spam, up from 8 percent in late 2001 and nearly doubling in the past six months; that AOL's spam filters now block 1 billion messages a day; and that spam will cost U.S. organizations more than $10 billion this year from lost productivity and the equipment, software and manpower needed to combat the problem."
Good percentage (Score:2, Funny)
sure, sure. (Score:4, Funny)
Re:sure, sure. (Score:3, Funny)
Another stat (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Another stat (Score:2)
40% ...? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:40% ...? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:False Positives? (Score:3, Interesting)
I remember one instance not too long ago where AOL even admitted that address had been forged and they were blocking incorrect
now i get spam (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:now i get spam (Score:5, Insightful)
However did you notice in the article it said:
"nearly doubling in the past six months, according to Brightmail Inc., a major vendor of anti-spam software."
So I'm not 100% sure the stats can be believed - it's in their interest to tell you it's all doom and gloom. It's even in their interest to have you spammed, but that of course would be conspiracy theory central...
YAW.
Only 40%? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Only 40%? (Score:5, Funny)
Only for AOL? (Score:5, Insightful)
If it was AOL or Verizon, then I would think that the numbers would be skewed as they have sued spammers and those spammers have agreed not to send spam on those networks.
Grasshopper, remember the two rules of spammers.
1. Spammers lie.
2. If a spammer says anything, see rule 1.
100%-ish effective spam-prevention technique (Score:5, Informative)
I have two e-mail addresses. One gets nothing but spam, and the other gets no spam at all.
I have a free account at hotmail.com and a private one on a server that isn't owned by a big business. When I'm giving my address to someone I know personally, I give the private one. When I have to give an e-mail address to sign up for some service or to get some account, or basically whenever I'm giving my e-mail address but I don't know who is getting it, I give my hotmail account.
Result:
-My hotmail account occasionally gets confirmation e-mails when I've just created one of those free accounts for some website, but I always know when they're coming. Otherwise, it just collects spam, which I periodically delete (and block the addresses it came from).
-My personal account never gets spam.
(I have a university account that forwards to my private account, so occasionally it gets what could be called "spam" that's aimed at univ. students, but if I stop the forwarding it stops the spam, so I don't really have a problem.)
Re:100%-ish effective spam-prevention technique (Score:5, Insightful)
It's also possible that a spammer could harvest email addresses using a Outlook virus that infected one of your friends or anyone who has been sent an email that has your email address in the header (or body for that matter).
I don't know if these sort of viruses are common but if they're not now they could be in the future.
Having multiple email addresses is a good idea but, unfortunately, not a perfect solution. Once your "safe" email address is in the hands of a spammer they can pass it on to other spammers and it can become unusable quite quickly.
Accuracy (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Accuracy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Accuracy (Score:3, Interesting)
Not terribly. Several years ago, after I first got broadband, I set up my own mail server because my ISP's was constantly going down. I've run it since then with no trouble.
Several weeks ago, I started getting bounces on mail I sent to AOL addresses. Turns out AOL uses lists of IP addresses that are known to belong to ISPs but not be their mail servers and refuses connections from them.
Their attitude is that I have no business running my own mail server, t
Re:Accuracy (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Accuracy (Score:5, Insightful)
This might be inconvient for you, but this system exists as a deterent to spammers. Don't like it? Get your own IP addresses for home use or host your own domain somewhere (that's what I do).
Re:Accuracy (Score:4, Funny)
Hey, hey, hey.
What did a pit full of decaying fecal matter do to deserve being filled with spammer?
Have some respect for shit, man.
Optimistic (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Optimistic (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Optimistic (Score:5, Informative)
Cost/Benefit (Score:2, Funny)
Does not surprise me (Score:2, Insightful)
Anyway, I get about 1800 messages a day, total. Messages are ran through procmail and a complex spam filtering perl script that I wrote for myself. about 600-700 messages are blocked per day, therefore being more than 40%.
I'd also state that most SMB popups are SPAM.
in my inbox today: (Score:3, Funny)
Maybe that's the way to go... (Score:2, Interesting)
Sure, we'll still have to worry about foreign sources, but I'm sure the U.N. will be happy to help with this issue.
Sounds about right to me (Score:5, Interesting)
550 Spammer Go Away!
Re:Sounds about right to me (Score:3, Interesting)
A friend of mine is a sysadmin at Vanderbilt University in TN. He said they can only place spam filters on client machines, and that no filtering is allowed on the receiving server whatsoever. I asked him why, and he said they believed it was unjust to assume that any message was unwanted by the users, that it was their choice alone to decide what was spam and what was not.. Pretty insane if you asked me.
