On Mon, Feb 23, 2004 at 11:27:35AM +1100, Broun, Bevan wrote: > Although the economic method would work do you not think that the problem > is really the "simple" in SMTP? I believe there is work going on to write a > new mail protocol for then Internet and that this will go a long way to > solving the SPAM problem.
If you mean that sending mail should require authentication of some sort then yes, that would help. But consider that a lot (most?) spam is sent via unwitting proxies/relays. ISP's could block outgoing smtp but it would it only need a few ISPs to not cooperate with the rules for this sort of thing to fail. In fact the rogue ISPs might encourage this sort of thing, because then they charge the spammers more. (reduced supply = higher demand = higher charges) I think part of solution has to be increased use of the black hole lists. Matt -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
