Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

Post removed (X-No-Archive: yes)

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

Yet another example of why "blacklisting" is a very poor anti-spam measure.

-Frank

"Rob J" wrote in message
news:MPG.1e57f982dcd9201a989c45@news.chc.ihug.co.nz...
> Interesting results from this Google search:
>
> http://www.google.co.nz/search?q=alan+brown+sorbs
>
> This is Alan Brown formerly of Manawatu Internet Services, also formerly
> of the ORBS blacklist, which was sued out of business after they were
> found to be conducting a blacklist vendetta against New Zealand's
> biggest ISP, Xtra.
>
> Now we find that Mr Brown has involved himself in SORBS, which has
> blocked many servers from big, legitimate ISPs like Xtra (NZ), Paradise
> (NZ) and Hotmail.
>
> http://www.mhonarc.org/archive/html/ietf/2004-06/msg00138.ht ml
> "In fact, like ORBS before it, SORBS also isn't a __spam__ blacklist.
> Its a
> "personal" blacklist of sites that Alan Brown, Matthew Sullivan, and
> Paul
> Vixie and their associates just don't like. It is completely
> innappropriate for the IETF or its staff to associate with or use such a
> list for IETF business."
>
> "...This is a
> bald lie, first promoted by Alan Brown, who you might recall once used
> his
> ORBS blacklist to block ISPs that had nothing to do with spam, for
> reasons
> that had nothing to do with spam: just because he didn't like those
> ISPs.
> Brown then lost 3 separate lawsuits involving defamation and false
> statements, and ultimately appears to have lost his business to pay the
> consequent damages. When Brown's own subscribers complained, he said it
> was a "personal" blacklist and had no particular standards. Brown was
> pretty thoroughly discredited but this does not appear to have deterred
> Sullivan and Vixie from associating with him. Brown and his associates
> Paul Vixie and Matthew Sullivan have continued to promote and support
> defamation of ISPs they don't like, just like ORBS did previously. None
> of
> the 3 cases Brown lost had anything to do with spam. Similarly, this
> has
> nothing to do with spam."
>

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

> http://www.mhonarc.org/archive/html/ietf/2004-06/msg00138.ht ml

For what it's worth, the author of that particular message is the subject
of the following:

http://www1.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/ietf-announce/current/ msg01967.html

-- Mark --

http://staff.washington.edu/mrc
Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate.
Si vis pacem, para bellum.

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

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Frankster writes:

> Yet another example of why "blacklisting" is a very poor anti-spam measure.

And which spam-friendly, blacklisted Internet provider are you a customer
of?


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Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud?

Post removed (X-No-Archive: yes)

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud?

On Sat, 11 Feb 2006, Rob J wrote:
> Many of these services, however, are extremely controversial, and it is
> a fact that our users have been put to considerable inconvenience by
> SORBs' blacklisting of reputable ISPs such as Xtra (NZ), Telstra (NZ)
> and Hotmail.

That may be the case. Nevertheless, the person who you quoted has
discredited himself. You need to be more careful in who you quote, lest
you get dismissed out of hand due to guilt by association.

I will also note that, with limited exceptions, all email that I receive
from Xtra, Telstra, and Hotmail is spam. Furthermore, I have suffered DOS
attacks from both Telstra and Hotmail; and found that neither were
particularly responsive in dealing with the problem.

-- Mark --

http://staff.washington.edu/mrc
Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate.
Si vis pacem, para bellum.