Re:Sounds about right to me (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Sounds about right to me (Score:5, Funny)
Re:How much "real" mail is lost? (Score:5, Funny)
Those few people can type "enlarge my penis" into Google and click on a link that comes up.
What is spam? (Score:3, Interesting)
This is exactly what we need... (Score:2)
Once spam makes a substantial dent in corporate america's profits, you can bet there will be a federal law passed banning the practice. Granted, we slashdotters might not like the fact that Corporate America(tm) controls Congress, but in this case, it can actually do us some good...
And the best way to do this (Score:3, Interesting)
Let's face it; if we focus solely on the spammers themselves, we'll have little luck reducing the flow.
But if the court system allow people to sue the companies that contracted out for spam, a few hefty verdicts might cause corporations to think otherwise.
Spam Control (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm no software designer, but surely we could find some concept for migrating off of SMTP and POP and to a better, more secure protocol.
Other thoughts?
-cheezus_es_lard
Re:Spam Control (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not a technical issue (ignoring open relays, which can already be fixed without changing any protocols).
The fundamental issue is that one of the most important uses of email is to let anybody, anywhere email you, with no hassle. Of course, spammers take advantage of that.
What's needed is accountability. Give someone internet or smtp access? Make sure you have a way of billing them for any spam they send, and put it in big letters when they sign up.
Re:Spam Control (Score:4, Insightful)
At what % do we look around and say, its time for a new protocol with spam avoidance built in?
50, 60, 75?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Take this with a grain of salt (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Take this with a grain of salt (Score:5, Informative)
No, the article states that 40% of email is spam.
Which, frankly, seems low. But perhaps they're including corporate email, which often sees a much lower spam level.
I'm still trying to find estimates on how much of all Internet traffic is from SMTP -- I've seen estimates of anything from 5% to 30%.
BrightMail (Score:4, Interesting)
They monitor a LOT of mail boxes...many customers plus many created mailboxes for spam. If a message hits a number of mailboxes in a short time span that message is forwarded to their NOC. A person looks at it and decides if it's spam. If so they tag it as spam before sending it to other customers that receive it.
It works very well. We now block almost all of the spam we receive and have not had ONE single false positive.
Losing a figurative war on spam (Score:5, Insightful)
The answer to this shortcoming in the current email infrastructure is redesigning email protocols to allow spam to be stopped as it is sent.
I don't have the answer, but something that forces the sender to verify that the recipient will accept the message before it is relayed will be a start. I also like the idea that came from Microsoft recently of forcing the sender to pay the recipient a small amount of money.
The problem with bayesian filters is that they filter too much spam. The more people that use bayesian filters, the more messages the spammers will have to send to get through. Because it is almost free to send messages, they will continue to increase the number of messages they send until it gets to a point that email infrastructure can't handle it anymore.
Speaking from Experience (Score:4, Informative)
I will note that in general this is only coming to around 20% of our users. It is approximately 100 messages per user per day. This actually seems reasonable compared to one of my email accounts that is on a webpage.
So I would say the only reason the amount of spam is so low is that enough people in our firm don't give out their firm email addresses on the internet to strangers.
Although they do miss out on alot of great offers for Hovercraft Toys.
What say you "just hit delete" crowd? (Score:5, Insightful)
There are people who want to re-invent the email protocol to solve the problem. Yeah, doing something technological can help the FUTURE, but what are we going to do for the 5 years it takes to develop, implement, and deploy this new technology?
Think about it.
Re:What say you "just hit delete" crowd? (Score:4, Insightful)
Probably the same thing we would do if we didn't develop the tech. Just sit there and delete spam.
Re:What say you "just hit delete" crowd? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What say you "just hit delete" crowd? (Score:3, Interesting)
It's not that easy (or simple), friend. It's not just about giving your email address away to trusted folks, nor is it about placing your email in places that can be trolled from the web.
About 99.9% of my mail I get is spam. I receive about 2000 emails a day to my personal account and if I'm lucky, 3 of them are legit (I now mostly communicate with my family and friends via IM).
