Re: [OT] mail filtering (Re: [cobalt-users] Co-Lo Suggestions)

[Jeff Lasman <jblists@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Surfbaud wrote:

> >I disagree.  Once spammers learned that using an MX left a log
> >trail, they began spamming direct-to-MX from dialups, DSL, and
> >cable.  Few people have a valid reason for not using their
> >provider's MX.

answering here to keep it on the forked thread...

Note that I'm NOT sending email from a server on my dsl line... I'm
sending email from a server at Inflow.  It's my machine that lives on an
aDSL block, NOT my server.  So by blocking that way you're blocking
everyone who uses sDSL, I'd think, no matter who they are or what server
they use.

I suppose I could cloak my originating IP# (yes I know how to do that),
but that would just make me look more like a spammer, right?

> agreed, and blocking single offending IP's no longer works either because
> the pink contract just shift them around, hence the popularity of spews
> 
> the comment was also made that using these extreme block lists must mean
> that a significant proportion of legitimate mail gets filtered, this just
> is not the case, and I have and do check...

It depends.  If you correspond with people on DSL connections, then you
don't get email from any of them.

> the user in question on this list is hit twice by my filters, once because
> of their xdsl connection, and once because of the domain, which is on the
> same uunet block as some of the worst spammers in chrisendom,

Since I'm the user in question ...

I have no personal control over the IP# being in a block in which
spammers also reside.  Neither do most of us on this list.  However, I
can and will make a case for moving me to another set of IP#s...

First I need to know where you get this information.  I have no idea. 
Everyplace I've typed in my IP#s I've never gotten a "listed" tag back. 
So tell me where to start looking and I will.

How bit is that uunet block anyway?  If the spammers are in my
datacenter I can most likely get them shut down today.  If not, then you
have to ask yourself how big a block is blacklisted... if someone
blacklists half of UUNET just because some of the IPs are held by
spammers, then I can say that's probably true for blocks owned by most
of the major providers... and it could be you tomorrow.

So instead of just referring to me in the third person, how about giving
me some information I can use to get off blocks?  Instead of blocking
half the world because the people you correspond with don't happen to
use those connections, how about becoming positively anti-spam instead
of just blocking half the world?

> so it is a fallacy that using severe block lists impairs your e-mail
> functionality, UNLESS you live in a spam friendly IP range, and if you live
> in a spamhaus and choose not to move then you deserve everything you get in
> my book

As far as I know, we're not in a spamhaus.  How big is that netblock? 
Give me some tools and I'll get it fixed.

Or tar me with any brush you want, and pretend I don't exist.

Jeff
-- 
Jeff Lasman <jblists@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Linux and Cobalt/Sun/RaQ Consulting
nobaloney.net
P. O. Box 52672, Riverside, CA  92517
voice: (909) 778-9980  *  fax: (702) 548-9484