[Mailman-Users] problems with more then 16000 users

[Ron Peterson]

J C Lawrence wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 20 Jul 2000 12:11:30 -0400
> Ron Peterson <rpeterson at wallacefloyd.com> wrote:
> 
> > If it's not SPAM, great.  But I'm not going to lift a finger to
> > help a SPAMMER, and I would hope no one else does either.
> 
> Ahem.  Seriously, what are the odds of a spammer using Mailman,
> considering the fact that Mailman embeds various useful traceback
> information in the header of every message it sends, tends to like
> to send password reminders, doesn't have any support for forging
> headers, etc?

Good point.

I'm really not trying to raise anybody hackle's here.  I just had my
password hijacked by SPAMMER, who then proceede to use my account to
blitzgrieg the world with their crap.  It was my own stupid fault for
picking up POP mail over the public Internet, but still.  This was just
a couple of weeks ago, so I'm a little sensitive about the subject.

16,000 members is a big list.  People are not adding themselves, they
are being added in bulk.  If this doesn't at least raise an eyebrow,
then I'd like to share whatever you're smoking.  Maybe you can trace it
back.  Maybe this is very well intentioned.  There are varying levels of
abuse.  You don't have to hide your identity to send SPAM.  Maybe you
can opt out.  But who in their right mind responds to opt outs?

Mailman also has the ability to allow people to subscribe themselves,
rather than being added in bulk.  To opt in.  Maybe there are reasons
that is not the procedure in this case, but again, anyone running a
legitimate list should have no compunction whatsoever about providing
evidence that the list they are running contains only members who have
_chosen_ to be in it.

-- 

Ron Peterson
Systems Manager
Wallace Floyd Design Group
273 Summer Street
Boston, MA  02210
617.350.7400 tel
617.350.0051 fax
rpeterson at wallacefloyd.com