[thechat] +1 subscribers only

George Dillon <> Chat! thechat at georgedillon.com
Wed May 8 03:22:03 CDT 2002


+1 Subscribers only... I never knew it wasn't!

For a list intended to be for professional web workers, which is proud of
the high signal to noise quality of its traffic and whose list admins work
tirelessly night and day to keep it safe ... AND given the ever-improving
(if that's the word) tactics of the v#R*$ writers - ( some recently even
managing to penetrate thelist's defences)  ... subscription only is a line
of defence we can no longer neglect to implement.

However...

Even making the list Subscriber-only will not prevent every example of
messages with p0r* related subjects getting through, although it will most
likely prevent repeated and deliberate spam attacks.

The current top v#R*$ is particularly difficult to defeat since it forges
its source to match an address found in the victim's address book.  So the
recipient has no real way of knowing where it came from and cannot therefore
warn the oblivious sender.  ( Now I recall my own horror when I received a
v#R*$ with a list subject line which purported to come FROM ME !  And that
was nearly 2 years ago, so this is nothing new. )

SO... we go subscriber only... yes, but what happens when the p0r* subject
arrives... automatically block the sender?  What if the sender is (forged so
as to appear to be) .djc?

IMO  If you're liable to be sacked just because something bad reaches your
inbox or your cache, then your employer needs educating.  The criteria for
sacking should be that you actively sought that material - and that you did
so during working hours and/or using your employer's equipment (so to
speak).

I know of a case where a man recently lost his job, had his child taken away
from him, and had social services alert all his friends with children that
he was under investigation and all because a co-worker found a cached ad for
a kiddie p0r* site.  No charges have yet been brought or are likely to.  And
yes the man is a friend of mine and is someone who I actually admire for his
opinions and actions.  He's a good man who I've known long enough and I know
well enough to stand by him.

With p0r*-merchants leading the way in web-marketting techniques - including
hijacking genuine sites and creating bogus links to trick the search engines
into pointing people their way from innocuous queries - the avoidance of
p0r* on the net is about as likely as never receiving any v#R*Sez.  The ones
with the power to wreck careers and lives are not so much those who send
this stuff as the employers and legislators who don't understand how the web
works and are so terrified of the freedom it allows that they have created
an atmosphere of terror and are quite happy to sacrifice innocents on the
altar of their ignorance in order to maintain that atmosphere.

Oops... sorry!  Just a bit upset over how my friend's treatment.




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