Unbrand America

Unbrand Americai thought that this was a moderated group ?

wrote in message
...
In the coming months a black spot will pop up everywhere . .
(snip)

Thanks...
I guessed that you did not approve this post but I had to ask !

Mark

"Peter W. Rowe" wrote:

On Sat, 23 Aug 2003 20:37:54 -0700, in rec.crafts.jewelry "Mark"
wrote:

Unbrand Americai thought that this was a moderated group ?

It is, Mark. But once spammers figure out how to forge an approval header (it's
not that hard, after all), then spammed posts bypass the moderation process, and
I only see them the same way you do, already in the newsgroup. Not a whole lot
I can do about it, when the spammers are somewhere like in this case, in China.

And thanks to Don Thompson for running a full trace and emailing me. Saved me
the trouble. But, since it trackes them to China, as I said, there's not much I
can do about it that matters at all to the senders. Other moderators with
better knowledge of the ins and outs of it all (some of them are sys admins at
ISPs, are already taking what steps can be taken)

Just ignore this crap. fortunately, it's not that common...

Peter Rowe
moderator
rec.crafts.jewelry


Peter,

You may want to look into mailblocks (http://www.mailblocks.com/login.htm)

It may work for moderated posting also.

It may be worth to find out.

Abrasha
http://www.abrasha.com

On Wed, 27 Aug 2003 21:02:23 -0700, in rec.crafts.jewelry Abrasha
wrote:


Peter,

You may want to look into mailblocks (http://www.mailblocks.com/login.htm)

Nail blocks is a web based email service. It's fine for setting up a mailbox
that can filter spam, or as a throwaway address for public use, in the way many
folks use things like a valid Yahoo address for their posting address, which
they can get replies to an all, but which is easily changed when it gets too
glutted with spam.

The problem with the unbrand america posting is that it forged an approval
header, which mean it, when sent to the senders news server, was handled as an
already approved posting, and that news server sent it out on the news feeds,
rather than diverting it to email, and thus to me. Spammers who do this
bypass the whole moderation scheme, and their posts go to the newsgroups in the
same way posts are sent in unmoderated groups. A web based email service would
do nothing to stop such a thing, since such types of spammed posting never get
to anyones email, they go straight to the news servers. Only if the senders
news server, or someone elses, reading the group, happens to be able to detect
an improper approval header will it get stopped. This is, unfortuantely, quite
unlikely, so most such forged postings get posted until someone sends a cancel
command to the news feeds, which I did as soon as I saw it. However, again,
unfortunately, only a few news servers actually process and accept cancel
commands, so it's not especially effective.

In the case of this message, it was sent by a Canadian firm, company, or sender
(who actually knows just who in that company sent it, or whether it was official
business or not, but the message originated from that company) in Vancouver.
Some marketing firm or other. I had the name from the moderators mail list, but
have accidentally deleted it. Not that I need it. Anyway, they apparently
found an "open" news server somewhere in China, and posted the message through
that news server. From there it went to the news group.

If this firm had sent it through their normal local ISP, then complaining to
their ISP could likely get their account cancelled. Because they sent it
through some third party, Chinese open server (someone in china made an error in
configuring a news server, so it doesn't correctly check that incoming messages
are from actually logged in and legitimate users), it becomes very difficult to
do anything about, even when some of the net gurus in the moderators mail list
managed to track the actual sender.

Cheers

Peter