direct magazine
e360 vs Spamhaus Update
Here’s an update on the Amicus Brief filed in support of Spamhaus.
All posts
best practices
Surveys, Profile Information, and Hamtraps
As part of my massive spam/ham tracking project , I’ve been signing up for lists. Hundreds of lists. Somewhere north of four hundred and I k...
bad ideas
Flixster Wants Your Passwords
Anne Mitchell pointed me toward a post on her Internet Patrol blog about how Flixster’s “invite a friend” functionality either asks you for...
gmail
Gmail, End User Privacy, and Harassment
Gmail gets a lot of things right, but gets one really important thing very wrong. I'm going to tear into Google momentarily, but befo...
direct magazine
Well-Known E-mailers Back Spamhaus in Amicus Brief
From Ken Magill, published on Direct Magazine's website: Twenty-nine individuals and organizations have signed onto an amicus brief fi...
lawsuit
e360 vs Spamhaus: Sparring in the Newsgroups
Oh boy, the things you find on the newsgroups sometimes. Here's a link to a thread on the news.admin.net-abuse.email newsgroup where ...
spamhaus
What are spamtraps?
In short, spamtraps are bad addresses that you don’t want on your list. They’re old email addresses that haven’t been used for real people f...
abuse mailbox
Dealing with spam to your abuse desk?
Among other things, I run the abuse desk for a large service provider with lots of clients. We get a handful of complaints a day. For exampl...
article
The Changing Definition of Spam
Over on CIO Magazine's website, capable jounalist Esther Schindler posted an interesting article on the topic of spam defined, and how ...
ask al
What it does it mean “We do not relay?”
Have you ever received a bounce message that says “We do not relay” or “Mail loops back to myself”? Wondering what that means? I get this qu...
best practices
CAN-SPAM Roundup
The US Federal Anti-Spam law (CAN-SPAM) has been in effect for just over three years now, yet I still get questions about it constantly. Her...
microsoft
Microsoft using Spamcop and Spamhaus? Yes!
5/22/2007 Update: Some of this information is out of date. Please click here for my latest thoughts on Spamcop and the Spamcop SCBL. Rece...
funny
Blast from the past: Scott Richter on the Daily Show
It's time for a Friday night funny. Remember this video of Scott Richter on the Daily Show, from back in 2004? Well, check this out....
aol
The AOL email tax: Is the sky falling?
Remember the famous internet rumor that made the rounds in 2006: “ AOL is trying to tax your email, write in now! ” Was it a rumor? Let’s ...
autoreplies
Backscatter: What is it? How do I stop it?
What is it? Backscatter is a certain kind of mail you receive that you didn't ask to receive. If you've ever received a “Your mail ...
joe jared
Joe Jared Wins
Joe Jared used to run an open-relay blacklist called Osirusoft. I respected what Joe’s intent was, though I was of the opinion that Joe ran ...
best practices
Senders: How to avoid false positives
As I often say, listen to as many sources of information as possible, and learn as much as you can from all of them. Don't be afraid to ...
blocklists
SPEWS Current Status
The SPEWS blacklist seems to have gone AWOL. A lot of people haven't realized this, and still believe they're being impacted by way ...
aol
How to deliver mail to AOL
2022 Update: Long after this was published (way back in 2007), AOL and Yahoo have merged. The resulting platform is Yahoo Mail; so if you...
michael rathbun
The Story of "Nadine"
(Note: David Hutchens contacted me today, looking for access to the Story of "Nadine" website. I sent him an email reply, which b...
lawsuit
Quick Update: Scott Richter Makes the News
This isn’t the first time he’s run into legal issues over advertising. As I mentioned before , he’s had to settle with both Microsoft and t...
spam
I Still Get More Spam Than You
I have thirty-five domains registered with various administrative/technical contact addresses. I also have a bunch of other email addresses ...
address validation
Whatever happened to VRFY?
SMTP used to have a command called VRFY which allowed you to verify whether or not an address was valid. RFC 2505 talks about how spammer ...
ask al
Ask Al: Help, you're blocking my mail!
JC Writes: " I just discovered that SBC/AT&T is refusing mail going from me. Most kindly, I submit to you sir, that I have never,...