I run my own email server (and have since '93). The problem is that my s
Re:What say you "just hit delete" crowd? (Score:3, Insightful)
It
Explain
Re:What say you "just hit delete" crowd? (Score:3, Insightful)
We don't need new laws. The SPAM is already illegal. You can't enforce a NO SPAM list because a) spammers are difficult to track anyway and b) even if they weren't there is nothing finacially or otherwise
Re:I thought about it, and you know what? (Score:3, Insightful)
Restrictions on how/when/where some businesses can advertise. (Tobacco/Alcohol)
Nike v. Kasky [motherjones.com]
It's not as clear-cut as you make it sound.
Re:I thought about it, and you know what? (Score:3, Informative)
Wrong [abuse.net].
Re:I thought about it, and you know what? (Score:4, Interesting)
Seriously, what gave you that idea? Are corporations citizens? Do you think they have the right to vote? Does the second amendment apply to them? Does a sufficiently old corporation have the right to run for president, if it was founded in this country?
My impulse is to think that was an incredibly asinine statement, but I do not claim to be an expert on constitutional law. In fact, "mildly informed" is putting it too strongly. So educate me, back up the claim that "Corporate speech and individual speech are equally protected under the First Amendment."
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Technological solutions will be easiest (Score:5, Interesting)
A system like Hash Cash [cypherspace.org] could solve the problem. The most popular free mail clients could start including hash-cash postage with each sent message, and then in a couple of years' time start to drop incoming messages that don't have postage paid. AOL could include hash cash in their mail client easily. *Easily*. That spam-detection centre they run is not cheap. Even Microsoft would add hash cash to Outlook, Outlook Express and Hotmail, since it's another encouragement to upgrade to a new Outlook release (which of course requires a new Windows version).
Getting the whole world to upgrade its mail clients is a hard task, but getting every government in the world to pass anti-spam laws and enforce them is much harder. Goodness knows it's bad enough trying to get _one_ legislature to take a sane view on anything technology-related.
Re:Technological solutions will be easiest (Score:3, Interesting)
For example suppose the standard postage amount is a problem which typically requires five seconds of CPU time on modern systems. Then no proxy even if it were taken over by crackers could send out more than one spam every five seconds. This is a greatly
Re:Technological solutions will be easiest (Score:3, Interesting)
You
Re:Technological solutions will be easiest (Score:3, Interesting)
All this depends on the existence of open relay servers which take messages and compute the postage for them, presumably to support legacy email clients which don't add postage for themselves, and moreover are misconfigured to accept incoming messag
Re:Too many problems (Score:3, Interesting)
Also, note that if payment for messages (whether real cash or hash cash) becomes widely adopted, spam will stop because there won't be any money in it any longer. So the problem of costs to the ISP is also dealt with.
Of course it is possible for ISPs to configure
What's the point? (Score:3, Interesting)
First, a fundamental problem: There IS NO COMMUNICATION between your mail client and a sender. Therefore, you have no way of submitting the hash problem TO the sender, he can only return an answer. Therefore, if this even happens, it HAS to be server-based. Re-read the site you quoted, nowhere do they talk about mail clients. There's a reason.
I wasn't thinking of the cost to the SMTP server but of the human cost of spam - wasted time in deleting it and the fact that people are turned off email altog
Re:What's the point? (Score:4, Interesting)
I could be wrong on this but having looked at the hash cash site I think that no communication from receiver to sender is necessary. The problem is based on the message body and the recipient name. The sender knows these at the beginning.
The costs to ISPs in the short term will be no worse than at present. In the long term costs to ISPs will fall as spam traffic declines.
You are right that adoption is a problem but that is no reason not to start now. Of the 10% of messages I get that are not spam, almost all are from relatively knowledgeable people who can upgrade to the latest version of Pine or whatever to get hash postage. For other users, it just needs AOL or Microsoft to put out a new release, which as likely as not will be an automatic update. Attaching postage to your message increases CPU load, but only for a few seconds per message sent, and even that can happen in the background.
The advantage over the status quo is that legitimateness of a message can be checked *automatically*. That is the point, you don't have to have your time wasted by checking and deleting spam, this job can be done by the computer. Children do not have to look at pornographic messages, etc etc. Saving time for humans, not computers, is the most important thing. Though like I said, in the long term making spam uneconomical will reduce the load on ISPs as well.
And unlike Bayesian filtering there is no way around it, the message has to cost a few seconds of CPU time or else the postage will not be valid. (Assuming the hash function is cryptographically secure in the sense there is no easy way to get either partial or total collisions with a given hash value.)
isn't it ironic??? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:isn't it ironic??? (Score:3, Insightful)
Spammunition (Score:5, Informative)
Bayesian filters are definitely the way to go. They flat-out *work*. Other programs I've used just didn't perform, like Cloudmark Spamnet.
