Microsoft Offers Tools to Spamming ISPs 105
Michael writes "Computer Business Review reports that 'Internet service providers curious to know how much spam they are sending Hotmail users will be able to get detailed reports on the topic, courtesy of a service Microsoft launched in beta yesterday.' Microsoft's new Smart Network Data Services, a part of the larger MSN Portmaster initiative, allows the owners of IP blocks to view reports on the volume of email being sent from their networks to Hotmail users, and see how much of that email is being flagged as spam."
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:And the real question (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:And the real question (Score:2)
Re:And the real question (Score:2)
Re:And the real question (Score:3, Interesting)
Sure they will... It'll help them calibrate their spam-blocking techniques. If the volume goes up (or stays the same) and the hit count drops, then they'll know that something's working especially well.
Re:And the real question (Score:2, Insightful)
They should care. If everyone was to reduce the amount of spam they are sending, then this will in turn reduce the amount of spam they are receiving and having to filter out. Creating less total spam and making each ISP's customers happier. These reports should also help in determining the zombies that they are currently serving and allow them to contact or 'pull the plug' on these customers.
Re:so confused ... (Score:1)
Re:And the real question (Score:2)
(before you all start, yes, they're opt-in, and they're limited subject lists anyway, so there's no reason to spam with them.)
Re:And the real question (Score:1)
My personal favorites to send people to include sewing and knitting sites.
They are VERY eager to sign people up, and they are right, they are totally opt-in, and all recipients have filled in the online form. Its just accidental that I give their address instead of my own.
Now, what do you think the annoyed recipient will do as soon as this hits his inbox (with a decvent provider)?
Re:And the real question (Score:2)
Re:And the real question (Score:3, Insightful)
It could be a preamble to a law suit. (Score:2)
If it isn't sorted, six months down the line they may have a case.
Re:And the real question (Score:1)
How long will it take Microsoft to react to the fact that spam condoning ISP's are using the results to help tune the content of spam being sent?
fp (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:fp (Score:3, Interesting)
Very little, i'd say. The thing is, a lot of the spam doesn't actually come from hotmail.
The bulk of it seems to come from virus infected spam zombie networks, carrying a fake from & return address specifying hotmail, or worse, some poor schmuck who has nothing whatsoever to do with the spam.
What's the solution? well, aside from lining up the spammers against a brick wall and shooting'em all, the SPF system seems to look promising, as do the well-run blocklists.
On the subject of blocklists, spamcop
SPF Checking Works Well (Score:2)
I'm looking forward to the day when I can change my SPF checking from "soft" (Allow domains without SPF records) to "hard." There are still a few mail servers I get mail through that
Re:fp (Score:2)
Spam to hotmail accounts I'd say is probably quite large too though.
Re:fp (Score:1)
Re:fp (Score:1)
Re:fp (Score:5, Informative)
When you look at where these messages are coming from, though, and compare them to the IPs hotmail uses for outgoing smtp... I don't actually see any messages that really came from them--they are almost entirely forged addresses.
Not that I have any love of MS/Hotmail, just sayin'.
What's the point logging "From" headers? (Score:1)
I have reported thousands of spam messages using spamcop.net, and haven't seen even one coming from Hotmail servers. I've seen many with forged Hotma
Finding False Positives and Trends (Score:2)
Re:fp (Score:2)
Oh great (Score:3, Funny)
Thanks Microsoft!
You aren't very smart, are you? (Score:2)
Re:You aren't very smart, are you? (Score:5, Insightful)
Even better. If you are a spammer, this gives you the most useful data ever: how much of my spam is actually being recognized as spam? I'd want my spam messages to be so clever or so interesting that users don't readily figure out that it's spam.
Of course, I'm not a spammer, and few who stoop to such pathetic marketing tactics would think enough to craft a message that ( to a person ) in not easily recognizable as spam, so I guess you have a point.
Re:You aren't very smart, are you? (Score:2)
Re:You aren't very smart, are you? (Score:1)
Or had you not heard of phishing?
Re:You aren't very smart, are you? (Score:2)
Re:You aren't very smart, are you? (Score:2)
You'll never outsmart a human (Score:2)
Really? (Score:2)
That's simply not true. The spammers may not be clever, but there are black-hat programmers who recognize the need and write easy-to-use software for generating spam that gets around filters. Have you not seen emails from someone named, say, "Rectum G. Arboretum" that has an advertising image, and a passage from an encyclopedia at the
Re:You aren't very smart, are you? (Score:1)
Re:You aren't very smart, are you? (Score:1)
And we all know how well that works with AOL's 'feedback loop' mechanism...
We have people that mail things like wedding pictures to AOL addresses.. and get marked as spam by the recipient. (Looked like a nice wedding, too, in Tilden Park in Berkeley..)
I get the job of telling our customer, "well, you mailed your wedding pictures to someone at AOL who apparently thinks it's spam... so please either tell your friend to stop marking your mail as spam
Fix windows (Score:3, Insightful)
Spotting zombies (Score:2)
You don't need feedback from Microsoft to tell you that you have zombies on your network. The question is, what are you going to do about them?
