No, I don't mean spam from a can....
In January, I switched from a domain redirector for my newpacifica.net
domain to an actual host. I had forgotten to turn off the email "catch-all"
option, so I not only receive emails to my regular address
([EMAIL PROTECTED]) but I receive emails that are sent to generic or
non existent names @newpacifica.net. For example, someone could send an
email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and it would still arrive in my mailbox as
the owner of the domain. I filter all email other than my normal address to
a specific folder.
Since February 1, 2002 up until today, March 29th, I have received 695
unsolicited messages in that folder. Most of them come to
[EMAIL PROTECTED] That is about 12 spam messages per day.
Most of the junk mail is sent to: [EMAIL PROTECTED], however, some of
the generic addresses that I received mail at that is directed through my
mail server:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
9x3x&*[EMAIL PROTECTED]
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
etc, etc,...
There were even some highly pornographic word/names @newpacifica.net.
The interesting and relevant thing about all of this is that I have never,
ever published the [EMAIL PROTECTED] EXCEPT in the WHOIS database when I
re-registered the domain name.
So my conclusion is that people are accessing the WHOIS database and just
sending junk mail to the generic addresses at domain names.
The options that I have are turning off the "catch-all" mail redirector in
my mail server, but my fear is that I will also miss legitimate messages
concerning my domain registration since [EMAIL PROTECTED] is listed as
my administrative email address.
The point in all of this:
I have briefly toyed with the idea of continuing to gather these statistics
and trying to convince one of the Ohio representatives to consider an
anti-spam bill for Ohio.
I think I will break out the percentages of the different types of spam -
i.e.: porn, financial, etc.
I don't think that there are any options for the owners of the WHOIS
database that would stop someone from harvesting this information and using
it for spam.
Any thoughts or suggestions?
____________________________________________
Gary L. Nunn
Delaware Ohio
"Everything that has happened had to
happen. Everything that must happen
cannot be stopped."
- Dwayne Dyer