The spam is hidden, not gone (Score:5, Insightful)
You, and your ISP, are paying for the bandwidth it uses. And if you ever had to travel and get email by dialup/cellphone... you can expect that you'll notice spam simply by the large delays it takes you to download email.
Client-side filters only mask the problem... it's like having an air-freshener and big fan in a public washroom.... the stink is still lingering in the background.
Re:Spammunition (Score:3, Insightful)
Don't get me wrong, I have been filtering spam for years. Filters can minimize the impact of the spam problem, but they do nothing to solve it.
Go after the businesses who pay spammers (Score:5, Insightful)
Here is a possible solution. Spammers cover their tracks. Well instead of trying to go after spammers go after the business that use them. Those businesses MUST be traceable because they include ways to buy their product. If we must make a law, which would only work in the US, it should say "You can't hire a spammer to send your mail". Then when www.pacificmeds.com sends me a spam for "save money on prescription drugs" they can be fined.
Go after the source, not the person who fills the need. Once the need is squashed by the law spam will reduce greatly.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Go after the businesses who pay spammers (Score:3, Interesting)
Started working for new company under contract. Help the bossman w/ his spam. Make him do it legitimately by unconfirming all lists and sending reconfirmation notices. Result: 60% reconfirm (including people who had reported us for spamming before). Now we have nice, clean lists and the reply-to/return-path headers are actually LEGIT! Imagine that... an honest bulk mailer. Too bad our rep is already soured. We even have people who are afraid to click on the unconfirm links f
I hate spam (Don't we all) (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem is that nobody can find a reasonable solution. Here are some examples of common solutions:
1."Make spam illegal out right."
Problem: OK, this is a bit extreme. Even if you did manage to do that, companies from outside the US or companies/people can hide where the e-mails are coming from, good luck catching them.
2."Charge for e-mails."
Problem: The people that want that are the post office folks. I seriously doubt anybody would sit back and allow this. Just thinking about pisses me off.
3."Find the people that send spam and destroy them."
Problem: OK, this is my personal favorite. But, the goverment already made that illegal. It's like the saying goes: "Some people are alive simply because it is illegal to kill them." BTW, all of you peeps out there that are going to yell at me for suggesting something like that: RELAX, IT WAS A JOKE!!! Have a sense of humor for goodness sake.
That's just my opinion,
SirLantos
in other news ... (Score:5, Funny)
Ratio is higher here (Score:3, Interesting)
A simple solution is replacing the broken SMTP with something that requires authentication and doesnt give you the ability to modify the headers unless you run the server. If the spammers have to use real email addresses or had a real way of tracking them easily attached to every email, they would stop.
Just like how cockroaches scatter when you turn on the lights.
Psychological profile of spammers (Score:3, Interesting)
My theory: most spammers are the cyber equivalent of "flashers" - sexual deviants who derive thrill from shocking unsuspecting citizens. I believe that the products offered are largely irrelevant. It is the shock value which motivates the spammer. Perhaps they could be prosecuted under similar sex crimes laws that allow us to go after the "flasher".
40 percent by number or by size ? (Score:5, Interesting)
So, when they say 40%, is that by number of messages or total size?
Sturgeon's Law (Score:5, Funny)
White list with pass code (Score:5, Informative)
Now, a white list like this can be bypassed by a spammer claiming to be a friend of mine. It can't claim to be me, because my filters automatically delete anything sent to my address claiming to come from me. I'm wondering if anyone else who has implemented a white list for themselves has seen any problems with it.
more like 60-70% (Score:5, Interesting)
Blocking spam before it gets to our main mail server has extended the life of our mail server indefinately. The less we have to spend on hardware, the more time and energy we can spend on building quality of service for our customers. That keeps the customers happy, and keeps the business people doubly happy, since they don't lose customers and don't have to buy new hardware every year for a mail system.
Not true (Score:3, Funny)
Several Easy Solutions (Score:3, Funny)
yep, we're all doomed (Score:5, Funny)
I figure I get about 425,000 a day myself at this point (er, give or take). It's at the point where it's getting painful to go through my SpamAssassin "caughtspam" folder. But there are still enough false positives (really, one is enough) that I can't send the whole thing to /dev/null.
