Choking on Spam

I would love to see the response from all the ISP's that CAP their users on this. Let see Mr ISP per this report it says that 39% of my bandwidth was wasted by spam and you charged me x amount for going over. Please send me a credit.

Thanks you

lol I can just see it now

ym

How spam could increase your costs via bandwidth? If you pay for X-amount of bandwidth, how would it "cost" you more if spam or "real content" were to go through the pipe? Now if you saturated the connection, and were forced to upgrade I could maybe see a justification for the figures but as it is this sounds a lot like how they said Kevin Mitnick cost companies "millions of dollars" worth of damage, when by his own admission and most of those investigating him, he did no damage to the systems he infiltrated, nor used the information he gleaned for financial gain. Granted spam is annoying as hell but I fail to see how it could be 10 billion dollars worth of annoying.

said by MrTangent:

---

How spam could increase your costs via bandwidth? If you pay for X-amount of bandwidth, how would it "cost" you more if spam or "real content" were to go through the pipe? Now if you saturated the connection, and were forced to upgrade I could maybe see a justification for the figures but as it is this sounds a lot like how they said Kevin Mitnick cost companies "millions of dollars" worth of damage, when by his own admission and most of those investigating him, he did no damage to the systems he infiltrated, nor used the information he gleaned for financial gain. Granted spam is annoying as hell but I fail to see how it could be 10 billion dollars worth of annoying.

---

If you have a download cap and you exceed it because of SPAM then it costs you. Let's say your CAP is 1000 units. You use 1100 units so you have charge of $x for 100 additional units. But wait a minute ... you downloaded 200 units of SPAM and then you client side email filter nuked it. Real usage was 900 but you pay for extra because of SPAM.

said by bassdude:

---

If you have a download cap and you exceed it because of SPAM then it costs you. Let's say your CAP is 1000 units. You use 1100 units so you have charge of $x for 100 additional units. But wait a minute ... you downloaded 200 units of SPAM and then you client side email filter nuked it. Real usage was 900 but you pay for extra because of SPAM.

---

Yeah, I can see your point and agree. I just think the 10 billion dollar figure is grossly exaggerated. I can see another way it costs (but again, not 10 billion dollars worth) is by having to write software and train engineers to filter spam. It is a problem, there's no denying it, but I just fail to see how it's costing that much money. I get maybe 10 spams a day in my main email address, with some containing an image or two. Fortunately my provider has no caps, but I wouldn't think they'd be all that much as far as data goes. Probably well under 20-50 kilobytes apiece. Especially the ones without images. It's a nuisance, but again, 10 billion dollars worth??

I would like to see the table turned on the spammers though. I just wonder how effective a marketing technique it is? Everyone I know loathes spam, and takes extraordinary steps to delete/avoid it, so you wouldn't think it'd be all that profitable. Spam is quickly becoming the new telemarketing, and you know how everyone hates telemarketing. Hopefully one of these days spammers will get it that they're only alienating their potential "customers".

"Everyone I know loathes spam, and takes extraordinary steps to delete/avoid it"

You said it yourself, it cost alot of money to train people how to filter spam across a F500 company and so on. Its more of time spent doing this than actually being productive, lack productivity = cost and less ROI from a employoers POV.

ym
spell check not included.

I'm not so sure about $10 Billion per year being an exaggeration...if you consider the time factor involved in dealing with spam. Consider that even if you have a good spam blocking setup on your machine, that you will still be downloading it. So the time that was spent even downloading the spam should be included. Next, consider that some spam does get through...and a user has to spend a second or three reading the title, then clicking the delete button. Using these considerations, let's say that a user gets only 20 spam emails per day. Out of those 20, 4 made it through the spam filters to be deleted by a user. Total cost in time = about 24 seconds. Multiply this by 52 weeks in a year and 5 days per week. Now we have approximately 6,240 seconds (1.73 hours) lost to dealing with spam every year per user. Now multiply 1.73 hours times the average hourly wage in the US times the number of people using email at work in the US and you can see where the $10 billion figure may not be so off base.

Err yeah - but the people exceeding their caps are not using JUST email. Now if all they did was read email and they still went over their limit then they might have a case.

For every message being blocked at AOL, 2 or 3 more are reaching other (un)intended targets.

Blocking Junk Mail access to one network, will simply move the junk to someone else's, and do nothing to contribute to finding a solution for WHOLE problem, which AOL, while 'protecting it's own borders' is currently practicing.

I'd REALLY like to hear about what steps AOL is taking to insure that it's OWN network is not being used as a relay for spam originating from Asia, Mexico and Europe.

Edited for Clarification of point
[text was edited by author 2003-03-13 16:01:29]

said by Logan 5:

---

Blocking Junk Mail access to one network, will simply move the junk to someone else's, and do nothing to contribute to finding a solution for WHOLE problem, which AOL, while 'protecting it's own borders' is currently practicing.

---

This is exactly what happened in my case involving a
spammer known as Hotdealtime.com. For a while they
were being hosted on XO/Concentric's netspace until
repeated complaints from myself and others forced them
to crack down. Well guess what? Hotdealtime.com and some
of the other Trueoptin spammers that were once hosted on
XO are now on E Broadbandnow/CET Networks, a spamhaus
that ignores abuse complaints. And furthermore, the
spammer in question now has the green light to spam with
impunity, which he has done. Before XO booted them, I was
getting only 1 or 2 items a weeks from Hotdealtime.com.
Since then, the spamming has increased (three this week
alone, and perhaps even more is on the way). A few
other noteworthy spamming gangs have gotten themselves
into friendlier territory as a result of this kind of
blocking: a case in point is C&W (Clueless & Witless is
the usual epithet for them) - spammers kicked off other
providers are now being hosted by them, and all their
contact addresses bounce.