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

On comp.mail.misc, in , "Rob J" wrote:
> Path: newsspool2.news.pas.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink .net!elnk-pas-nf1!newsfeed.earthlink.net!news.maxwell.syr.ed u!newsfeed.media.kyoto-u.ac.jp!newsfeeds.ihug.co.nz!lust.ihu g.co.nz!ihug.co.nz!not-for-mail
> From: Rob J
> Newsgroups: aus.computers,comp.mail.misc,nz.comp
> Subject: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud
> Date: Sat, 11 Feb 2006 13:42:53 +1300
> Organization: Ihug Ltd
> Lines: 42
> Message-ID:
> NNTP-Posting-Host: 203-109-183-24.dialup.ihug.co.nz
> Mime-Version: 1.0
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-15"
> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
> X-Trace: lust.ihug.co.nz 1139618563 32581 203.109.183.24 (11 Feb 2006 00:42:43 GMT)
> X-Complaints-To: abuse@ihug.co.nz
> NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 11 Feb 2006 00:42:43 +0000 (UTC)
> User-Agent: MicroPlanet-Gravity/2.60.2060
> X-No-Archive: Yes
> Xref: news.earthlink.net aus.computers:203190 comp.mail.misc:76450 nz.comp:420032
> X-Received-Date: Fri, 10 Feb 2006 18:08:26 PST (newsspool2.news.pas.earthlink.net)



I see that you are hiding behind a throw-away alias and
> X-No-Archive: Yes.

That means that you have zero credibility, and no except effing
trolls (like "Sam") and ignorant newbies will even bother reading
your krapp.

Or are _you_ "Sam"?

Who cares?

I'd tell you to shut the phukk up, but that's already been
accomplished in every way that matters.

[Note: I don't read the posts of "Sam" or his numerous
sockpuppets or his 'friends', nor any responses to them.]

Alan

--
http://home.earthlink.net/~alanconnor/contact.html
see also: links.html and newsfilter.html
Other URLs of possible interest in my headers.

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

Post removed (X-No-Archive: yes)

FAQ: Canonical list of questions Beavis refuses to answer (V1.50) (was Re: Alan Brown gets in

This is a MIME GnuPG-signed message. If you see this text, it means that
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Usenet Beavis writes:

> On comp.mail.misc, in , "Rob J" wrote:

BEAVIS!!! YOU'RE BACK!!!

How's Bigfoot, and the missus?

>
>
> I see that you are hiding behind a throw-away alias and
>> X-No-Archive: Yes.

And I still that you still claim to be a victim of sexual assault by Xena,
the Warrior Princess (http://tinyurl.com/2gjcy)

> That means that you have zero credibility, and no except effing
> trolls (like "Sam") and ignorant newbies will even bother reading
> your krapp.
>
> Or are _you_ "Sam"?

Beavis FAQ, #6. See below.

> Who cares?

You do. Obviously.

> [Note: it's not my fault that I'm a complete dumbass. I was dropped on my
> head as a child. See http://www.pearlgates.net/nanae/kooks/alanconnor for
> more information]
>
> Beavis


FAQ: Canonical list of questions Beavis refuses to answer (V1.50)

This is a canonical list of questions that Beavis never answers. This FAQ is
posted on a semi-regular schedule, as circumstances warrant.

For more information on Beavis, see:

http://www.pearlgates.net/nanae/kooks/alanconnor.shtml

Although Beavis has been posting for a long time, he always remains silent
on the subjects enumerated below. His response, if any, usually consists of
replying to the parent post with a loud proclamation that his Usenet-reading
software runs a magical filter that automatically identifies anyone who's
making fun of him, and hides those offensive posts. For more information
see question #9 below.

============================================================ ================

1) If your Challenge-Response spam filter works so well, why are you munging
your address, when posting to Usenet?

2) If spammers avoid forging real E-mail addresses on spam, then where do
all these bounces everyone reports getting (for spam with their return
address was forged onto) come from?

3) If your Challenge-Response filter is so great, why do you still munge
when posting to Usenet?

4) Do you still believe that rsh is the best solution for remote access?
(http://tinyurl.com/5qqb6)

5) What is your evidence that everyone who disagrees with you, and thinks
that you're a moron, is a spammer?

6) How many different individuals do you believe really post to
comp.mail.misc? What is the evidence for your paranoid belief that everyone,
except you, who posts here is some unknown arch-nemesis of yours?

7) How many times, or how often, do you believe is necessary to announce
that you do not read someone's posts? What is your reason for making these
regularly-scheduled proclamations? Who do you believe is so interested in
keeping track of your Usenet-reading habits?

8) When was the last time you saw Bigfoot (http://tinyurl.com/23r3f)?

