[CentOS] OT Mailing List Spam

Sat Oct 4 15:39:22 UTC 2008
Chris Boyd <cboyd at gizmopartners.com>

On Fri, 2008-10-03 at 11:43 -0400, Mark A. Lewis wrote:
> So, in that spirit, some orgs have setup auto responders telling you
> how to get in touch with them. In my opinion, this is a perfectly
> reasonable solution that accomplishes the same goal. Why you feel like
> you are too good to communicate them in an effective manner is your
> own issue, not theirs or the RFC. They are obviously understanding the
> goal of the RFC and attempting to comply, where you are just blindly
> taking it literally.

Mark,

Consider the case where you have logs from dozens of servers, routers,
etc.  Whois the offending IP, find the abuse contact (if there is one),
copy the address, open an email, paste the address, copy and paste the
appropriate bits of log data or the spam message, include a line with
your GMT offset, hit send.  Done in 10-15 seconds.

Now, try to do that with a web form.  It takes a lot longer, since they
usually make you type in lots more info, you have to read the form to
make sure that you set all the right radio buttons for spam, brute
force, etc.  Find the timezone field, get it set correctly, etc.  Takes
way longer.

By reporting network abuse, I'm doing you a favor; being neighborly.
Getting an autoreply (that usually doesn't include what I sent in) to go
to a web form means that I have to go and spend more of _my_ time to do
you a favor.  Kind of like trying to tell your neighbor that their house
is on fire, and they give you the finger.

Web forms aren't bad if you only send one or two a day, but if you had
to fill out hundreds of them you'd quickly become tired and frustrated.

--Chris