PHISHING

frank_f15 · Jan 22, 2005

i really get tired of the emails i get from phishing expeditions, do u think it might be a good idea to clik on the links and fill in the lines gibberish, DARN IT i just want to hit back at these rectal orffices. i just got another one, if i don't reply my EBAY account will be discontinued for the 237th time. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif just venting

Dargo · Jan 22, 2005

I've reported dozens to eBay. They don't seem to do anything other than say that they are bogus. I replied to the last couple and filled it in with totally bogus information. In the last one, I put in their "comment" box "do you think I'm stupid?" I haven't had one in a couple of weeks now. Maybe once they figure that you're on to them, they move on? So far they haven't sent me any more.

frank_f15 · Jan 22, 2005

yes , i have reported many to ebay, but don't even bother anymore, seems to do no good, i don't really think ebay or any other s do anything about it. Guess it is just a matter of Beware and if u are dumb enough to fill in the info, tough luck. but sure would like to be ale to hit back /forums/images/graemlins/mad.gif MUST JUST BE ME IN MY OLD AGE /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Bob_Skurka · Jan 22, 2005

I bounce them back to their server as unread. It makes it appear as if the email address they sent it to is not valid, after a while they tend to clean up their list and take me off. I also did that to an aunt of mine who kept sending me about a dozen jokes every day, now she wonders why she can get emails from me but every time she sends me a joke, the email comes back to her as being sent to an invalid email address /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif

JimR · Jan 22, 2005

I love the ones that read like this. My uncle's brother's first cousin Prince Faquar of eastern Ethiopa died and left me $40,000,000.00 to move as I please. I need you to move this to an american bank. I will pay you 1/10th of that amount when the fund is established. Please send me your bank account information so I can transfer the funds to you immediately. Please keep this between you and I as I do not want the local officials to know what I am doing. My reply to these emails is a plain and simple 3 words. F-ck Off A-shole. That seems to have stopped the emails from Liberia, Ivory Coast, Sudan, Ethiopia and a lot of other countries. I don't get the Ebay and Paypal emails as of yet.

DKinWA · Jan 23, 2005

How do you go about bouncing the emails back as unread? I wouldn't mind doing that to a few that come my way. I'd like to send something else back to some of these losers, but I'd probably be the one to get into trouble.

OkeeDon · Jan 23, 2005

One way is with a program called MailWasher: mailwasher.net . One of it's abilities is to bounce an email back to any address you place on a blacklist. However, I read somewhere that bouncing does not always work, nor is it always desirable, but it was a couple of years ago, I'm having a senior moment, and I can't remember the details. I'm pretty sure I read the discussion about bouncing on the MailWasher documentation. I used a shareware version of MailWasher for a while until I got my own web site with Spam Assassin built it free; now I simply re-direct all my email through a Spam Assassin setup. It works pretty good, about as well as any Bayesian Filter setup (which is how most of the newer ones work), but not as well as a Spam Arrest type subscription program, which I'm currently to much of a miser to pay for.

California · Jan 23, 2005

For spam don't send a bounce message.

Spammers use software that plugs bogus data into the From, Reply-to, and routing fields. Your bounce just bothers some innocent whose name was harvested and fraudulently used in the From field. The bounce will never reach the spammer.

I used myrealname @ myisp as my ebay id for six years. Later that email account received thousands of bounces for spam that had myrealname @ myisp in the From field next to random first and last names, none mine and with no duplication across thousands of messages that I purportedly sent. Every message had different routing in the headers, again none of it was my ISP or my static IP. Obviously my ebay id got harvested.

I wrote about this in this post I made last April.

(For crazy aunt a bounce probably is the best answer, and Mailwasher configured selectively should do the job.)

Bob_Skurka · Jan 23, 2005

Spammers use software that plugs bogus data into the From, Reply-to, and routing fields. Your bounce just bothers some innocent whose name was harvested and fraudulently used in the From field. The bounce will never reach the spammer. 

