I've kept every spam email I have received since 2003-07-04 and used a script to pull all the IP addresses from each Received: From header. I had hoped to find some chronic offender IP addresses or to see ranges that merited special attention.
Instead, I found that of the 2406 IPs extracted (not counting the IP of my backup server), 2238 were unique. It is very much a moving target. I then used Eudora to search the headers of all mail in my spam mailbox (all of it confirmed spam) and found that 59.4% of the spam that I, personally, receive comes through my backup mail server. Now, I know that spammers often target lower-priority mail servers and I know that many mail server admins have abandoned backup mail servers altogether. Do YOU have a backup mail server and is it under your control, or do you rely on someone else? (I have a reciprocal DNS, MX arrangement with another fellow and it has worked well, but seems to need more stringent anti-spam measures.) At this point, I've asked the fellow doing backup for my mail to toughen up his RBL server list. I think I'll also add a lower-priority MX record for my primary server as well and see what effect this has. For those of you who have done this, did you measure the effect it had? Was it a noticeable difference? -- Warren Michelsen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Online Tools For Business -- <http://www.OTFB.com/> Small Business & E-commerce web hosting ############################################################# This message is sent to you because you are subscribed to the mailing list <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. To unsubscribe, E-mail to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To switch to the DIGEST mode, E-mail to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To switch to the INDEX mode, E-mail to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Send administrative queries to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
