What some will do for money. And, what some will do because they’re lazy.

Hackers are deploying ransomware which hijacks Hotmail accounts.

I don’t get the point, but then again, I don’t get much. Meanwhile, I am still trying to figure out what real purpose is served in keeping your free email on the provider’s servers, particularly since most POP access is free as well.

UPDATE: Techdirt says you wouldn’t have this problem if you kept your data to yourself. Uh, POP?

First it was Google’s Gmail, and now it is Microsoft. SpamCop is blacklisting big companies as though they are the lead enforcer on an organized crime taskforce.

The bad of this is that a lot of helpless users are going to get their email bounced. The good part of this is that free email services are a haven for spammers, no matter what they say about security. Maybe this will force them to tighten up their ships a little more.

I didn’t get any spam until I started Spamroll. I got very little until just a few months ago. Now I get plenty.

Bill Gates said the problem would be solved within two years, and as of this week, time’s up. Of course, the powers that be in Redmond say it depends on where your email box is, purporting to have solved “95%” of the problem with Hotmail.

I can’t even get a POP email through to Hotmail, while sitting on a Comcast line. I guess I’m getting all this spam because I’m not using the right service.

A marketing trade group starts requiring its members to use authentication, but Techdirt says its a joke that only leads to more problems.

I don’t have much of an opinion on it either way, as the whole authentication battle seems like a bunch of monkeys in a barrel. But I seem to have been effected by Microsoft’s moves with Sender ID.

I am a Comcast SMTP user, and I can’t get any mail through to Hotmail or MSN addresses anymore. The secure help section at Comcast says they and MS are “working on the issue.” Is this problem a result of Microsoft requiring Sender ID compliance with Hotmail/MSN, or am I missing something big here?

Sophos has published their top 10 viruses and hoaxes list for March 2005. Damn, that was quick.

The virus list is kind of boring - lots of the same old Netsky, with a dash of MyDoom and Sober, and ZaFi-D holding a strong lead (this sounds like cross between your aunt’s recipe for devils food cake and an announcer at a dog track, doesn’t it).

Meanwhile..

The Hotmail chainletter is still going strong on the hoax side. The Hotmail hoax is a chainletter type email sent to Hotmail subscribers, inferring that they need to login to their accounts in order to avoid removal. It is not a phishing attempt, as the email in circulation had no links to it (at least that I have seen). The emails simply requested that you forward to other Hotmail users, as “a test.” I don’t think there is much more to it, other than being a pain in the ass for Microsoft.

For the whole list, see Top ten viruses and hoaxes reported to Sophos in March 2005, from Sophos UK.

Larry Seltzer of eWeek has an interesting op-ed entitled More Evidence Spam Has Peaked. Interesting, I say, as late in the article Larry points out a big reason why it might not have actually peaked (and why it may never go away).

Late, he notes that Postini, MessageLabs, Symantec, and others like them “don’t really have an interest in spam going away, because their sales are proportional to the level of threat. Ah ha.

Now we get to the root of the issue. These firms don’t have a vested interested in ridding the natural world of computer threats, whether they be spam, viruses, phishing, zombies, whatever. As long as the threats exist, these firms make a bundle convincing us they are saving us from them.

I personally rely on some of their wares, but only when running Windows, and then only as an “additional” countermeasure. I have a huge (and growing) block in my server’s Sendmail reject list, and make sure MailScanner is always running. According to industry reports, MailScanner has more users than AOL and Hotmail combined. The SpamAssassin component rarely fails me.

Funny thing is, this front end protection mechanism is open source, and is provided as part of the Linux distro this site runs on. THESE wares don’t cost anything extra, and they are distributed via the open source community. OS to the rescue once again.