[geeks] New Spam Disclaimer

[Mike Meredith]

On Sunday 16 June 2002 18:03, dave at cca.org wrote:
> I was just talking with a friend last night about the future of
> the spam issue.
>
> As I see it the most likely scenario is this:
>
> a. ISPs start enabling spamassassin (or equivelent) by default.
> 	When AOL does this, it initiates an "arms race" obviously,
> 	with spammers testing their attacks on spamassassin, but
> 	nevertheless, the filters will win.

The 'arms race' is already with us; plenty of places use one or more of
the RBLs that are around, which has lead to spammers making use of open
proxy servers, and vulnerable 'formail' cgi scripts instead of the open
mail relays that used to be used.

I wouldn't be suprised to see CodeRed-like worms developed by spammers
that would leave the victims machines capable of being used easily by
spammers.

> d. We're back where we started, but with more money moving around.
> 	But perhaps, the higher-priced ISPs will be spam-free.

I suspect you'll see more and more specialist subscription mail services
with robust anti-spam measures. I get the feeling that many of the
larger ISPs don't block much spam because of the worry about the
reactions of some of their customers (some people actually *like*
spam). I get far more spam coming into my ISP account than coming into
my work accounts (which are far older and widely publicised).