[170350] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: IPv6 isn't SMTP
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Barry Shein)
Wed Mar 26 14:25:05 2014
From: Barry Shein <bzs@world.std.com>
Date: Wed, 26 Mar 2014 14:22:57 -0400
To: Larry Sheldon <LarrySheldon@cox.net>
In-Reply-To: <53325892.2070801@cox.net>
Cc: "nanog@nanog.org" <nanog@nanog.org>
Errors-To: nanog-bounces+nanog.discuss=bloom-picayune.mit.edu@nanog.org
On March 25, 2014 at 23:33 LarrySheldon@cox.net (Larry Sheldon) wrote:
>
> Is spam fighting really about SMTP? Or is it about abuse of the
> transport layer by (among other things) the SMTP?
That is the point, isn't it.
Most see spam as its content.
The real problem with spam is its volume.
Without the volume, some bot operators probably send on the order of a
billion messages per day, it wouldn't be much of a problem.
What makes that volume possible and pervasive is IP address mobility.
Otherwise we'd just block the offending IPs and be done with it, to
some extent -- I have a newer view on that but it'd be distracting.
What makes IP address mobility possible is mass, unauthorized if not
simply illegal use of others' resources, such as with botnets or
massive exploiting of holes in web hosting sites' software.
Fundamentally spam is a security isse.
A spammer's stock in trade is the massive, free use of IP address and
bandwidth resources.
That the content is unwanted is almost incidental to this fact.
--
-Barry Shein
The World | bzs@TheWorld.com | http://www.TheWorld.com
Purveyors to the Trade | Voice: 800-THE-WRLD | Dial-Up: US, PR, Canada
Software Tool & Die | Public Access Internet | SINCE 1989 *oo*
