[tlug] Re: several messages

[Curt Sampson <cjs@example.com>]

On Wed, 6 Dec 2006, Godwin Stewart wrote:

> Why should they go to the trouble of deobfuscating e-mail addresses
> when it's so easy to have software generate them randomly and then sell
> them?

Becuase it's also pretty easy to de-obfuscate them.

Given a system that is already scraping non-obfuscated addresses from
web pages, how long would it take an average programmer to extend it
to deal with the common forms of text obfuscation? A day or two? The
low end of the going rate for programmers from India and Eastern Europe
is $5 an hour, so that's $40-$80. That's almost certainly cheaper than
writing new software to do the random address to SMTP thing, and you
also don't have to deal with the hassles of active attacks, where you've
got an annoyed sysadmin on the other end who is (due to the amount of
his system resources you're using up) a rather strong interesting in
stopping your SMTP program.

Keeping up with every small advance in obfuscation is fairly cheap for
any individual step.

Shannon Jacobs wrote:

> > I think spammers make decent money without having to work
> > particularly hard.

Not from what I've seen. I've been watching spammers pretty carefully
for a decade or so now (I started an ISP in 1995), I know how to do it
if I wanted to, and I can certainly think of easier ways to make a buck.

> > Everything is automated, so all they have to do is buy their
> > lists of email addresses, feed them to the software, and go.

It's far from that easy. I won't get into all of the tedious details.

> However, in my case I admit that I want my NEMS address blocked in
> Case 4. I just want *ONE* email address that will never get spam, no
> matter how many people know it.

And you're happy that you can't just hand a business card to someone to
give them the ability to send you e-mail.

That doesn't work for me, and there's a lot of other people in the same
boat. The spam problem would have to be much, much worse before I'd
switch away from standard SMTP.

cjs
--
Curt Sampson       <cjs@example.com>        +81 90 7737 2974