ietf-asrg
[Top] [All Lists]

RE: [Asrg] Some data on the validity of MAIL FROM addresses

2003-05-19 13:11:27
From: "Hallam-Baker, Phillip" <pbaker(_at_)verisign(_dot_)com>

The FROM address is being choosen to maximize the probability
the email is opened.

People trust what they know. They know AOL, Hotmail, yahoo.
It would be interesting to see whether the YAH addresses
decline over the next few months as they step up enforcement
on the legal front.

Is an address like wndu4mja(_at_)yahoo(_dot_)com better known than an address
like wndu4mja(_at_)cnn(_dot_)com?  Given the flood of spam, are most users more
likely to open mail from wndu4mja(_at_)yahoo(_dot_)com, 
wndu4mja(_at_)cnn(_dot_)com, or
wndu4mja(_at_)obscure(_dot_)com?  The answers clearly favor spammers using
wndu4mja(_at_)cnn(_dot_)com(_dot_)  That they could use 
wndu4mja(_at_)cnn(_dot_)com but don't is
almost certainly not a coincidence.

AOL has a very long history of enforcement on the legal front.  Why
haven't spammers been paying attention?  My answer is that AOL stopped
launching lawyers for a few years or perhaps AOL is again giving away
free, spam-all-you-want-for-40-day drop-boxes because they are no
longer checking credit card numbers.

If the legal front matters to spammers, then the long established laws
against header forgery as well as civil actions such as flowers.com
case should also matter.  Those should cause spammers to look for ways
to legitimately own their sending addresses.  The easiest way to do
that is to use free provider drop-boxes.


Vernon Schryver    vjs(_at_)rhyolite(_dot_)com
_______________________________________________
Asrg mailing list
Asrg(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org
https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/asrg



<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>