Richard Alan wrote:
sean wrote:
funny, I was just on the line with our ISP (freaking cox.net) about
a flood of new spam from (AT)onmicrosoft.com... doesn't seem to
matter how many times I mark their whole domain as spam, I seem to
be getting exponentially more...
A WHOIS lookup indicates that onmicrosoft.com is owned by Microsoft.
Of course, it is entirely possible that a professional spammer is
simply using that domain name in his spew.
What is the nature of these emails that you are classifying as spam?
If the domain is owned by Microsoft, then chances are high that the
content is forged. A check of the Received: headers (ctrl-U) is likely
to show one or more servers prior to Cox that are unrelated, either
servers that are owned by spammers, or exploited servers (either
dedicated servers, or end-user computers with rogue mail servers installed).
I doubt that the content is coming from Microsoft.
At server level (i.e., Cox), there are a variety of tools available for
fighting this kind of stuff. The most prominent is with DNS blacklists,
and/or use of content-filtering tools such as SpamAssassin, but it takes
an admin that's really focused on that kind of thing, who knows what
he's doing, and can give it sufficient attention. And the most effective
DNSBL, spamhaus.org, isn't free, for a large provider, such as Cox.
From my own history with Cox (I've been a customer of theirs in the
past), I don't think they're particularly serious about being a mail
service provider. As with most connectivity providers, they'll provide
email, but it's mostly an add-on service, especially in the consumer
space. For consumers, they're far more focused on connectivity,
especially in trying to get you to sign up for their most profitable
offerings, bundling with their television and phone products, and maybe
even convincing you to let them be the reseller for your cell phone service.
Several years ago, when I left Cox, my new provider provided me an email
account. I don't remember even what the address is, and I don't think I
ever activated the account, because for years, I've done my mail through
a dedicated mail service provider.
In my view, if you simply want mail, you're fine with getting it from
your connectivity provider. If you want more than that, then you need to
be using a dedicated mail service provider (including more advanced spam
filtering). And if you want to avoid having your content being exploited
by your provider (e.g., gmail, hotmail, yahoo, etc.) consider the option
of moving to a paid service, where the provider is serving you, as a
paid customer. The other benefit of using a provider that's not your
connectivity provider is that if you change connectivity providers, then
you don't have to make a corresponding change in your email address.
Smith
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