[lug] off topic, spam laws

[D. Stimits]

Rob Riggs wrote:
> 
> Or, you could just use the RBL and be done with it...

I know virtually nothing about RBL. I'll look into it. So long as it
isn't some service that I pay a fee to I'll like it. I'm not sure right
now if it is a tool or a legal acronym.

> 
> I agree with your goals. We need to change the economic equation of UCE
> (see Communications of the ACM, Vol 44, No 12; Admediation: New Horizons
> in Effective Email Advertising). However, I do not see how govenment can
> pass effective legislation when more than half the problem exists beyond
> their jurisdiction. At best you have an answer similar to what you
> propose, which results in the problem being shifted from the ISPs and
> end-users to the back-bone providers.

Better yet, it would be easier to filter repeat abuse domains. Someone
who can't play by the rules does not need to play at all.

> 
> No, the answer is in the RBL, or similar tool. The RBL is very effective
> at blocking spam. It is not affected by international borders the way
> the U.S. Congress is. Based on my experience, I would actually believe
> that it is more effective against international spam.

Somewhere I think there was a URL related to RBL, but I have not yet
looked at it. If it is just a tool, well, I don't run fetchmail or
sendmail for my email, and have no opportunity to "bounce" email and
tell them it is refused. And my ISP is zero help there, but I have this
problem about paying more (especially while unemployed) or being driven
out of my email address each time too many spammers find me, I want to
drive them out instead of running away with a filter. I suppose I would
have never come to this point of exasperation if my ISP had a filter I
could set to force a bounce.

> 
> A two pronged approach (RBL & legislation) may yield more effective
> results in the long term. But this is one area where community action
> has already shown itself to be quite effective
> 
> Try the RBL for a bit. I think you'll be surprised by the results.

Since I point NS directly at my ISP's smtp and pop3 ports, I can't
benefit by installing it locally if this is a tool. Even if it is I
would end up wasting my 56k bandwidth both downloading it to find out it
needs to bounce and with the bounce reply. 56k is only going about 48k
in download, and all 56k modems run half that in upload. I get about 30
spams per day, about half in languages that won't even display their
character set here. Now if I could install a tool to bounce anything
with non-latin1 character set, it would help, but it isn't enough. I'd
like to go on the offensive and make existing spam laws effective. I
know my ISP doesn't care, but it isn't their fault someone in China
wants to sell stock to me (which by the way is illegal in the extreme,
it violates NASDAQ and SEC rules that would land an American in jail for
10 years).

D. Stimits, stimits at idcomm.com

> 
> -Rob
> 
> D. Stimits wrote:
> 
> >I am considering trying to get some legislation passed that would make
> >it a criminal offense to forge headers during commercial advertisement.
> >I am also thinking that due to the amount of foreign spam that is
> >invading with no means to cut it off (along with accelerating
> >quantities), which breaks local spam laws, there should be a means to
> >submit these spammers to backbone routers at entry points to the USA and
> >have their domains blocked. Basically, the toothless laws need some
> >means of adding weight to those who ignore them, and there needs to be
> >some form of non-civil recourse against those who purposely forge
> >headers intending to use it as a pre-planned evasion of spam laws. The
> >Constitition says one of our most fundamental rights is the right to be
> >left alone, I do not believe the issue is as trivial or petty as it
> >sounds. It is already a right of the state secretary of each state to
> >deny all business operations to any outside business which would be
> >against the welfare and laws of that state, and I don't think this
> >requires any fundamental change in existing laws, but it does require a
> >way to gain recourse.
> >
> >If I were to try to do this, does anyone have any advice on where to
> >look up the procedures related to this? Or advice URL's on how to do it
> >successfully? What makes a good proposal format?
> >
> >D. Stimits, stimits at idcomm.com
> >_______________________________________________
> >Web Page:  http://lug.boulder.co.us
> >Mailing List: http://lists.lug.boulder.co.us/mailman/listinfo/lug
> >
> 
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