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Message: <blockquote data-quote="WizarDru" data-source="post: 868499" data-attributes="member: 151">I just typed up a huge e-mail detailing many points about Spam, and the boards just ate it, unfortunately.  Darned SQL errors. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f621.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":mad:" title="Mad    :mad:"  data-smilie="4"data-shortname=":mad:" /> I'll be brief.  I'm a tech person for a firm of 26 people or so.  Spam is my personal demon.  Over the past four days, we've received 1600 spam messages...that I've caught.  Add another 150-300 that I didn't get this time through, as I'm configuring my anti-spam appliance.Quick summary: <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Spam costs the reciever inversely to the sender</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Spam's success rate is shockingly low, but the low cost makes it worth it:  A junk mail sender needs a 3-4% return to make a profit, and requires a good deal of manual labor and infrastructure...a spammer can work alone, spend pennies, and can send out batches of 10,000 mails, hoping to get 0.01% response to make a profit.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Spam has many hidden costs.  Increased internet traffic, increased bandwidth needs, increased time to configure mail and relay servers, router and other devices, increased time to monitor e-mail, deal with issues, and increased software costs to stop it, support said software and continue to advance to deal with changing spam evasive techniques</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Most spam is misleading.  Falsified headers, from and to information, intentionally misleading subject/headers, and much of it is patently offensive, if not just annoying.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Spam, if left unchecked, could turn to darker purposes.  Imaging if you got spam 'hate mail' from extreme political hate groups, featuring graphic depictions of lynchings, for example.  The possibilities are disturbing, to say the least</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Spammers abuse the available technologies, emphasing a need for the implementation of new technologies, such as IP v6, to remove many of the vulnerabilities associated with IP and SMTP that allow spammers to work from the shadows, without consquences.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Junk mail would drop dramatically if the USPS were to change class 'D' rates.  Such changes, thanks to the likes of AOL, MSN and others, has allowed spammers to employ a 'scorched earth' policy of freebie accounts and wasted bandwidth.  Plus it requires technicians to shut those accounts down, and folks like me to deal with the consequences on the receiving end.</li> </ul>Spam is a major problem, and it's only getting worse.  Legislation is the only way to get the bottom feeders to move on or back to their pyramid-schemes and other nonsense.Phew.  I'll get off of my soapbox, now.</blockquote>

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