Thanks Darin.  Most of the stuff is getting caught and not getting to the
end user.  So that's good news for him (and they love me for it in the
meantime).  I do review all of the "hold" spam with fpReview (I love that
utility) and have a few searches set up to quickly filter through it.  So
it's not even that big of a deal to me.  My biggest concern was ending up
being penalized (blacklisted) without trying to do anything about it.
 
Also, I would appreciate any feedback on your other option if it ends up
working.  
 
Thanks!
 
Todd
 
  _____  

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Darin Cox
Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 11:43 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [IMail Forum] New user problem


Hi Todd,
 
Backscatter from forging spam is a serious problem, and what you are
experiencing.  What's happening is that a spammer has harvested your
customer's email address, and is sending out spam through their zombie
network forging your customer's email address.
 
There are two ways to combat it:
 
1. Use SPF on your customers domain in the hopes that mail servers receiving
the spam will check SPF, see that the message was forging spam, and not
bounce back to you.  This has limited success.  If the receiving server had
good filtering in place, and used proper no-bounce-on-spam procedures, you
wouldn't be receiving the bounces anyway.
 
2. Filter on any information you can find within the email, like the
original spammy subject, in order to push the bounces into review or delete
range.  This is also limited to responding to particular spammy subjects or
constant forging with wrong names, and is very reactive and temporary.
 
I have another idea that I'm discussing on another list right now to combat
this in a more proactive manner.  I'll report back if any progress is made
towards implementing a filter.

Darin.
 
 
----- Original Message ----- 
From: Todd Richards <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
To: [email protected] 
Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 12:20 PM
Subject: [IMail Forum] New user problem

Hi Everyone -
 
I'm not sure where this post belongs, so I will post here first.
 
We took on hosting for one of our members mid-week last week, and there is a
problem going on.  Before the changeover, they complained that one of the
users, in particular, was getting a TON of spam with their old host.  I
proudly said "no problem" as we have things clicking very nicely now with
our setup.  
 
Well, the switch has been made and said user does not get the spam he was
getting before.  However, I'm seeing it in that Declude/Sniffer/etc is
catching it.  The stuff he was referring to as "spam" is bounced messages
from other people.  Either his email address has been hi-jacked, or his
computer has as the bounced messages are coming in that say the message from
"Wrong Name <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>" could not be delivered.  The trail after
that shows that they are definitely spam.  I have been looking through the
logs and can't see for sure that the originating message is coming through
our server (I haven't spent hours looking at the logs).  So I can't say for
sure that he is sending it through us.  But I'm worried about ending up
blacklisted for sending this crap.
 
I have asked the end-users to thoroughly scan his computer for problems, and
fix if found.  There is no on-site tech, so they asked about changing the
email address.  While I'm not opposed, if it is in fact his computer then
that won't make much difference.
 
Am I missing anything?  Is there any better way to troubleshoot that you can
think of?  None of the other users on his domain are seeing this, and I have
not seen this type of traffic from any of the other users we host mail for.
 
For what it's worth we are using Imail 8.22 (with ALL patches), the latest
version of Declude, Sniffer, and invURIBL 2.7 - all running on Windows 2003
Server.
 
I appreciate any thoughts or direction on this.
 
Thanks!
 
Todd
 
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 

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