On Mon, 21 Jan 2013 16:08:19 -0800, Paul C Bernhardt wrote:
Spoofing email is trivial, from what I understand. There are ways to provide authenticity proofs for senders. While they are implementable and implemented, they are not required from what I can tell. So, claiming the email headers as some kind of proof of anything is not definitive because, for all I know, you are someone who is spoofing Mike Palij's email address. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Email_spoofing
Paul, you appear to have confused spoofing with using a fake account. Spoofing refers to receiving email from a source that is different from the address listed in the "From" field of the email (to completely hide the source one also needs to be change the "Return-Path" and "Reply-To" fields; whether or not these are changed are an indicator of the knowledge level of the person committing the act; looking at the headers will reveal this as well). For one example of how this is done, see pages 117-118 in Eric Cole's "Hackers Beware"; see: http://books.google.com/books?id=fNRuUrhyd4QC&pg=PA142&lpg=PA142&dq=%22spoofing+and+hijacking%22&source=bl&ots=pjRUoIIWQq&sig=Nz_LAlD8bpXvzo0jpWd3gaVanYM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=HOX9UKS7Gabg0QHHroGIBw&ved=0CEQQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=manic.cs.test.edu&f=false So, if someone was spoofing Tips from the [email protected], this address would appear in the "From" field but the post actually comes from some other address. Responses to the NYU address would wind up at the nyu.edu address (if Return-Path and Reply-to are also changed to NYU) but then the "real" Mike Palij would wonder why he is subscribed to Tips and/or receiving the replies from Tipsters to posts he didn't make. It would only be a matter of time before the "real" Mike Palij said "WTF?!", contact the appropriate IT people at NYU as well as Bill Southerly about the matter. Spoofing works best as "one-off" or for a limited number of posts because the actual owner of the email account usually finds out that someone else is posting/emailing and fraudulently representing the owner. Now, if the NYU email account was hijacked and used to send out emails, then those emails would legitimately be from that account but not sent by the real Mike Palij. Presumably, angry emails in response would get to the real Mike Palij who would have a "WTF!?" reaction and so on. In either case, it would just be a matter of time before the real Mike Palij found out about the fraud/misuse of his account. So, if you think that I am spoofing Tips with Mike Palij's NYU email account, let me be clear: you are wrong. Also, email spoofing is a crime and claiming that I am engaged in a criminal activity is a libel and a defamation of my character (for definitions see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defamation ) All this means is if you continue to claim I am engaged in email spoofing, your behavior will be considered actionable. Ask your lawyer what that means.
Good thing I'm at my posting limit for the day, or this could go on for a while, because it is, IMO, impossible to resolve.
Talk to your network people, especially someone familiar with internet protocols on how to resolve such issues. Reading header info is just one part of the process, just like doing proper statistical analysis is part of doing good research. And talk to your lawyer.
As the saying goes, "On the internet, nobody knows you are a dog" (Steiner, 1993). You aren't a dog, are you? You've seen Benji, right?
All I have to say is "stop recycling my material". See the bottom of: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/msg09398.html -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=23225 or send a blank email to leave-23225-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
