4 ms·

It can be exciting when your filter blocks a ton of spam, but then you get a few false positives, and of course they happened to be very important mails ... I t

by z3t4 8y ago

It can be exciting when your filter blocks a ton of spam, but then you get a few false positives, and of course they happened to be very important mails ... I think the spam filter needs to be plugged into the MTA, so that when a message is flagged as spam, the MTA can tell the sender that hey, this message got flagged as spam.

viraptor 8y ago
The problem with that is that the sender can then iterate on the message until they don't get a "flagged as spam" notification. This applies both to the real sender and to the spammer.
- lifeisstillgood 8y ago
  Just dont block anything that has an email address you have mailed to before. Its highly unlikely an important email will come from someone I have not mailed. I am playing with different gmail api fixes to do things like this - with 12,000 unread mails in my inbox I need some automated help. And if the lottery commission wants to tell me I have won, they can get my number easily.
  - z3t4 8y ago
    It has mostly been invoices. It's however like if they want the invoice to get lost so they can send a remainder with a +50$ added to the 5$ bill.
  - tinus_hn 8y ago
    If you never sign up for services on the web and are not part of mailing lists.
- flavor8 8y ago
  Otoh if the sender could reliably know if the message was received/read, then we could get rid of the Victorian age idea of mailing bits of dead trees around for official notices.
detaro 8y ago
That's kind of what ARF is for. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abuse_Reporting_Format https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abuse_Reporting_Format
- z3t4 8y ago
  Spammers use different (hacked) servers, so by the time someone have acted on the abuse letter and blocked outgoing SMTP the spammer has switched servers 10 times. About the spammer iterating until the message get through it probably wouln't be worth the time, or the spammer doesn't have the technical ability to, or he/she would be able to get a real job that pays out 1000x more then what those spams generate. Getting a spam notification would also make lazy major e-mail providers to use existing standards such as SPF because their customers would complain.
  - detaro 8y ago
    I'm not sure what this response has to do with me telling you about an existing standard for what you propose?
    - z3t4 8y ago
      I interpret the article you linked that a abuse mail would be sent, quote: "from users to some anti-spam center". While I propose that the mail transfer agent (MTA) on the receiving end tells the sending MTA whether or not an e-mail was (automatically) flagged as spam. Sending MTA: HELO I would like to send an e-mail Receiving MTA: Great, send it to me Sending MTA: Sending ... Receiving MTA: Analyzing mail, please wait ... Receiving MTA: Email accepted, but it was marked as spam Sending MTA: OK, goodbye It would then be up to the sending MTA to notify the user, like it does now when an e-mail is undelivered.
      - detaro 8y ago
        there's an "e.g." in front of the quote, and the example shown is for reporting to the source domain, which then can decide how to handle it (e.g. inform the user if it was a false positive, or take measures against the user if it was actual spam)

by z3t4 8y ago

viraptor 8y ago

The problem with that is that the sender can then iterate on the message until they don't get a "flagged as spam" notification. This applies both to the real sender and to the spammer.

lifeisstillgood 8y ago
Just dont block anything that has an email address you have mailed to before. Its highly unlikely an important email will come from someone I have not mailed. I am playing with different gmail api fixes to do things like this - with 12,000 unread mails in my inbox I need some automated help. And if the lottery commission wants to tell me I have won, they can get my number easily.
- z3t4 8y ago
  It has mostly been invoices. It's however like if they want the invoice to get lost so they can send a remainder with a +50$ added to the 5$ bill.
- tinus_hn 8y ago
  If you never sign up for services on the web and are not part of mailing lists.
flavor8 8y ago
Otoh if the sender could reliably know if the message was received/read, then we could get rid of the Victorian age idea of mailing bits of dead trees around for official notices.

detaro 8y ago

That's kind of what ARF is for. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abuse_Reporting_Format https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abuse_Reporting_Format

z3t4 8y ago
Spammers use different (hacked) servers, so by the time someone have acted on the abuse letter and blocked outgoing SMTP the spammer has switched servers 10 times. About the spammer iterating until the message get through it probably wouln't be worth the time, or the spammer doesn't have the technical ability to, or he/she would be able to get a real job that pays out 1000x more then what those spams generate. Getting a spam notification would also make lazy major e-mail providers to use existing standards such as SPF because their customers would complain.
- detaro 8y ago
  I'm not sure what this response has to do with me telling you about an existing standard for what you propose?
  - z3t4 8y ago
    I interpret the article you linked that a abuse mail would be sent, quote: "from users to some anti-spam center". While I propose that the mail transfer agent (MTA) on the receiving end tells the sending MTA whether or not an e-mail was (automatically) flagged as spam. Sending MTA: HELO I would like to send an e-mail Receiving MTA: Great, send it to me Sending MTA: Sending ... Receiving MTA: Analyzing mail, please wait ... Receiving MTA: Email accepted, but it was marked as spam Sending MTA: OK, goodbye It would then be up to the sending MTA to notify the user, like it does now when an e-mail is undelivered.
    - detaro 8y ago
      there's an "e.g." in front of the quote, and the example shown is for reporting to the source domain, which then can decide how to handle it (e.g. inform the user if it was a false positive, or take measures against the user if it was actual spam)