At 10:17 AM 8/25/97 -0500, W. Wesley Groleau x4923 wrote:
You can also forward illegal money-making schemes to the IRS at:
net-abuse(_at_)nocs(_dot_)insp(_dot_)irs(_dot_)gov
I can't help but note that the #3 MX for this system is "gotcha.treas.gov"
(which is the #1 MX for plain "irs.gov"). At least SOMEBODY at the
Treasury dept has a sense of humour.
Does this really work? They do not acknowledge receipt. Also, about
three weeks ago, this address resulted in a three-machine mail loop.
Telnetting to SMTP on the #1 MX = tcs-gateway2.treas.gov reveals an ESMTP
capable mail server, on which I ran the EXPN procedure, along with some
additional attempts (net-abuse(_at_)irs(_dot_)gov and
net-abuse(_at_)treas(_dot_)gov) to see what
the results are. From the results, I figure that the mailbox *IS* valid.
Took three hours fumbling around to figure out who to report it to
(figured I should report it because the loop still existed a couple days
later). There was no acknowledgement of that report either.
Try mailing issues to root(_at_)gotcha(_dot_)treas(_dot_)gov to report this.
This is
identified in the SOA record for irs.gov. If it took three hours for you,
you most certainly don't want to know how fast I found this. nslookup (and
dig, if you have it) is nifty for this sort of stuff.
One rumor was that they wanted any kind of spam, allegedly because
spammers generally do not report income from spamming. Note: I said
RUMOR.
That would be a good rumour. Have you checked the IRS website - I took a
quick browse to their newsbulletin area and did not see anything which
would have appeared to be spam-related.
Anyone actually acquainted with an IRS person that could tell us what the
I would like to state that fortunatley I am NOT aquainted with any IRS
lackeys.
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Please DO NOT carbon me on list replies. I'll get my copy from the list.
Sean B. Straw / Professional Software Engineering
Post Box 2395 / San Rafael, CA 94912-2395