How should NTL handle spam ?
 

This poll relates to thread - http://forum.nthellworld.co.uk/showt...9&page=1&pp=15

How do you think ntl should handle spam ?

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Depends on how you define the spam to be blocked as it stands the definition is way to broad in terms of what we discussed in the other thread.

Better poll would maybe be "should NTL be taking positive steps to reduce spam server side?", and if so then add definitions of which specific abuses should be included in such an exercise.

Just a thought.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Maybe it would m8

However - I want to see how NTL customers feel about NTL filtering there mail. I tell you what - If people vote in favor of killing it at the server then I will buy you a drink, If people vote in favor of flaging the mail then you can buy me a drink and if people vote to leave it alone then we both have to buy a drink :)

:naughty: ( No rigging the poll for rep points now chaps ) :naughty:

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Guess the true proof of this pudding will be what NTL actually decide to do or are eventualy coerced to do by any new legislation or regulation.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Is that a yes to buying the beers then ? :D

There are some new laws coming into play regarding spam so it will be interesting to see how this plays out.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

personally i think NTL should operate a blacklist.. the method popularised by http://www.spamhaus.org

recently those with hotmail accounts will have notice a huge reduction in spam.. they are now operating a blacklist.

it's not totally watertight.. but i think it's the only server side method that won't block anything legit

something is better than nothing as they say

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I voted for "Block it at the server" because I find Yahoo's service very good, and I've not lost a single e-mail that I've wanted (that I know of).

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

They should never delete any e-mail addressed to me, that is not their right. :mad:

I don't mind if they want to mark it as possible spam.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I'm surprised the poll is 2/3 in favour of blocking server side so far, does that mean 66% of the people who voted are confident in NTL ability to only block spam and not the mail they want? I'd prefer them to flag it as spam so I can divert it into a separate folder for a quick look if I think I've missed something. People are complaining about missing mail already and this would only make the problem worse, remember port blocking becoming the fall guy for everyones problems when that was introduced.

The problem is that if you ask 100 people what should be blocked and what shouldn't you will most likely get 100 different answers.

As far as the law is concerned, yes there will soon be tighter controls on spam from UK companies but 90% of my spam originates outside the UK and how well will the new laws be enforced anyway?

Spam is a pain but so is not getting the email you want.

software like spam assassin would get my vote.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I know this wouldn't be expected of everyone with a mail account with NTL, but shouldn't the users be a lot more aware about where to use their email addys (Or to the point, When NOT to use them).

I use a hotmail account for things like signing up for forums and only give out my NTL addy to friends, family and the like and I've never had any spam in it (Other than the NTL Insider thingy!).

Again, this can't be expected for all, or even the majority of users but people don't knowingly give their home address to companies that are going to bombard them with a lot of bo***cks, should an email address be treated with less confidence??

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Gets his coat and counts his beer money with a quite sniffle :cry:

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I think the main problem is that a fair percentage of spam doesn't rely on knowing your real e-mail address at all, but uses other methods to send to a list of "possible" or "likely" permutations.

It is my guess it is this and other clear examples of abuse that earns the sender inclusion on any blacklist applied by NTL assuming they have indeed started to block some unwanted traffic as some believe.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I personnaly think blocking at the server is a very bad idea.

Every spam filter system I've seen & used never gets it right all the time.
SpamPal I use here, Yahoo & Hotmail have all flagged up emails I wanted as spam.
Hell, even our "mega-expensive" filter at work (no idea what it is!) gets it wrong from time to time.

With Yahoo & Hotmail it's not such a big problem as it just gets put into the junk folder.
But blocking it totally at the server is a very bad idea.

I had one incorrectly marked as spam this morning. It was an order confirmation from a website, imagine if that had been blocked and I never got it, I'd then have to chase the company up about my order etc.

If NTL are going to do anything with spam, it should just be flagged.
But there would need to be some controls that each user could control over the spam flagging, like white lists.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I take your point MikeyB but this is not what we are suggesting here.