This is true in SOME cases but not in ALL cases. Much of the spam I get is from companies that consider themselves to be legitimate businesses trying to offer me a valuable service (like a new mortgage) and for those types of spam, the "bounce" does work. Also for the Nigerian financial scam type letters, bounce also works. However, there are many cases where bounce does send the email back to a void address or to a "harvested" email address.

As to the question posted previously asking how to "bounce" my email program has "bounce" as a built in feature but many shareware programs are also available.

gws · Jan 23, 2005

NEVER click on a link. Most of the links will have a "serial" number tied directly to you email address.

frank_f15 · Jan 23, 2005

i NEVER DO click on the links. i usually just delete them. but it sure is frustrating.

Moon · Jan 23, 2005

( As to the question posted previously asking how to "bounce" my email program has "bounce" as a built in feature )

Hey Bob,
What email program are you using? That would be a handy feature to have.

Thanks
Moon

Henro · Jan 23, 2005

I think I saw an example here recently...

Someone reported their solution to water condensing in their loader valve was adding anti-freeze to their hydraulic fluid!

I assume that poster was phishing... /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif ... so to speak...

Have to get back to that thread and see what else evolves... /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif

btolle · Jan 23, 2005

Please don't bounce spam. It creates an unnecessary load on the Internet and never does any good. The return address is "spoofed" (false) anyway so the spammer never see it.

NEVER click on a link in a phishing email. As someone has already said, the scammer may have your email tied to a serial number to identify you.

Don't bother to fill out the forms with bogus information. The spammers are used to that and are such jerks they are not offended by name calling and so forth.

The only way we will ever slow the spam down is to NEVER buy anything from a spam email no matter how attractive a price is.

The reason spammers are still in existence is that they are making money from those who click on the links and buy from them! They don't care if they only get 1 sale for every 100,000 emails they send out. They send out millions for little more than they can send out one so it pays off.

Unfortunately, there are still morons who buy from spammers so we will continue to get spam for a long time to come.

If you think you have it bad, my server provider complained the other day because I was getting over 23,000 emails a day. Only 12 to 15 were legitimate. I do a lot of filtering and only 5 or 6 a day get past my filters.

Bill Tolle

Bob_Skurka · Jan 23, 2005

( As to the question posted previously asking how to "bounce" my email program has "bounce" as a built in feature )

Hey Bob,
What email program are you using? That would be a handy feature to have.

Thanks
Moon 

Moon . . . I use "MAIL" from Apple. I was using MS OUTLOOK (the full blown version not the Express version) but it was too vulnerable to attacks so I switched.


Please don't bounce spam. It creates an unnecessary load on the Internet and never does any good. The return address is "spoofed" (false) anyway so the spammer never see it.

As I outlined before, many of the return address are NOT spoofed and bouncing can be very effective under those circumstances. I would say that less than 30% of the emails I bounce have "spoofed" addresses because when they do, then I get them back! The % of returns is fairly low, and my spam mails (which used to average 100+ a day, nothing like your 23,000!!!) average only a few a week now. I don't even need to filter my email anymore!!!


NEVER click on a link in a phishing email. As someone has already said, the scammer may have your email tied to a serial number to identify you. 

I'm not sure about the serial # part, but basically this is very sound advice and company policy at our office.


The only way we will ever slow the spam down is to NEVER buy anything from a spam email no matter how attractive a price is. 
Probably the BEST advice I've ever read about spam. But unfortunately some people succomb to greed and that is why the Nigerian letters still persist. Others can't pass up that "LOW MORTGAGE RATE" and fall for those spams, which are actually legitimate businesses using spam to generate leads. And still others want to see "Paris Hilton Naked" and again, those are businesses that are trying to attact folks to their sites.

Moon · Jan 23, 2005

Thanks Bob! /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

frank_f15 · Jan 23, 2005

( Someone reported their solution to water condensing in their loader valve was adding anti-freeze to their hydraulic fluid!
)
PLEASE tell me you are joking /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Henro · Jan 23, 2005

Frank, no I am serious...

And the psoter sounded serious too. I will add a link to that thread if I come across it again... /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif