[Samba] [OT] SPAM

[Mike Ely]

> From: "Erik Soderquist" <esoderquist at mcstamp.com>
> Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 12:18:51 -0400
> To: <samba at lists.samba.org>
> Subject: RE: [Samba] [OT] SPAM
> 
> I've been watching this thread with amusement. On one side, I see people
> with calm collected reasoning explaining how email works, how lists
> work, etc. and on the other side, I see rash, overzealous people who A.)
> don't want to admit that they have been doing something that most
> intelligent users know they shouldn't (use a critical email address for
> list subscriptions) regardless of past success of failure (Russian
> roulette is a fun game, until you win . . .),

Here here!  The first thing I do before subscribing to >any< mailinglist or
newsgroup is to create an email alias specific to that group - note the
rather obvious alias I've chosen to post to this group with.  Believe me, if
the spam/worm/virus problem gets too bad for a particular group, I'll simply
delete the alias and blackhole any mail sent to it.  Problem solved, and my
"real" email address is unharmed.  I agree with the idea of using Hotmail or
some such if you are unable to create an email alias of your own.

> and B.) seem to want to
> yell at someone other than themselves to vent their frustration at
> winning the roulette game.

If you wanna yell at someone, lookup the IP addresses of some of the virus
senders, and yell at them or their ISP - probably won't get you much further
than yelling here, but at least you'll be pointing your frustration in
another direction, and one closer to the proper target.  LARTing can be very
satisfying stress relief.

One trick which I recommend all network admins to use is a panic button such
as the following line ripped from our firewall:
# $IPTABLES -I FORWARD -i $IN_IFACE -p tcp --dport 25 -j REJECT
Basically, if I find out that one of the 800+ computers on our LAN has a
mass-mailer, I uncomment that line and restart the service before heading
out to locate the computer with the bug.  Once I've pulled it's plug, I
comment out that line again and re-restart the service so everyone can send
email again.

Finally, you will see a little tag my mail server adds at the end of this
message.  I'm not recommending a particular brand name piece of software or
anything, but if you run your own mailserver you're an idiot not to run
something similar.  For one thing, I have yet to see a single copy of swen
on my email client.

All I'm saying is, these things happen.  Take responsibility for your own
protection when they do - don't blame a list admin for it.

</rant>

Mike Ely

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