Suppose "Snail Mail" became free for all users sending out mail and as a result the commercial companies and others all started flooding the network with junk mail.

The inevitable result would be that all mail would get bogged down by the sheer weight of the junk causing delays and increasing costs to the point the whole system would break down.

Would your solution in this case be to want the postman to knock on your door and say, "ok we have split the mail in to two piles, one pile appears to be junk the other appears to be OK sorry it is two days late but we have too much mail to handle now".

Or would you rather someone at the local sorting office kept track of all the obvious junk and delivered it straight back to the person that sent it when that sender is know to be on a list of abusers of the system and is repeating previous misuse of the system.

This second option would reduce the impact of the junk mail freeing up the system to improve and maintain efficient delivery of the legitamate mail.

Yes the odd letter might get treated inappropriately but the sender would be made aware of this by its return to them. They can then make arrangements to have themselves eliminated from any list of automatically rejected mail by confirming it is legitamate.

OK maybe the example is a little far fetched but come to think of it if this could be applied to the Royal Mail too I could eventually get off the Readers Digest mailing list. :)

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

My Mum sent be an online birthday message (from Yahoo) on my birthday - my spam assassin (which is generally very good) classed it as spam.

I would have been very annoyed if NTL had took it upon themselves to delete this.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

What if Pems mum was emailing him to tell him that she had won the lottery and had £500.00 for him. He would be slightly miffed that he missed out on the money !! :)

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I voted mark as spam, but leave it alone. I've had important work mail gone missing because the sender's ip address was marked as an open relay and our spam filter deleted it. Even though the mail was bounced, the IT department at the sender's end did not seem to notice (until I notified them ;))

I was quite happy at the time I could redirect that email to my NTL account because it doesn't block spam.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Thanks for the rep point Sociable - Do I take it that you are letting me of buying you the beer ? :)

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Nah just acknowledging a reasonable and reasoned debate being carried out just as it should be. :)

As often is the case there are good arguements on both sides and even parliament will have fun sorting out their approach to this issue I'm sure.

That said should we ever get to meet in real life the first round will be down to you even if mine will have to be a soft one. :)

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

There seem to be some mis-conceptions about how a server side anti-spam solution may work..

The blacklist, is a list of either domains or IP addresses that are KNOWN to be originators of spam, as in they've had a certain number of complaints and had them followed up.
A blacklist should never block an entire domain if there are legitimate accounts operating from it.
Nor should open relays be blocked, because an appropriate spam reporting system should highlight a problem like that and enable the relavant admins to rectify problems with their setup.

A well established and maintained blacklist would not filter out the legitimate emails described in previous posts.

What we need to get out of our heads is the notion that an ISP would operate some kind of active filter based on rules.. that would be a total waste of their time.. and more to the point it would use up much more processing time, which again.. no sensible ISP would want.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Well said s1lv3r.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I voted leave it alone, I would tolerate it being marked as spam.

But I will not tolerate NTL taking it upon themselves not to deliver certain items of my email. If NTL adopt (or have adopted) this policy then they must provide an opt-out, such as Demon have done.

Whilst not a legal expert, I would suspect that the deletion of the wrong email may well leave NTL vulnerable to consequential loss claims.

If I discover that NTL have started deleting certain of my emails I shall be taking my business elsewhere.

I have used the Spamcop blacklist and got a lot of false positives, so I'm afraid I have no confidence in them or NTL's ability to select a "A well established and maintained blacklist"

NTL's responsibility should be restricted to preventing spam being sent from NTL accounts only. If all ISP's did that, then there would be no spam.

Enterian

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I voted leave it alone, Mailwasher Pro works for me - if everyone deleted spam off the server before downloading it, there would be no point in sending it in the first place - but I want to be in control of the process.:)

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

not really as they provide a residential service. I am sure ntl's response would be - If email is that important then a business service would be more appropriate

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Do you really think that NTL would have a well established and maintained blacklist?

