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A little trick to spam the spammers (2021)

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Re: A little trick to spam the spammers (2021)

#41

Post by legitster »

Avamander wrote: post #33
legitster wrote: post #18

I run marketing email databases. This is cute, but it doesn't actually do anything in most systems - either the employees all already get the marketing emails or there is a system-wide rule to suppress against the email domain. If you actually want to (potentially) break something, try submitting some obscure characters or malformed html into some fields. Blank spaces in emails can particularly be a nuisance. And if…

I would also recommend naming yourself Viagra, Cialis or CBD.

This is actually kind of clever, but only if you give us a real email address.

We will often take your name and insert them into emails (for some dumb reasons around personalization supposedly increasing opens). But an email being stuffed full of spam words is a good way to get it flagged by anti-spam software and potentially hurt our sender reputation score.

You would probably have to do it en masse and use real inboxes. A couple other names you could use would be "free", "lovers", "singles", or any sort of mid word character substitution.

Re: A little trick to spam the spammers (2021)

#43

Post by urda »

dsl wrote: post #17
codetrotter wrote: post #13

I wonder if most sites maintain any of the following addresses or not for externally incoming mail: hostmaster@ postmaster@ webmaster@ dns-admin@ info@ contact@ root@ (And if they do, if anyone is actually reading the mail coming to those addresses.) I used to but I got so much spam and 0 actually legit mails to these addresses on my own domains so I stopped accepting externally incoming mails for those names/aliases…

Every email to legal@ has to be read by any legitimate site, thanks to GDPR/CCPA. Not that you'll get a response.

Hardly, and especially no to the GDPR. As a US citizen operating my own US site, doing no business with the EU, I do not care nor am I required to comply with EU law that has no bearing on a US citizen like me.

Re: A little trick to spam the spammers (2021)

#44

Post by legitster »

codetrotter wrote: post #13

I wonder if most sites maintain any of the following addresses or not for externally incoming mail: hostmaster@ postmaster@ webmaster@ dns-admin@ info@ contact@ root@ (And if they do, if anyone is actually reading the mail coming to those addresses.) I used to but I got so much spam and 0 actually legit mails to these addresses on my own domains so I stopped accepting externally incoming mails for those names/aliases…

These types of addresses are actually used by corporate anti-spam software and they are called "honeypots". The idea being you setup a inbox with no public email address and report any IP Addresses sending it emails. There is no legitimate reason someone should be emailing these addresses, so it's an obvious flag that someone is being naughty.

Re: A little trick to spam the spammers (2021)

#45

Post by mcnesium »

DonHopkins wrote: post #25

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12951917 DonHopkins on Nov 14, 2016 | parent | context | favorite | on: The NHS's 1.2M employees are trapped in a 'reply-a... Back in the days of ARPANET mailing lists, there used to be an "educational" mailing list called "please-remove-me", that was for people who asked an entire mailing list to remove them, instead of removing themselves, or sending email to the administrative…

> discuss the topic of being removed from mailing lists with people with similar interests

lol

Re: A little trick to spam the spammers (2021)

#46

Post by djbusby »

codetrotter wrote: post #13

I wonder if most sites maintain any of the following addresses or not for externally incoming mail: hostmaster@ postmaster@ webmaster@ dns-admin@ info@ contact@ root@ (And if they do, if anyone is actually reading the mail coming to those addresses.) I used to but I got so much spam and 0 actually legit mails to these addresses on my own domains so I stopped accepting externally incoming mails for those names/aliases…

I still run those names for many domains I operate. Only info@ gets the spam. The others are quiet - but I've actually gotten real emails (in 2022 even) to postmaster and hostmaster.

Re: A little trick to spam the spammers (2021)

#47

Post by temp0826 »

DonHopkins wrote: post #25

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12951917 DonHopkins on Nov 14, 2016 | parent | context | favorite | on: The NHS's 1.2M employees are trapped in a 'reply-a... Back in the days of ARPANET mailing lists, there used to be an "educational" mailing list called "please-remove-me", that was for people who asked an entire mailing list to remove them, instead of removing themselves, or sending email to the administrative…

Something similar happened (multiple times?) when I worked at AWS when someone decided to send a mass email to literally the entire company and people inevitably reply-all enough to clog the system and bring it to its knees. Many confused people were replying "UNSUBSCRIBE" (again, to the whole company) as if it would take them off

Re: A little trick to spam the spammers (2021)

#48

Post by iamacyborg »

legitster wrote: post #41
Avamander wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would also recommend naming yourself Viagra, Cialis or CBD.

This is actually kind of clever, but only if you give us a real email address. We will often take your name and insert them into emails (for some dumb reasons around personalization supposedly increasing opens). But an email being stuffed full of spam words is a good way to get it flagged by anti-spam software and potentially hurt our sender reputation score. You would probably have to do it en masse and use real inb…

This reminds me of when I briefly worked at a major luxury fashion retailer.

We were not allowed to send emails with “pussy bow” blouses as they were getting caught by corporate spam filters

Re: A little trick to spam the spammers (2021)

#49

Post by iamacyborg »

legitster wrote: post #44
codetrotter wrote: post #13

I wonder if most sites maintain any of the following addresses or not for externally incoming mail: hostmaster@ postmaster@ webmaster@ dns-admin@ info@ contact@ root@ (And if they do, if anyone is actually reading the mail coming to those addresses.) I used to but I got so much spam and 0 actually legit mails to these addresses on my own domains so I stopped accepting externally incoming mails for those names/aliases…

These types of addresses are actually used by corporate anti-spam software and they are called "honeypots". The idea being you setup a inbox with no public email address and report any IP Addresses sending it emails. There is no legitimate reason someone should be emailing these addresses, so it's an obvious flag that someone is being naughty.

There are plenty of legit reasons to be mailing some of those addresses.

Re: A little trick to spam the spammers (2021)

#50

Post by willcipriano »

ortusdux wrote: post #36
logifail wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the best fake emails we've been given If I were to do this, the email wouldn't be fake! I have hundreds of email aliases on my (main) domain, and the list keeps on growing.

I have a catchall for my domain, so most sites get a unique website@mydomain.com email and a unique password. Not only does is help against password leaks but I also can find out very quickly if someone sells the unique address.

I have a 3 character plus tld domain for this purpose. I used to run my own server with Postfix and Dovecot, I was able to deliver mail and it all worked but Microsoft can do the same thing for less money and effort.

The best part of running Postfix was I could add domains and addresses to a denylist and it would bounce the email and the senders server would often put a REJECTED message in their inbox. The email equivalent of slamming the door.

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