Meanwhile, I'm accruing a great collection of classic spam subject lines. Some examples (all real):
- "I don't need your social security number yet"
- "this mom loves to stick hot dogs up her cooch"
- "Pill to Increase Your Ejaculation by 581%"
- "i am not perfect but i suck c0ck"
- "I got revenge by fucking! Here's proof
:)"
- "Mission: To fuck as many mothers as I can!"
- "Fucking Machines! 13IN,
.5HP, 350RPM"
- "Your slut wife boss need some action!"
- "#1 COLON CLEANSER! SEE PROOF"
- "Maybe your pets dream of intercourse with you"
Mmmm, society at its finest.What the article didn't say (Score:5, Interesting)
I get a lot more than 40% (Score:4, Funny)
Later,
gergi@aol.com
Sliding scale (Score:5, Informative)
Then, you get a few friends your email. General email volume increases. You sign up for some server or other and forget to use a protect email... spam starts to drip in.
A little while later, the drip becomes a trickle as your email gets sold again, and again, and spreads like splitting amoebas.
Then... a few friends send you e-cards around Christmas, or invite you to some joke sites etc. Not your really gonna get it (I strongly b*tch-out any who e-card me at my work address).
To top it off, a LUG or whatever you are posting to puts their history on a public website... you start getting picked up by spam-spiders.
So over time, one will go from maybe 0-5% spam, to 50+% spam. As more people get you in their address books, the more likely it is that somebody will let your email slip to a spam-source. And spam-sources sell your email to other spam-sources... it spreads like wildfire.
The best way to protect yourself is to use a difficult-to-guess, 9+ character email, for which you never sign up for anything with, and only give to people you trust not to e-card you or have "sniffers" installed on their system which gives away the address book. Using bounce addresses might help also, as you could then switch bounces but still pull from the main email, and then filter the ones that get messy or drop them.
Terrorism! (Score:5, Funny)
Accountability Void (Score:3, Insightful)
At the core of this problem is the Accountability Void, and the temptation that carries with it. When you look at the lengths that (some) ISPs and watchdogs go to block (much to libertarian chagrin) kiddie porn and other potentially offensive material, its clear that solving the spam problem is NOT about technical feasibility. If there was impetus there would be a solution. The problem is that the ISP can say "we dont send it, we dont receive it, its not our problem," the spammer can say "I send it, but I use fake accounts that get closed in 6 hours, so I don't have to take responsibility for it" and, for the most part, the receiver says "I received this, but theres really not much I can do about it." I describe this phenomenon as an "Accountability Void." No one is responsible for spam.
Until there is an accountability structure in place, either legislative, technical, or economic, spam will go on. One of these days, AOL or some other "big enough" player is going to do something that will "change everything" like demand digital signatures, or some other method that fills the accountability void and spam will cease to be a problem.
It's not just quantity but SIZE (Score:3, Informative)
Total Volume Sent on as Clean Mail: 211 (342.3KB ) 44.8%
Total Spam Messages: 260 (1.4MB ) 55.2%
This is the most important evil of the spam flood; not only do I not want it but it's huge!
40% is an understatement (Score:5, Informative)
You can see our mail stats here [hiwaay.net].
Compare it to the real world: (Score:3, Insightful)
About 18 percent of the traffic carried by the US Postal Service is bulk mailing, but USPS studies say that postal employees spend 25 percent of their time sorting it. All a waste? Keep in mind that the DMA asserts the $50 billion was raised as a result of bulk mailings by charities.
I'd be interested in knowing what the total load on our economy is from the two forms, inluding manpower, network load, inconvenience etc. My suspicion is that the hyperventilation over spams growth is driving up the percieved cost, especially when you consider the cheapness of bandwidth, and that spam control is an automation battle leaving the real expensive resource, humans, to design the filters and clean up what they miss.
"The spammers are evil folks," Evil? Like Hitler evil?
Opportunists, yes. Using mildly unethical means to further themselves in business venture, often. But I wonder how many people who are apoplectic about the "evilness" of spammers cheat on their wives, cheat on their taxes, park in handicapped zones, etc. . .All no more evil than faking a return address, and certainly no less.
-----
Why 40% does not seem unrealistic. (Score:3, Insightful)
Whitelists! (Score:3, Interesting)
Remove the Filters (Score:3, Insightful)
What if for one day - 24 hours - everyone who is running a spam filter at any level simply took the filters down. Show the users what the real flood of junk looks like. I bet the hue and cry would provoke real efforts - legal or technical - to solve the problem once and for all.
