Posted by Ian Holsman
In the latest escalation of the spam war, the spammers have switched gears and are using PDF files containing their rubbish.
I’m guessing SpamAssassin will have PDF scanning capabilities within a week if it doesn’t already.
Posted by Ian Holsman
zyons is famous. :-)
it has at least one spammer attacking it on a regular basis.
“PussyCat 1.0, Murzillo compatible” is the user agent in question.
my logs show that is is coming in from ~50 different IP’s in the past week.
I’m proud to say you wouldn’t be able to tell, but I see it on the error logs, and if zyons gets more attention the spammers will adjust themselves and figure out a way to deal with it.
now.. I could just ban it, but that is just making it some one elses problem as it will just jump to the next url in it’s list which isn’t really helping is it?
So I was thinking.. there are tarpits for email, but are there tarpits for HTTP?
unfortuantly I don’t have a spare IP or machine/VPS to dedicate to the task, but I am willing to maintain 5-6 of them if someone will supply those.
then when you get a spammy type request you can just redirect it, or make invisible forms on your pages which link to it. you could even hook it up to a RBL which black lists the IP as well.
The idea behind it is to slow down the spammers and make it more expensive for them to run.
Unfortuantly I can’t think of a business model which will make this system self-sustaining.
Anybody want to come up with some sponsorship, IP’s and VPS’s I can use? I think i could get a apache module going does something similar to Spam Cannibal
and we would then need something like dyndns to maintain a list of active tarpits. (seriously)
or am I being my usual clueless self, and missing an existing implementation somewhere?
Posted by Ian Holsman
spam is getting even funnier.
Is this the equivalent of the ‘you may have already won’ junk mail of the future? or is this some kind of form letter based on a virus email being sent to some auto-responder?
Dear Candidate,
We appreciate for showing your interest in our organisation regarding the openings we have in our technical department.
You have been selected for our Technical department as a Trainee Programmer. You could collect your offer letter after you confirm yourself in our company for the Training & Projects by following some procedures.
This is a “Career break program” where you would be offered for the training on dotnet technology for the first three months, after which you would be in to probation period and would be getting a stipend salary (between 4K to 6k) from the company.
This training would be on a self support basis for an individual, where an individual would be paid stipend salary during probation. The need of training is required only to build you stronger in the technology so that you would be in a position to accomplish the assigned projects by the company.
The company is having 2 Projects going in Java Technology whereas the team for the first project is already selected and we have started the project too. There are few upcoming projects which is about to finalise within 2 to 3 months.
Your selection in our company has been made in relation to your Technical background you have. Also you need to first clear a Technical test. If you have any doubts you can mail us on queries@aura-software.com
Mumbai based candidates can directly call up & speak with Mr. Dev on 9833555953.
We wish you all the best for your bright future and career ahead.
Regards
(HR Dept.)
(Note : Reply within three days or it will be assumed as a cancelled application in case of your recruitment in our company. This is 100% job guranteed and secured program. (you get an appointment letter of our company the day you join).
Posted by Ian Holsman
I got a trackback on a recent post (yes I am that popular.. a single trackback). and naturally I clicked through to see who this new found friend was. This looked like a link farm to me, BUT it also seemed topical and the links it linked to seemed kinda interesting to me.
now.. besides from clogging up the ping servers and having a couple of dozen robots giving it some traffic I don’t see the harm here.
Since I use the ‘nofollow’ tag, it doesn’t get any of my precious googlejuice, and seeing how they don’t seem to be using it I get some of their juice in the process making feh even more juicy.
So to the topic of the post, I guess some peoples spam/splog are others aggregators. The difference is subtle, and dependant on the beholder.
(note: if the link mentioned Texas Holdem, or poker it would have been removed) If you see a google ad below about poker or some other questionable thing click it. Make spammers pay by clicking through their ads.