talkmagic.co.uk

Sorry for the totally OT post but I know there are a lot of you on this group who are a lot more teccie than me.

Very suddenly (within the past two days) I have started receiving vast amounts of returned email / out of office responses etc. to my inbox.

They are all replies to emails that have, apparently, been sent from my domain. They all are addressed to a random name @ 'my domain'.com .

It only started yesterday and they are coming in thick and fast (well over 100 today).

Should I be worried and can I do anything about it?

TIA.

What's your anti-virus software like? Up to date? Have you actually checked? Because it sounds like you're part of a spambot network.

Not getting at you, just tired of the swines who think spamming actually gets them anywhere and who release malware to do their bidding.

Thanks Tomo. I use AVG free, new version 7, all fully functional, updated daily with a full scan every day.

So is it likely to be originating from my computer then?

130 more between 11.00pm and 07.00am!

Yorkshire Pudding wrote:Thanks Tomo. I use AVG free, new version 7, all fully functional, updated daily with a full scan every day.

So is it likely to be originating from my computer then?

130 more between 11.00pm and 07.00am!

Sounds more like your website has been found and an email address has been discovered on there.

The spambots literally then send out loads of 'stab in the dark' emails in the hope that some get through.

If it's any consolation, we host about 70 domains, consisting of about 100 actual domain names. 5 of these are our own (not clients) and currently on our 'spam-o-meter', we are up to about 1800 spam messages a day.

Anti-virus won't help at all I'm afraid. Go to 'versiontracker.com' and search for a spam filter... there's loads of free ones which use matching methods, 'Bayesian' filters and more self-teaching methods to get the cr@p out and leave your inbox clean again.

If you actually own your own server (as we do) you could consider a server-side solution, such as SpamAssasin, which kills the spam at source.

And because prevention is better than cure, DO NOT put your email address on yours or anyone elses website. If you must have it on your own site, there are ways of cloaking it so that spambots can't use it, but humans can... PM me for more info.

Finally, NEVER give email addresses out willy-nilly. Sometimes they are a necessary giveaway for things such as signing up to forums etc. In which case, get a disposable one, such as a Gmail or take a look here:
http://email.about.com/cs/dispaddrrevs/ ... osable.htm

Basically, you create a throwaway address for signups etc, and if it's level of spam gets high, you just cancel it and get another!

Our spam at work is now down to just 2 or 3 which slip the net each day.

The problem is, SPAM is evolving as quickly as spam filters. It's all humanly engineered—so even the toughest spam filter can be reverse engineered and loopholes found, so you'll never stay on top.

As I said, the best method is to prevent the spam rather than cure it.

Thank you, Seige, sound and constructive advice. Sounds like I'm going to have to live with it now though.

First thing I've done is change my email forwarding. Previously I had it set so that everything@'my domain'.com was forwarded to my inbox, I've now set it so that only specific names@'my domain'.com (such as keith@'my domain'.com) are forwarded, everything else (ie. the spam) now goes to a disposable address which I'll just leave to fill up. Not a perfect solution but it should work... I think.[/i]

Alternatively I may try a permission based spam filter like choicemail ( http://www.digiportal.com/index.html ). Anybody any experience with or thoughts on using this?

also go to DOWNLOAD (click)

and get yourself SPYBOT SEARCH AND DESTROY

and

ADAWARE SE Personal (make sure it's the lavasoft version)

finally while there get yourself SPYWARE BLASTER

These 3 programs are free and will help to ensure you don't have any bots on your PC that could be doing things.

I don't recommend AVG as I have had viruses find their way through in the past. Try zone alarm or kaspersky...