Nigerian 419 Spam/Scam Mails ============================ Problem: ------- Nigerian 419 Spam/Scam Mails, have shamefully and unfortunately earned the mockery and antipathy of everyone who has an email address all over the world, not to talk of system administrators who constantly have to keep there spamassassin rule logic up to date. As is so published, it affects/costs millions of dollars for the US government to try and curtail it, not to mention the untold ISP/CyberCafe businesses it pulls under due to its share difficulty of handling, which most times requires manual monitoring, costing both in human and technology resources, not to mention the embarassements faced by both cafe operator and web users, to find their emails letters are being looked at just to confirm if its scam or not, talk of privacy? Method Used by 419 Spams: ------------------------ The process of 419 spams are well documented, it always requires the second party to be a greedy individual or a stupid one, that is the only reason the business flourishes or seems to flourish. Usually there are 2 methods used to carry out the spamming, First Method is very laborious and requires email addresses to be copied using search engine on particular criterias, and then individual letters typed and sent to each respective addressee, the Second Method, is more effective and the most dangerous, Mass Mailing Programs and Email Spiders are used to send up to 1000 email addresses at once after being extracted by Email Spider bots the go thru the web lookin for its target (email addresses). Tools Used: ---------- Rolling Launcher, Beijing Email Extractor, Advanced Email Extractor, Email Spyder Easy, Email Blaster, ICQ Search Engines, Email Launcher. (So far this are the ones I have experienced) Goal: ---- Using the present most advance, efficient, open-source Spam filter, SpamAssassin (TM), applying reverse logic to filter the mails before it leaves via http web traffic (this time around),(this may involve some form of packet filtering) the advantage of this will greatly reduce the overall ability of spam mails, and make life easy for both system administrators at both ends of the problem. Implementation/Platform: ----------------------- SpamAssassin on GNU Linux Operating Systems Solution: -------- No solution yet, right now the method being used is affecting legitimate clients, it involves blocking the URL's of WebMails used for sending the Spam/Scam Mails and applying a patch to Windows Machines which does not allow the Spam Tools to run, the more drastic approach carried out by Satellite companies and bigger ISPs is to block the IP addresses with recommendation from SpamCop. Talk of Pink Letters! Others Stuff I wanna just comment on ------------------------------------ SpamCop: ------- The greatest Problem for Nigerian ISP's and CyberCafe's, there reporting creates a non-tolerant attitude by Satellite providers whose approach is the continuous blocking of IP address and forcing the companies to continously purchase IP blocks from them (a good business I may add) Nigerian Government: ------------------- Is it there fault?, this is a moot point, for one, the labelled 3rd world country is unable to find the necessary resources to help provide better life for its citizens, thus if its to chose the lesser of 2 evils, the citizens (419 operators) might as well attempt to see how smart they are/or stupid! 419, Scam or Greed: ------------------ Is it really a Scam?, As the saying goes, it takes 2 to tango. There must be the other one, usually and always the greedy one, who is ready to exploit the rescources of another country in the attempt to aggrandize one self. US Government & its Citizens: ---------------------------- The US Government,aargh, what can I say, simply put, uuuhhh, there is not much that can be said, I'll simply repeat what a pal I met said, "Its our responsibility to Protect the Stupid Citizens in Our Country". I think that says it all.