I find myself thinking; what's all the fuss about, I only actually see a half dozen spam messages a day in my Hotmail and POP accounts. But I know that for every piece I see there are untold dozens being blocked by filters. Filters merely hide the scope of the problem from the end users, but ISP's still have to deal with the bandwidth.
Take down the filters for a day and let everyone see the real scope of the horror that is spam
-Jetset
- I can't hear the forest for all the falling trees-
Disposable Email Addresses -- Effective? (Score:5, Informative)
- Spam Gourmet [spamgourmet.com]
- Spamex [spamex.com]
- Sneakemail [sneakemail.com]
- Mailsehll [mailshell.com]
- Emailias [emailias.com]
General information about disposable email addresses can be found in this PC Magazine article [pcmag.com] and this about.com article [about.com].Briefly, I'll explain how they work in theory. After signing up with a disposable email service, they give you a disposable email address that you can, for example, enter into forms. Mail sent to that disposable email address gets automatically forwarded to your email account of choice. But here's where they supposedly come in handy. You can sign up for a different disposable email address everytime you fill in a web form. If you start getting spam, you can look at the disposable email address the spam was sent to and you can do 2 things: (1) cancel the disposable email address so you no longer get spam sent to that address; and (2) you know who gave out your disposable address and you can take whatever action you deem appropriate.
This seems like a cool product, in theory, but I haven't seen anyone with real world experience with these services. If anyone here can describe their experiences, it would be greatly appreciated.
Charge Spammers For Spell Checking (Score:4, Funny)
Rackspace (Score:3, Informative)
It just seems to odd to refresh the page to see more comments about spam, and I get a banner ad promoting one of the larger spammer hosters in the US ... Rackspace. Those who sign up for service from those scumbags are just as bad as the scumbags because that effectively helps support the spam they keep pounding my servers with. So far today, 98 attempts just from Rackspace addresses. Yesterday there was a total of 240.
And while previewing this comment submission, yet another Rackspace banner ad. Don't these guys know I'm never, ever, going to pay them for any services?
The cost of spam from an ISP point of view (Score:3, Interesting)
Our abuse department is manned by one person 365 days a year, a bunch of scripts, a largish database integrated with our customers database, and lots of red tape. This person calls our customers when they are the source of spam or other non UCE conforming use of our network (including running an open-relay). He explains the situation politely and asks the customer to conform to the policy written in the contract. If the customer does not comply after the first warning, he must look for another ISP to do business with, for we send him an official letter (with official receipt acknowledgement)each time we interact with him.
All in all, given our company size, a bit over 1% of our costs are burnt by our abuse department. Needless to say, we relay these costs to our customers, as do most of our competitors.
This is only half of the cost of spam from our point of view. Our mail servers farm is sized in order to perform well even with 40% of the mail being spam. These are larger human and hardware costs associated with spam as well (though more diluted and thus difficult to pinpoint).
Spam costs people and companies a lot of money, we feel the need for the Internet mail system to be reengineered in order for the cost of sending email to become high enough so that spammers don't get away with their offense.
The Brightmail report is not a big surprise.
Re:My tests shows (Score:5, Interesting)
Since the logs were cycled on Sunday morning, there have been 8332 messages, 5824 of which were spam, for a percentage of 69.89%.
This number has increased substantially over the last 3 weeks. This time last month we were below 50%.
Re:Spam is like TV advertising (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Why does spam work? (Score:4, Funny)
-Men with small penises who are insecure about them
-Someone who wants a diploma but is too dumb to go to college
-Someone gullible enough to think that they can buy pure human growth hormone for 29.95 a bottle.
-A person who really doesn't know how to find a teenage beastiality plump asian tranny webcam on their own with a search engine
-Someone who wants to "make money fast" and has never been burned by a scam before. (Or is too dumb to see that this is one)
Should I go on?
Think about how many complete fucking morons you run into every single day, now understand that about 75% of them have email addresses and receive spam. Out of 10 million spams, all it takes is a few gullible fools to give a return on investment.
People sometimes ask my why I rag on stupid people so much. It's because their ignorance causes me inconvenience in many forms...spam is one of those forms. (others include needing ID to buy liquor, pot being illegal, and car insurance in denver being so fucking high)
Re:A 3 Point Program to Eliminate Spam Completely (Score:3, Informative)
2. if you "legally" require software to contain certain settings, and that software is open source, it would be pretty easy to get around any settings that are "legally" put in place. This is called tarpitting, and is alre