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All those undeliverable email messages, are they SPAM?
May 21, 2008 08:26 AM | AutomationMick Reese - Systems Manager
We're aware that there were several email undeliverable reports that came into several SELCO email boxes overnight. Even though it looks like SPAM, these messages are not SPAM, and our email filter will not block it. In fact, there is very little that we can do about it. It is one rare occasion where we all have to spand a couple minutes deleting junk.
However, this is a great opportunity for everyone to learn just a little bit more about the SPAM problem, and email in general. What exactly happened, and why were there dozens of "undeliverable" messages in our email?
Yes, there was SPAM email sent out. I would guess it came from a Russian source, since there was Russian text in the subject. Now, it appears that it came from our email server - from the DIRPUB email address. However, it did not come from our email server. Here's why:
It is easy to fake the FROM address of an email message (This is called "spoofing"). This is one of the reasons it is so hard to put a stop to SPAM. You can not be sure that the message came from whom it says in the reply to address. This is exactly what happened last night, some spammer spoofed our address on his email.
Once that email went out, it got to some email servers that did not have any SPAM filtering at all. Some of the email recipients did not exist on the target email server. (Spammers love to try to guess at usernames) The target server then sends an undeliverable message to the sender. Who's the sender? Since this message was spoofed, it sends the undeliverable message to SELCO's DIRPUB address. That leads to us receiveing an undeliverable report in our inbox. Also remember, this spammer probably send this to several thousands of email addresses. I guess the fact that we only saw a couple dozen "bounces" might be a little comforting.
