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cpatch
Ahonui
USA
2187 Posts |
 Posted - 11/13/2004 : 11:10:33 PM
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You think you have problems with spam? A year or so ago I was averaging 1,000 spam emails a day. Currently it's up to 15,000 a day (no that's not a typo). Unbelievable.
In case you're wondering, I've had the same email address for 8 1/2 years now and haven't been careful to hide it from spammers. Why the sudden increase over the past year though I have no idea. Oh, and a highly trained spam filter in my email app means that I only see about 50 or so such emails a day.
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Craig
My goal is to be able to play as well as people think I can. |
Edited by - cpatch on 11/13/2004 11:13:35 PM |
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Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2004 : 03:26:34 AM
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That is terrible. My taropatch.net email address was not receiving that much but percentage-wise, 1/100 or 2/200 were real mail. I decided it's better to just start over. It's like email witness protection but it works.
Now my work email I do not want to change and it gets a ton of spam. I didn't even use that email address online but using it for business, I eventually got on some kind of marketing lists (trade magazines, online stores) and the spams lists came next. I have a spam filter on that one but it is still a pain.
Here's the only good spam.
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Andy |
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Reid
Ha`aha`a
Andorra
1526 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2004 : 04:27:15 AM
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Spam is just not avoidable, until and unless the Big Boys go after them internationally (not legally, as they are doing now in a perfunctory way, but all out technowar).
Mitigation is the best you can do. A proxy is one way. A router between your machine(s) and your cable or other modem is another (the outside world never sees your real IP address). My receipt of spam dropped off considerably once I put in an $80 router (for WiFi, too). Yale, where Sarah works (and I did) has blocked nearly 100% of incoming spam with a combo of hardware and software. And, people never see the stuff on their desktops. MS's Hotmail has done quite a good job of blocking most spam over the last year. I now get only about 5 spams per day on each of my 2 accounts (1 Hotmail, one some other place :-).
Having many accounts, or at least different addresses, is a good idea. Rotate them with one reserved for only very important commo. One trick that used to work was to block all incoming on which you are bcc.
...Reid |
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wdf
Ha`aha`a
USA
1153 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2004 : 08:12:21 AM
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Here's for the spammers 
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Dusty |
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marzullo
`Olu`olu
USA
923 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2004 : 08:21:28 AM
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craig, i'm impressed. i average only 10:1 on my ucsd account (had for 11 years) and essentially all spam on a cornell account that i've had for 18 years. neither university filters (due to university policy) and i still only get maybe 400 unsolicited messages a day. iMail's junk filters work fine for me, but it wouldn't for your load. i don't know what would - since filters have false positives, i have to check my junk email periodically to cull the one or two valid messages (and to marvel at what are the popular topics: i'm getting a lot of spam in chinese these days, and not for family products i guess given the furious blushing of one of my students who politely declined to translate one of the messages for me, and the spam inviting me to witness a cornucopia of imaginative uses of one of the body's major systems is dropping while invitations to purchase weaponry suitable for defending my home from attacks by small island nations is on the rise.)
i hereby nominate dusty as the emperor of animated GIFS...
i'm now using AIM as my primary form of communication with students and colleagues.,
aloha,
keith |
Edited by - marzullo on 11/14/2004 08:24:30 AM |
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edkalama
Akahai
USA
90 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2004 : 09:43:06 AM
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Dusty's Dog is my dream!
I have 3 dogs - Bichon, Papillon, and a Rat Terrier, they all do their stuff in my fenced backyard to keep the neighbors happy. If I can train these guys to clean up their cr..p, I can spend more time with my guitar
Dusty can I ask you to email me that animated image? |
ed
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Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2004 : 11:09:23 AM
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Ed,
You should be able to right click, save picture as... and you've got it? |
Andy |
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edkalama
Akahai
USA
90 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2004 : 1:28:29 PM
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Thanks Dusty & Andy. Forgot about that.  |
ed
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Reid
Ha`aha`a
Andorra
1526 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2004 : 1:40:55 PM
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Keith,
I can't believe that UCSD or Cornell does not have faculty and staff behind some heavy duty firewall. I know lots of the IT folks at Cornell and they are properly paranoid, as I was - and others at Yale still are. You might not be aware of what is being done in your behalf. There are usually secure legs on any internal net, because part of the problem is that the enemy (the students, and disgruntled staff/faculty) are already inside the fence. So there are measures taken appropriate to the risk. Our E-security guys would (and probably still do) regularly run penetration raids inside the walls to detect bad habits. Remember, these are not only teaching and research outfits, they are multibillion $$ per year corporations and they can't afford to take risks (although I have been appalled at the risks they took sometimes, including with people's lives as well as significant fractions of the gigabucks per year. Technoids can only advise. Anyway, you are probably protected in ways you don't know about.
...Reid |
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marzullo
`Olu`olu
USA
923 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2004 : 3:04:39 PM
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aloha e reid,
could be, yup. i know that they worry a lot about intrusion attempts and they do internal auditing for infected machines. i've talked with these folks periodically (i do research in network intrusion, but you know what they say about doing versus teaching ) but, i get a good 20 SWIN infected messages via cornell a day. at UCSD, our local people use spamassassin to tag messages but otherwise don't do anything (well, the last i checked on this; it was a UC policy not to get in the job of censuring email).
at 15,000 messages a day, the signal to noise ratio would be so bad that i'd start using smoke signals. |
Keith |
Edited by - marzullo on 11/14/2004 3:41:46 PM |
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Reid
Ha`aha`a
Andorra
1526 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2004 : 04:12:28 AM
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About "Free Speech" policies at Universities:
It always takes something really bad to make academics sensible.
In the early days (286/AT, remember), I designed and wrote (with a guy who programmed the commo side) a system to control smart locks. It was the first as far as I know. We (IT) tried to get the School of Management to install them as a trial, because they were a nice isolated part of the campus. They were incensed, complaining that my
database would allow anyone to know their movements, Big Brother style. So, a few months later, a poor woman student was trapped by a rapist at a locked door that she could have opened had my stuff been installed. Soon, smart locks were *everywhere* on campus.
One other story: computers were deemed "personal" until it was discovered (through Social Engineering) that a geophysicist had tons of kiddie porn on his workstation. Illegal, of course, but it also meant that all that kiddie porn was in the caches of servers the guy was downloading through. So, Yale was illegal, too. Lots of talk and no decisions. Then the guy was caught with a boy child and put in jail. Paroled. Caught stalking the kid again. Back in the slam. Now, all machines on campus are considered Yale property and checks are run regularly, if randomly.
Now, away from nastiness.
One other thing that people don't consider is Spy or Data Mining Cookies and programs. I run Lavasoft Adaware regularly and find tons of spy cookies. The non-realtime program is free (actually I get it and other vetted software from Yale downloads). Using it has also cut down on SPAM lots. I can tell from the spam I get that it is about old things that I have done (like occasional mortgage companies, because we refied a year ago). No new spam topics because my cookies are cleaned out.
Also, shut your machines down when not using. Won't hurt anything and will close windows of opportunity.
PERSONAL HYGIENE RULES :-)
...Reid |
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marzullo
`Olu`olu
USA
923 Posts |
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