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Technical Help & Discussion => General Tech Discussion, News & Q&A => Topic started by: sam on December 16, 2009, 14:32

Title: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: sam on December 16, 2009, 14:32
Quote
he spam email was sent by a bot running on a compromised machine in India (122.167.68.1). The spamtrap address to which the message was sent was originally harvested on November 4, 2007 by a particularly nasty harvester (74.53.249.34) that is responsible for 53,022,293 other spam messages that have been received by Project Honey Pot.

"Every time Project Honey Pot receives a message we estimate that another 125,000 are sent to real victims. Our billionth message represents approximately 125 trillion spam messages that have been sent since Project Honey Pot started in 2004.

"At this milestone, we wanted to take a second to report some of our findings. Our goal is not to rehash the same old insights but instead to give a new picture that only looking at five years and a billion data points can produce.

http://www.projecthoneypot.org/1_billionth_spam_message_stats.php
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Clive on December 16, 2009, 14:39
What a terrible waste of our time and bandwidth.   >:(
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: sam on December 16, 2009, 15:37
yep  >:(
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Rik on December 16, 2009, 16:37
Punishments need to be significant and enforced, maybe extending to people who are careless enough to let their machines get infected.
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Reno on December 16, 2009, 17:33
Punishments need to be significant and enforced, maybe extending to people who are careless enough to let their machines get infected.

That would be 99.8% of the public. Just because you had a lot of time to yourself in your early years doesn't mean everyone else was the same way rik.  ::)
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Rik on December 16, 2009, 17:34
I also had to learn to drive and take a test before I was allowed on the roads unsupervised...
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Reno on December 16, 2009, 18:30
Yes, I imagine hitting someone with your computer would be considered assault with a deadly weapon. Sounds like more bureaucracy to me. License people to use their own computers, IT'S GENIUS. Better not let the politicos here it.  They'll see a brand new opportunity for tax revenue.
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Rik on December 16, 2009, 18:34
So should we all be at the mercy of those who aren't prepared to take the most basic steps to ensure safe use of the 'net?
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Simon on December 16, 2009, 21:28
I'm not sure about making people take tests, as such, but I do agree that there should be some sort of mechanism in place, to prevent machines from going online without adequate, up to date, protection installed.  I really can't see that it would be hard to implement something into the operating system, to that effect.
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Rik on December 17, 2009, 09:09
Or have ISPs secure the connection at their end?
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Simon on December 17, 2009, 10:49
I'd rather manage my own security, but that could be useful for some, I suppose.
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Rik on December 17, 2009, 10:58
That's my view. If people won't help themselves, then take control centrally. It would bug the hell out of me, but there could be an opt out if you proved a level of competence and suitable AV etc software.
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Simon on December 17, 2009, 12:48
It would be complicated, and probably quite expensive for ISPs though, wouldn't it?
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Rik on December 17, 2009, 15:54
Not that badly so. It would just mean routing traffic through an extra server, a bit like spam traps/grey lists.
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: thegallery on December 17, 2009, 17:17
I wrote this in an email a while back toto make a point, but it seems fitting here:

You know one thing that is totally ridiculous in society? Locks. Totally pointless. Talk about "Bulls**t". Why do we have them? What are they for? No one looks like a bigger dweeb than the dude with 50 keys on a keychain. And keys just double the burden; carrying them, using them, looking for them, worrying about them...   

Locks don't do anything for us except get in the way. The only thing they actually do is help deter others from doing something to us. If we could just get rid of those 'others' we wouldn't have to have to deal with locks at all. But until then, sad as it is, we're better off using them.   
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: GillE on December 17, 2009, 17:50
It would take a complete change in human nature to achieve that paradigm, lovely though the notion is.  Imagine a world where we didn't need to guard our wealth or armaments  :rockon: .
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Rik on December 17, 2009, 18:18
Cue John Lennon... ;)
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Simon on December 17, 2009, 21:19
When I was a kid on the Isle of Wight, no one ever locked their doors, except at night.  Now, you can't even go out to post a letter without setting the burglar alarm.  :(
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Simon on December 17, 2009, 21:20
Not that badly so. It would just mean routing traffic through an extra server, a bit like spam traps/grey lists.

Ah, well, we know how well grey lists work.   :o:
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Sandra on December 18, 2009, 00:41
Proper sentencing in real prisons without Sky TV, playstations and other luxuries would certainly help to stop people thieving as much.
Locking up junkies until they were clean then keep them inside for a further 2 years would stop the junkies getting addicted again when they come back out and thieving again.

Not sure how to enforce pc security though  :dunno:
Title: Re: 1 Billion Spammers Served
Post by: Rik on December 18, 2009, 10:46
Ah, well, we know how well grey lists work.   :o:

It does if you use a powerful enough server. :)