9) If your C-R system employs a spam filter so that it won't challenge spam,
then why does any of the mail that passes the filter, and is thusly presumed
not to be spam, need to be challenged?

10) You claim that the software you use to read Usenet magically identifies
any post that makes fun of you. In http://tinyurl.com/3swes you explain
that "What I get in my newsreader is a mock post with fake headers and no
body, except for the first parts of the Subject and From headers."

Since your headers indicate that you use slrn and, as far as anyone knows,
the stock slrn doesn't work that way, is this interesting patch to slrn
available for download anywhere?

11) You regularly post alleged logs of your procmail recipe autodeleting a
bunch of irrelevant mail that you've received. Why, and who exactly do you
believe is interested in your mail logs?

12) How exactly do you "enforce" an "order" to stay out of your mailbox,
supposedly (http://tinyurl.com/cs8jt)? Since you issue this "order" about
every week, or so, apparently nobody wants to follow it. What are you going
to do about it?

13) What's with your fascination with shit? (also http://tinyurl.com/cs8jt)?

14) You complain about some arch-nemesis of yours always posting forged
messages in your name. Can you come up with even a single URL, as an example
of what you're talking about?

15) You always complain about some mythical spammers that pretend to be
spamfighters (http://tinyurl.com/br4td). Who exactly are those people, and
can you post a copy of a spam that you supposedly received from them, that
proves that they're really spammers, and not spamfighters?


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Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud?

Mark Crispin wrote:

> On Sat, 11 Feb 2006, Rob J wrote:
> > Many of these services, however, are extremely controversial, and it is
> > a fact that our users have been put to considerable inconvenience by
> > SORBs' blacklisting of reputable ISPs such as Xtra (NZ), Telstra (NZ)
> > and Hotmail.
>
> That may be the case. Nevertheless, the person who you quoted has
> discredited himself. You need to be more careful in who you quote, lest
> you get dismissed out of hand due to guilt by association.
>
> I will also note that, with limited exceptions, all email that I receive
> from Xtra, Telstra, and Hotmail is spam. Furthermore, I have suffered DOS
> attacks from both Telstra and Hotmail; and found that neither were
> particularly responsive in dealing with the problem.

Hotmail DoS'd you? How so?

They don't offer subscriber access like Telstra does, they're not an
ISP

Cheers
Nathan

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud?

>
> Hotmail DoS'd you? How so?
>

The worst I've seen from hotmail is spammers sending 419 Spam
from hotmail. (http://www.secretservice.gov/alert419.shtml)
My Spamtraps maybe get 20 per day of them and
If I report them (report_spam@hotmail.com or
report_spam@msn.com - depending where its coming from)
gets actioned normally in a resonable time)

Thanks
Craig
Talking For Myself

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud?

On Fri, 10 Feb 2006, Nathan Mercer wrote:
> Hotmail DoS'd you? How so?

This happened some years ago.

It was a mail bomb/dictionary attack. Rather than using one SMTP session,
it spawned off a separate *simultaneous* SMTP session. So "a", "aa",
"aaa", "aaaa", etc. each came in separately.

At the time, my home mail server was running on a bitty box, and I had
foolishly removed the limit on the number of incoming SMTP sessions. To
make matters worse, I was using a spam filter that required each SMTP
session to run in its own process. So, when the bomb hit, the bitty box
quickly ran out of processes, memory, swap,... Within seconds after
rebooting the bitty box, the same thing happened.

When bitty box faces an onslaught of powerful servers, bitty box doesn't
stand a chance.

I solved the problem by blocking Hotmail. When it happened again a few
weeks later (this time from Yahoo), I replaced the mail server (both
software and hardware) with something more capable.

For what it's worth, Yahoo was equally unresponsive, even though this spam
was coming from their business servers.

It's rather sad that it's no longer possible to use a bitty box for a home
mail server; not because your own mail needs require more, but because the
onslaught of abuse is so great.

