BS: Where did all the spam email go?

Subject: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 21 Dec 08 - 08:47 PM

What the heck? I seem to not be getting all that junk email anymore. At least not for the past day and a half. What's going on? I usually get 20 or 30 of them a day, and now....nada. Are they all on holiday or is my email provider blocking them somehow with a new subroutine? Gosh. I can hardly believe it.

Maybe I'm dreaming and will wake up presently and discover that this post was also just part of the same dream.

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Ebbie
Date: 21 Dec 08 - 09:20 PM

I read somewhere that a high percentage of spam is sent out by just one person. I can believe it- the headings are identical.

Enjoy the hiatus while it lasts, Little Hawk. My guy is still in there pitching.

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: catspaw49
Date: 21 Dec 08 - 09:25 PM

After you bought that condom, once barely used by William Shatner, all the scam artists figured you'd be declared insane and unable to purchase additional goods. Sorry Hawk becasue I know how badly you wanted that video of the Dachshund having anal sex with a Werner Klemperer blow-up doll.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Bill D
Date: 21 Dec 08 - 09:27 PM

That 'one person' was arrested not long ago... it cut down on the volume. Also, my ISP, Comcast, has developed some filters. I get very little spam anymore.

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 21 Dec 08 - 09:28 PM

Wasn't this on the news about a month ago? (I was offline at the time so I have no idea if you guys discussed it or not).

"They" busted the site that was responsible for the majority of the spam that was going on and shut it down.

I'll let someone else sort out the Blicky - but you can probably find a report somewhere on the BBC website.

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 21 Dec 08 - 09:33 PM

WTF??? Who the hell is Werner Klemperer? You're just sulking because wearing that stupid Cheech hat around in public didn't get you anything from the local bad girls, Spaw, not even a hand job, and you know why? Cos you never did one trick. Not one.

Ebbie, you say that ONE person is responsible for most of the spam email????????? Holy crap. Well, maybe I got lucky and the son of a bitch who sends them to me died.

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 21 Dec 08 - 09:34 PM

Well, it may have been on the news a month ago, but my spam has only dropped off in the last couple of days...I think...

(No rude jokes about what I just said, please! Have a little class for once...)

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: catspaw49
Date: 21 Dec 08 - 10:19 PM

Werner Klemperer, AKA- -Col. Klink of "Hogan's Heroes"

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: number 6
Date: 21 Dec 08 - 10:23 PM

Spaw .... it's been 10 minutes since reading your post and I'm still laffing uncontrollably .... if it keeps up much longer I'm going to have a cardiac arrest !!!

Good one ... indeed a good one.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Mr Red
Date: 22 Dec 08 - 07:58 AM

The was one major site that sold the spamming services. If they closed him then he is the one person referred to.

I used 2 fairly obvious names (I own cresby.com) and the one I keep alive certainly has very little mail now. So I cut off all the unused one and sent them nowhere without even proof of arriving (ISP driven).

at one time they sent to bill, jim, miranda etc and did it in a logical alphabetical way. Obvious names, so I now call myself [e-mail] --- not. (chew on that one spammers)

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: catspaw49
Date: 22 Dec 08 - 08:12 AM

Thanks 6-Man...... personally, I'm getting a laugh over Hawk not knowing who Werner was!

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: GUEST,LTS pretending to work
Date: 22 Dec 08 - 08:32 AM

I think he got bored and found a new victim.. even with a Spamfilter, I'm getting upwards of 75 a week.

If I could filter out everything with 'viagara' or 'watches' in the title, I could cut that by 3/4s... oh well.. it's interesting seeing just how many people think I want to make my penis bigger.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 22 Dec 08 - 08:46 AM

I have used to have a spam filter that allows anything with your designated key words declared as spam, but it's not as much help as you'd think, even though I had quite a list of declared-spam words.

So "viagra" is declared spam? That's commonly done, but it's not too much help. They send vlagra, vy-agra v!agra, etc.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Dec 08 - 09:07 AM

There actually have been a half dozen arrests of major spammers. MSNBC recently had an article about "the ten spammers you love to hate," and the amount of junk they were sending is huge.

The most recent action that may have affected what people are receiving was not directly against individual persons, but was the complete shutdown of several servers (and the ISPs running them) who were providing the connections that many spammers (and other more malicious malware distributors) were using.

Most service providers do make an attempt to detect and limit inappropriate use; but the ones shut down of course just "had no idea anything was going on."

My recollection is that it was claimed that three "servers" processed close to 50% of all the spam circulating at the time of the shutdowns, although several smaller ones also were closed.

It's likely that new "tolerant" (oblivious) servers will be found, and the flood will resume. If you happen to have been getting your goodies via one of the closed servers, you may see a temporary drop; but it's unlikely to last too long.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Dec 08 - 03:17 PM

Well, the spam is just gone here. Totally gone. So they obviously shut down whichever server was sending them to me.

