spam

General discussions and other topics.
21 posts Page 1 of 3
by Richs » Fri Jan 09, 2015 5:42 pm
I am trying to relearn Sonic e-mail after many years of looking at adds on Yahoo. Was told by support that this is a good place to give suggestions. I want to blacklist all the e-mail spam that is getting through the filter. Don't want to open them because that may allow a virus. Was shown a work around by support but that takes many clicks and is just plain a pain. I remember using a service that allowed a right click on the email which opened a window and then a left click to block that mail. If the spam program can't filter better, than it should be easier and safer way to block spam.
by ankh » Sat Jan 17, 2015 11:52 am
Seems like I'm getting a whole lot more spam lately, in several different email addresses.

Spamcop used to offer service with email.
They quit that recently; mail to addresses @spamcop now just gets forwarded.
They still have a reporting service but it was rather awfully complicated last time I looked.

Is there a way with Sonic for us to forward or file spam that gets to us past the filters?
Put it somewhere that it will be analyzed in some useful way?
by nsmiller » Mon Jan 19, 2015 12:29 am
ankh wrote:Spamcop used to offer service with email.
They quit that recently; mail to addresses @spamcop now just gets forwarded.
They still have a reporting service but it was rather awfully complicated last time I looked.
In what way is the Spamcop.net reporting service complicated? Unless you reported by copy-and-paste from MS Outlook, or Eudora, it seems pretty simple. With a reporting account, and mailhosts configured, just forward as an attachment to the Spamcop.net reporting email address, log in to the Spamcop.net account, and report away.
by ankh » Tue Jan 20, 2015 3:57 pm
> just forward ... with a reporting account

I'll look into what a "reporting account" is.

Problem is mail received at an address @spamcop, being automatically forwarded to me @sonic.net
(that's all Spamcop offers now, forwarding -- they used to be an actual email provider).
When they were an email provider that included reporting on their email interface.

Now, I dunno. A few years ago I tried reporting mail forwarded from an address@spamcop to one @sonic -- and Spamcop automatically tagged Sonic as a spam-friendly ISP.

Hilarity ensued. I don't want that to happen again (yeah, it was sorted out quickly, but the recommendation was that I edit headers by hand to take out the path mentioning Sonic. maybe they've fixed that).

I'll poke at it again.

Also seeing lots more spam getting through other email accounts lately, direct to Sonic, and a couple other email services.
by nsmiller » Tue Jan 20, 2015 4:35 pm
ankh wrote:> just forward ... with a reporting account

I'll look into what a "reporting account" is.
It is just an account with Spamcop.net. I log in, and I am shown a text field for the copy and paste.
Now, I dunno. A few years ago I tried reporting mail forwarded from an address@spamcop to one @sonic -- and Spamcop automatically tagged Sonic as a spam-friendly ISP.
Spamcop.net recommends configuring mailhosts; indeed, without doing so, much reported spam will not even generate a report. A "mailhost" configuration is created by requesting a test email to be sent to the email address for which you will be reporting spam. The test email is received at your email address, and you enter it in the SC parser. This email includes a code, so the SC parser knows it is not spam. From the test email headers, and the test code, Spamcop.net learns what your normal inbound path looks like. This avoids errors, such as you experienced.

Once the account is set up, you can get a customized reporting email address; something like, "submit.%Rnd_Chr%@spam.spamcop.net". Using this, you can forward spam "as an attachment". When the spam has been processed, you get an email from "SpamCop AutoResponder" with this Subject: "[SpamCop] has accepted 1 email for processing". Inside is a link to the reporting page.
by ankh » Tue Jan 20, 2015 4:53 pm
Found their advice, thank you.
It's https://www.spamcop.net/fom-serve/cache/397.html

which begins
How do I configure Mailhosts for SpamCop?
Mailhost configuration

SpamCop is undergoing a major renovation to the underlying logic which it uses to determine spam sources. Soon, all SpamCop users will be required to use this new system and to complete this additional setup. Some "unique" users may not be able to report all the spam they have in the past.

Why?We are addressing ongoing problems - spammers are finally doing what we have known they could do all along - create really convincing mail header forgeries. These forgeries make SpamCop think spam is being sent from innocent sites, when it is not....
by ankh » Fri Apr 08, 2016 8:24 am
... several years go by like nothing ....

I was relying on Sonic's graymail comfortably enough.

This last few months, I started getting malware files -- almost every day -- in phishing mail pretending to be bills or invoices, which was getting past Sonic's graymail. Since I forward several other email addresses to Sonic that added up fast.

I asked Support, they said Sonic uses Spamcop and to report the problem to Spamcop.

Well dang. Since Spamcop's change a few years back I'd just ignored their seemingly complicated "new" system and quit reporting.

So I finally got around to figuring out Spamcop's changed system for reporting.

It's not as bad as I thought.

Basically -- in Spamcop's "Mail Hosts" menu -- you have to enter your Spamcop mail address as a mail host first, then methodically go through and list one email address at each of the other sites where you have an email address. It only cares about the site, not the individual email account, at each host.

Once that's done you can forward the crap --as attachment -- to a "Submit...." address at Spamcop.
Minutes later they reply saying they've screened an item and it's ready for you to check.
Once you check it to make sure the reports are not going to the wrong place, they send the report.

Whew.

And -- remarkably enough -- the malware in email that had been getting past Sonic's graymail tapered off within a couple of days.
by ankh » Mon Apr 18, 2016 11:50 am
Okay, still getting a good bit of spam.
Reporting everything that actually shows up in Inbox to Spamcop reporting address
No problems with that, it's working fine now that I got Mailhosts configured there.
Should've done that a few years ago.

---- Now, another area -----

When Sonic holds email in graymail and says

" The original message has been attached to this report so you can view it"

Sometimes (1)
--- there's an attachment (.eml, envelope icon)
I can open that and forward it as an attachment to my Spamcop reporting account.

Question (1): is there any point in doing that? Does another report to Spamcop make a difference?
-- and, (2) how about when the spam was sent TO [my email]@spamcop address
Will Spamcop ever actually filter spam, or are they only a forwarding and blacklisting site now?
(I think the latter)

and

Sometimes (2)
--- there's no attachment, and "The original message has been attached to this report" simply means I get an email with all the Sonic graymail spam detection headers plus just the text of the spam -- not the full headers.

Question: is there any way to report that to my Spamcop reporting account?
And is there any point in doing that?
by gkeller » Mon Apr 18, 2016 4:57 pm
Would you mind forwarding one of the graymail notifications you received that did not have the original message attached to support@sonic.net? Putting ATTN:gkeller in the subject will get it to me.
Grant Keller
Sonic.net System Operations
by ankh » Mon Apr 18, 2016 5:34 pm
OK, forwarded as attachment the most recent three, to you as requested
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