-- Mark --

http://panda.com/mrc
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to eat for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

Rob J wrote:
> In article ,
> i3x9mdw@j9n35c.invalid says...
>
>>On comp.mail.misc, in , "Rob J" wrote:
>>
>>>Path: newsspool2.news.pas.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink .net!elnk-pas-nf1!newsfeed.earthlink.net!news.maxwell.syr.ed u!newsfeed.media.kyoto-u.ac.jp!newsfeeds.ihug.co.nz!lust.ihu g.co.nz!ihug.co.nz!not-for-mail
>>>From: Rob J
>>>Newsgroups: aus.computers,comp.mail.misc,nz.comp
>>>Subject: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud
>>>Date: Sat, 11 Feb 2006 13:42:53 +1300
>>>Organization: Ihug Ltd
>>>Lines: 42
>>>Message-ID:
>>>NNTP-Posting-Host: 203-109-183-24.dialup.ihug.co.nz
>>>Mime-Version: 1.0
>>>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-15"
>>>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>>>X-Trace: lust.ihug.co.nz 1139618563 32581 203.109.183.24 (11 Feb 2006 00:42:43 GMT)
>>>X-Complaints-To: abuse@ihug.co.nz
>>>NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 11 Feb 2006 00:42:43 +0000 (UTC)
>>>User-Agent: MicroPlanet-Gravity/2.60.2060
>>>X-No-Archive: Yes
>>>Xref: news.earthlink.net aus.computers:203190 comp.mail.misc:76450 nz.comp:420032
>>>X-Received-Date: Fri, 10 Feb 2006 18:08:26 PST (newsspool2.news.pas.earthlink.net)
>>
>>
>>
>>I see that you are hiding behind a throw-away alias and
>>
>>>X-No-Archive: Yes.
>>
>>That means that you have zero credibility, and no except effing
>>trolls (like "Sam") and ignorant newbies will even bother reading
>>your krapp.
>>
>>Or are _you_ "Sam"?
>>
>>Who cares?
>>
>>I'd tell you to shut the phukk up, but that's already been
>>accomplished in every way that matters.
>
>
>
> Yeah right. i3x9mdw@j9n35c.invalid is a real email address, is it?
>
> And as for X-No-Archive: Yes
> I choose not to have Google violate my privacy by storing my messages.
> YOu got a problem with that?
>

Yes, if you post to a public forum, you effectivelly have no privacy. If
you are accusing someone of something, getting your posts archived for
future reference is reasonable IMHO.

Or maybe you dont stand behind your posts?

regards

Thing

Re: FAQ: Canonical list of questions Beavis refuses to answer (V1.50) (was Re: Alan Brown ge

On comp.mail.misc, in , "Sam" wrote:



Looks like "Sam" is off his meds again: No one named "Beavis"
has ever posted on this group....


[Note: I don't read the posts of "Sam" or his numerous
sockpuppets or his 'friends', nor any responses to them.]

Alan

--
http://home.earthlink.net/~alanconnor/contact.html
see also: links.html and newsfilter.html
Other URLs of possible interest in my headers.

Re: FAQ: Canonical list of questions Beavis refuses to answer (V1.50) (was Re: Alan Brown get

This is a MIME GnuPG-signed message. If you see this text, it means that
your E-mail or Usenet software does not support MIME signed messages.
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To open this message correctly you will need to install E-mail or Usenet
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Usenet Beavis writes:

> On comp.mail.misc, in , "Sam" wrote:
>
>

Darn, Beavis, you screwed up! You forgot to cut-and-paste the headers from
the message you didn't read.

You must be getting a bit slow, in old age.

> Looks like "Sam" is off his meds again:

You've been away, licking your wounds, for a couple of weeks. You had all
this time to figure out something intelligent to say, and that's what you
got?

> No one named "Beavis"
> has ever posted on this group....

Try again.

http://groups.google.com/groups?q=usenet+beavis

> [Note: it's not my fault that I'm a complete dumbass. I was dropped on my
> head as a child. See http://www.pearlgates.net/nanae/kooks/alanconnor for
> more information]
>
> Beavis



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Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

Rob J wrote:
> Interesting results from this Google search:
>
> http://www.google.co.nz/search?q=alan+brown+sorbs
>
> This is Alan Brown formerly of Manawatu Internet Services, also formerly
> of the ORBS blacklist,

My complaint with ORBS was that your mailer could never have been a spam
source, but if they could hack it, then they black listed it.