Perhaps this is Microsoft's way of saying, "We think you're spewing spam, and now you know we know it. Fix it or we'll stop accepting mail from you entirely."
Yeah, it would sure be better if Microsoft fixed its OS instead, and they're workin
Re:Fix windows (Score:1)
Publish the results (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Publish the results (Score:1)
And I think my sig speaks for itself when it comes to the terrorist methods of the spews blocklist.
The point is, we aren't going to solve spam by putting pressure on large ISPs using technical means.
MS is far bigger than Spamhaus (Score:3, Interesting)
I don't know what Microsoft has in mind, if anything, but a gentle threat may just be their first salvo.
Re:Publish the results (Score:1)
SPEWS attempts to use fear of being blacklisted to coerce people to change ISP, sue their ISP, or otherwise bend to their will. They are the very definition of terrorist.
Next..... (Score:1)
Please raise your hands... (Score:4, Insightful)
ummmm.. I dont see any.. Seriously, if ISP's were THAT concerned about the amount of spam their clients are generating, I wouldnt have to worry about spam, in the first place...
Careful MS... (Score:2)
Careful Microsoft...wouldn't want to get sued (again) would you? [slashdot.org]
They had to up the mailbox limit (Score:2)
Done... (Score:3, Informative)
BTW, you can do similar (Score:3, Interesting)
Sorry, I misread it... (Score:2)
Taking it to another level, I guess.
Re:Sorry, I misread it... (Score:1)
What does this run on? (Score:1)
Bravo... (Score:1)
Re:Bravo... (Score:2, Insightful)
Or maybe it's because spammers are forging the return addresses and they don't come from hotmail at all.
Re:Bravo... (Score:1)
Almost all the spam I see is from zombie PCs (Score:1)
Approximation (Score:2)
All of it.
Actually, it seems that almost all of my incoming mail is spam. I guess I don't know enough old people from Korea.
Are there really clueless ISPs who can't monitor their own SMTP traffic? They're paying by the bit for their outgoing volume, usually, so you'd think all of them would have a good handle on what is going out.
The ones who care already know. The o
Re:Approximation (Score:2)
Given the size of the internet, there are probably ISPs who can't even monitor their own total traffic.
Usually, ISPs don't pay by the bit, they pay for a pipe of a certain size - for example, $2000 a month for 100Mbps.
But even if they did pay per bit, SMTP accounts for less than 1% of
What about everyone else ? (Score:2)
Re:What about everyone else ? (Score:3, Interesting)
AOL has offered a feedback loop for years.
Information on how to activate it is available at http://postmaster.info.aol.com/fbl/index.html [aol.com].
MSN/Hotmail's offering is quite a bit different, and I'm not yet prepared to offer an opinion on which interface/mechanism is more useful.
Right now, we find the AOL feedback loop quite useful, as do many others.
More feedback loops for large mail providers are documented in this Spamhaus FAQ entry [spamhaus.org]
hotmail? what hotmail? (Score:1)
Re:hotmail? what hotmail? (Score:1)
wow (Score:4, Funny)
I would get better spam protection right? lol
Now that we've warned you ... (Score:2, Interesting)
Will MS(Hotmail) begin blocking those ISP's?
Will MS send them a notice saying something like, "... after $DATE we will bill you $BIGBUX per thousand spams. By continuing to spam our customers you agree to pay."
Frankly, it sounds good to me. Let the BigGorillas set the tone and practice for spam.
I made this up. Might happen. Might not. YMMV
Problem with Hotmail's filter (Score:1)
No legitimate uses? (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm no marketing whiz, but I'd lean toward #3 (Score:1)
I dont get it... (Score:1)
MS is so clueless (Score:1)
Re:They should give it to hotmail and MSN... (Score:1)
Portmaster (Score:2)
ISPs don't send spam (Score:2)
I find it amazing how the spam issue will turn people who everywhere else defend the end to end principle of internet design, along with other fundamental internet concepts such as flat-rate billing, opposition to port blocking and the rest -- to suddenly reverse themselves.
We all want to stop spam very much. Yet with spam, we're ready to shoot the packet forwarder (and even the other customers of that packet forwarder) at the drop of a packet.
Because be
ARG!?!? (Score:2)
It would be nice... (Score:2)
Once again Microsoft ALMOST got something right.. but failed (again)
Do It Yourself (Score:2)
Incredibly useful for a different reason (Score:1)
For reasons known only to themselves and their therapists, many of the students on our campus forward all their official mail to Hotmail accounts. This, despite the fact that we have a very nice webmail service that has great availabiliy, will never throw away important information, etc etc.
Inevitably, these same students come whining to us that their mail 'isn't getting through', typically because they aren't capable of looking in the junk mail area and certainly aren't capable of the four mouse click
They should provide a web service interface (Score:1)
To make this service even better, Microsoft should add a web service interface so that ISPs can automatically check their records. An alternative would be to email the ISP summary reports in a standard format -- in much the same way that AOL does.