The article is about a big picture problem (SPAM) and we've reduced it to why ISPs are dark, evil beings for instituting harsh, evil CAPS! (shudder). Yes yes yes, I know that it's not UNrelated. But it'd be easier to figure out how to stop SPAM if we were actually figuring out to stop SPAM instead of conjecturing about how ISPs would react to us trying to "stick it to them". Why does every discussion have to be about how someone is screwing us over?

If there was no SPAM, we wouldn't have to complain how junk usage eats up part of our capped bandwidth.

We could then spend our time reducing every single possible issue imaginable to the following:

• Why file sharing is (choose) legal/illegal


• Why bandwidth is (choose) cheap/expensive


• Why the (choose) Bells/CLECs are evil


• Why the US should be like South Korea


• Why we all deserve 500 gazillobit connections for 3 dollars a month

You left out the issue:

Why junk snail mail should be allowed if spam isn't...

Well for one thing, junk snail-mailers actually pay for the cost of delivering it to your mailbox. Spammers don't pay for your bandwidth, ISP's mail server space, etc.

Well, I suppose they could be using the network jack at the library to upload their crap...

said by Kylemaul:

---

Well, I suppose they could be using the network jack at the library to upload their crap...

---

Sarcasm is hard to detect in written form. I am guessing you're insinuating that spammers do indeed pay to send the junk, too. Is this correct?

Well - of course they do. But in thinking up the line about the network jack at the library, you've missed the entire point. In the process of sending their junk, an additional cost is incurred for me to receive it; this is a cost the spammer does not pay. I do. And you do too.

This is why, for example, laws have been established about telecommunications sent for which the recipient would be charged for the call.

»www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumer ··· cpa.html
»www4.law.cornell.edu/usc ··· 227.html

I personally am very sick and tired of going to my e-mail box and finding so much spam. what I would like to know is how they are getting my e-mail address so "freely"? Is my internet company actually giving it to them?? Can you just imagine if any 1 isp did have the technology to really be "100% spam-free" they could become very profitable.

The only surefire method I know to eliminate having to deal with SPAM in your Inbox is by developing a "White List". That is a list of people or companies you will accept email from and then set your software to bit bucket everything else. It works well for me. I have hundreds of names in my "White List"(address book), both friends, relatives, business contacts, technical subscriptions, etc. I use both Hotmail and Outlook Express and the "White List" method works for both.

The only downside would be the occasional person you haven't put in your list that you wouldn't really mind getting an email from. Say an old colleague or school chum that got your email address from someone else you know. And in those rare cases, that person could still probably get to you thru that shared acquaintance.

said by FFH5:

---

The only downside would be the occasional person you haven't put in your list that you wouldn't really mind getting an email from. Say an old colleague or school chum that got your email address from someone else you know.

---

This problem could be fixed by adding an "unlisted sender pays" provision to the "white list". It could work like this: Anyone on your white list can send you email for free. Anyone not on your white list has to pay, say, 5 cents to send you an email. But if you reply to that email then the 5 cent fee is waived.

So your old school chum can send you email, and it's free because you respond. But spammers have to pay 5 cents to send you email (that you don't respond to). That would stop spam cold.

said by SanJoseNerd:

---

This problem could be fixed by adding an "unlisted sender pays" provision to the "white list". It could work like this: Anyone on your white list can send you email for free. Anyone not on your white list has to pay, say, 5 cents to send you an email. But if you reply to that email then the 5 cent fee is waived.

---

Now if only some ISP's would develop the business model you described and make it available to customers. That would be a great system.

The way I saw the article had nothing to do with your caps. Any email takes up bandwidth and resources. In a good portion of cases, with a good ISP, it never has a chance to reach your home. The bandwidth between mail servers and the resources of the mail servers is a problem. I easily believe the numbers of 39% being spam as a whole. Maybe not in your mail box but as far as communication between mail servers its easily that high. To keep customers happy you block a bunch of that spam. This also keeps email usefull instead of annoying.

[text was edited by author 2003-03-13 19:11:36]

Even if the estimates of how much bandwith on the internet backbones is being sucked up, it boils down to this:
The internet can handle only so much traffic, and with bandwith being taken up, eventualy things start to slow down

With high speed connections, you may notice it less, but what about people who still use dial up [or other slow type of connection?]? What about people who have applications where speed is critical [video & other things]?

The pipe can only hold so much and spam is a big drag.

And legislators won't ignore lobbyists - they are in office usually because of politcal lobbying themselves, they don't want to possibly shot them selves in the foot

Wouldn't it be a better world to live in if Microsoft removed the capability of Internet Explorer to handle popup windows?

Popup/unders are the worst creation that ever hit the internet.

Check out this forum for discussing spam issues: »antispamist.dyndns.org/forum/

I keep hearing how the direct marketing people are lobbying to stop anti-spam legislation... are they really making enough money to be able to outlobby all the big businesses that are loosing their shirts in bandwidth costs?