Further they never helped you to fix it.

So when they were wrongfully sued, I couldn't give a shit. Kinda happy
actually. Karma thing.

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud?

Mark Crispin wrote:

> When bitty box faces an onslaught of powerful servers, bitty box doesn't
> stand a chance.

You must have had a decent comms link. My bitty box just had a 28.8K
modem. Kinda funny to watch them just choke themselves off.

>

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud?

Terry Collins writes:

>Mark Crispin wrote:

>> When bitty box faces an onslaught of powerful servers, bitty box doesn't
>> stand a chance.

>You must have had a decent comms link. My bitty box just had a 28.8K
>modem. Kinda funny to watch them just choke themselves off.

He he it's funny how that happens. I'm on a 128 k ISDN link and the same
sort of hilarity ensues.

Craig.
--
Craig Dewick (craig@poison.lios.apana.org.au). http://lios.apana.org.au/~craig
APANA Sydney Deputy Regional Co-ordinator. Operator of Jedi (APANA Sydney POP)
Always striving for a secure long-term future in an insecure short-term world
Have you exported a crypto system today? Do your bit to undermine the NSA.

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 01:36:19 +1100, Terry Collins
wrote:

>Rob J wrote:
>> Interesting results from this Google search:
>>
>> http://www.google.co.nz/search?q=alan+brown+sorbs
>>
>> This is Alan Brown formerly of Manawatu Internet Services, also formerly
>> of the ORBS blacklist,
>
>My complaint with ORBS was that your mailer could never have been a spam
>source, but if they could hack it, then they black listed it.

Fooling around with SMTP command parameters isn't exactly "hacking". If
you were running an open relay, it was an open relay whether or not the
spammers were using it to relay spam.

>Further they never helped you to fix it.

That was your responsibility, not ORBS.

>So when they were wrongfully sued, I couldn't give a shit. Kinda happy
>actually. Karma thing.

ORBS wasn't wrongfully sued in my opinion. Alan added address ranges
that didn't qualify under the published ORBS criteria, and got just what
he deserved. You should get your ass handed to you when you run a DNSBL
and add spite listings that don't qualify under the published policies.

Steve Baker

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

Steve Baker wrote:

>>My complaint with ORBS was that your mailer could never have been a spam
>>source, but if they could hack it, then they black listed it.
>
>
> Fooling around with SMTP command parameters isn't exactly "hacking". If
> you were running an open relay, it was an open relay whether or not the
> spammers were using it to relay spam.

It wasn't "open"
>
>
>>Further they never helped you to fix it.
>
>
> That was your responsibility, not ORBS.

If you are going to be a policeman, then you also have an educational
responsibility. He got what he deserved.

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

In article
<43f9745c$0$1039$61c65585@un-2park-reader-01.sydney.pipenetworks.com.au>
,
Terry Collins wrote:

> Steve Baker wrote:
>
> >>My complaint with ORBS was that your mailer could never have been a spam
> >>source, but if they could hack it, then they black listed it.
> >
> >
> > Fooling around with SMTP command parameters isn't exactly "hacking". If
> > you were running an open relay, it was an open relay whether or not the
> > spammers were using it to relay spam.
>
> It wasn't "open"
> >
> >
> >>Further they never helped you to fix it.
> >
> >
> > That was your responsibility, not ORBS.
>
> If you are going to be a policeman, then you also have an educational
> responsibility. He got what he deserved.

Bollocks, there are hundreds of thousands of laws and it is up to you to
know what they are "ignorance of the law is no excuse", so what is the
difference between the law and ORBS ?

Re: Alan Brown gets involved in another spam blacklist fraud

whoisthis wrote:

>
> Bollocks, there are hundreds of thousands of laws and it is up to you to
> know what they are "ignorance of the law is no excuse", so what is the
> difference between the law and ORBS ?

Lol, I'd suggest that any place with this many laws is dead or dying.