Spaw, "Hogan's Heroes" would be on my list of the 10 TV shows I most despised in all history, and I never watched more than five minutes of it at someone else's place if it was on. Accordingly, I'm not too familiar with the cast. I hated "McHale's Navy" too, but not as much as I hated "Hogan's Heroes". Both those shows fall into the fallowing category:

basic premise - A bunch of zany American servicemen who are loudmouthed obnoxious jerks and major @ssholes wisecrack their way through World War II, somehow defeating the Germans and Japanese, despite the fact that if these morons had ever encountered the real Germans and Japanese, they would have been dead within five minutes or less. The German and Japanese characters in the show are uniformly depicted as ugly bumbling idiots, even stupider and less capable than the Americans they are up against...which kind of defies imagination, but there you have it. This is how you teach your kids how to disrespect other nationalities, misunderstand history, and fall into the illusion that only Americans have what it takes to fight and win a war...and that the way you do it is by making the best wisecracks.

Fuck Hogan's Heroes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Have I made myself clear?

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: JennieG
Date: 22 Dec 08 - 03:50 PM

A New Zealand bloke was charged in the last day or so, he was sending 35 million spam emails a day.........or something like 35 million since he started sending them, I disremember which. Either way it's a lot of spam.

He should perhaps stick to spamming sheep (with apologies to our lovely Kiwi friends and my Kiwi rels)

Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Dec 08 - 05:24 PM

One report, that may be related to the drop seen, was posted about a month ago:

The MSNBC link I tried says it's expired. Article title was "Spam host blocked from Net" or "Host of Spam Groups Cut Off" and might be found in Washington Post archives, if anyone wants to search.

[Extract quote]

Junk e-mail drops after providers disconnect a California firm
By Brian Krebs
The Washington Post
updated 11:12 p.m. CT, Wed., Nov. 12, 2008

The volume of junk e-mail sent worldwide dropped drastically today after a Web hosting firm identified by the computer security community as a major host of organizations allegedy engaged in spam activity was taken offline, according to security firms that monitor spam distribution online.

While its gleaming, state-of-the-art, 30-story office tower in downtown San Jose, Calif., hardly looks like the staging ground for what could be called a full-scale cyber crime offensive, security experts have found that a relatively small firm at that location is home to servers that serve as a gateway for a significant portion of the world's junk e-mail.

The servers are operated by McColo Corp., which these experts say has emerged as a major U.S. hosting service for international firms and syndicates that are involved in everything from the remote management of millions of compromised computers to the sale of counterfeit pharmaceuticals and designer goods, fake security products and child pornography via email.

But the company's web site was not accessible today, when two Internet providers cut off MoColo's connectivity to the Internet, security experts said. Immediately after McColo was unplugged, security companies charted a precipitous drop in spam volumes worldwide. E-mail security firm IronPort said spam levels fell by roughly 66 percent as of Tuesday evening.

Spamcop.net, another spam watch dog, found a similar decline, from about 40 spam e-mails per second to around 10 per second.

[end quote]

This was apparently "the big 'un," but there have been a few other "significant contributors" who have been similarly cut off since.

***

So a month is about how long it takes LH to notice something - (?).

Now we have a benchmark for the next test. We'll have to watch and see if he beats this record the next time something happens.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Dec 08 - 08:25 PM

LOL! Look, I don't remember exactly when I first noticed it...I just noticed it fairly recently, that's all. I'm not sure how recently. I have no way of figuring out back to when I first noticed it, but I eventually decided to start a thread about it.

I think it's wonderful. I may even start believing in the Easter Bunny again if this sort of thing keeps happening.

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: kendall
Date: 23 Dec 08 - 06:08 AM

LH, I agree on Hogan's Heros, but it is not the only sit com that I detest. Seinfeld, Friends, Malcolm in the middle, Everyone hates Raymond, the list is endless. Canned laughter and juvenile predictable "humor." I've never been bored enough to watch any of these turkeys all the way through. Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself.
None of this kind of pap will ever equal "Barney Miller."

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Mr Red
Date: 23 Dec 08 - 09:08 AM

Pardon my higorance but if a spammer is clever enough to set up the system of world wide zombies.

wouldn't he keep a list of them safe somewhere long with his ways to access?
not that he would be able to resurect it himself without being monitored,. But wouldn't he have customers in Russia or Moldova that would pay for the information. And wouldn't he have them in his back pocket in the event...................

Obviously it would have a declining value the longer he leaves it but....

Subject: RE: BS: Where did all the spam email go?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 23 Dec 08 - 05:59 PM

Uh-oh. It's creeping back. Five spam messages have arrived since yesterday.