The only person I trust to make a final decision about if an email I receive is spam is me. So if NTL want to make a guess and mark it as spam, then fine but I do not want them to start deleting my emails without my permission.

My opinion is that the ideal would be for NTL to offer this as an option - with the default being to not filter.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I wonder if the Royal Mail would get away with that response? Why is a residential service any less important than a business one? How many people on a 'residential' service exchange emails with businesses?

Are you saying than any person on NTL:Home who orders things on the internet should really have a business email account?

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Thats providing that NTL dont put 127.0.0.1 in the blacklist :rofl: :rofl:

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

nope i am just saying what ntl's typical response will be....

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

well i maybe get 2 spam messages a day - i used to get 15 - 20 - so they are doing something right

I have not had any emails go missing as I dont get personal messages from spam merchants

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Ahh - but !!

If filtering has been switched on how do you know for sure that you have not lost any mail ???????????????????????

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

um because I do.... I get messages from personal friends who i am in contact with. I send info from work to my mail addy. I get my usual newsletters and adverts from companies I buy stuff off, and information emails from other companies. sorry stuartbe I am not missing anything.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Don't laugh - I've heard of NTL address ranges being blacklisted!

That should produce some interesting results!

Enterian

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

if they are spamers then good riddance to 'em!

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Sorry m8 but I cant believe that you can account for every single email that has been sent to you. Do you have a list of everyone that has ever tried to send you an email ?

If this filter is in place then how do we know how many email have been deleted ? I wonder if ntl have a list.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Yes - But

When NTL had there mail server added to the blacklist it was due to someone spoofing the ip of the mail server and hammering people with junk.

What happens if a user falls out with a company, spoofs there IP and gets the server blocked. The block can be removed but this takes time. That companys mail will get deleted during that time - that could cost the company a LOT of money.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I employ both server-side blocking (using dsbl.org and spamhaus.org) and client-side filtering (using annoyance-filter, a Bayesian Spam filter) and some Spam still gets through.

The server-side blocking checks four listings dsbl.org's primary and multi-hop open relay lists and Spamhaus's SBL and XBL lists. This imposes four DNS lookups for each legitimate e-mail I receive and fewer for caught Spam. Imagine how much overhead a similar system would add to NTL's processing of customer e-mail.

The client-side filtering is also a significant processing overhead. Each received e-mail has to be scanned for occurrences of words in the dictionary and evaluated as to whether it is legitimate e-mail or Spam. This type of processing would be costly to implement at the server and is best left to free CPU cycles of NTL's customers' machines.

So I hit Spammers hard with two techniques. At the server I implement a blocking mechanism that can inconvenience legitimate senders (if their ISP's servers get listed because a customer has been using their network to send Spam) by bouncing their e-mail. At the client I filter based on recent legitimate e-mail and Spam content. This requires periodic maintenance and continual monitoring.

In conclusion, no blocking or filtering solution is ideal. The real way to defeat Spam is through global legislation with severe penalties but as most Spammers tend towards the criminal, this is unlikely to produce tangible results.

I believe that NTL should employ server-side blocking of known Spam outfits through the use of e.g. Spamhaus lists but leave the content filtering to their customers. This will lead to users requiring not only anti-virus and firewall programs but also an e-mail content filtering program.

Regards,
Neil Darlow

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Care to speculate on just how many people have deleted wanted mail by accident because it was lost in a long list of spam and they got trigger happy?

Besides the message is not "deleted" it is bounced. LOL :)

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

True - I have deleted mail like this myself.

The message is as good as deleted for the user. If the mail bounces it will usualy go to the domains postmaster account. If its an ISP they will get thousands of these a day due to mistyped address ect, thay are not going to bother informing the sender that the mail has gone walkies !!

If the message is bounced to a company the mail will again go into the postmasters mailbox. Speaking by my own experience this box is hardlry ever checked. The last company I worked for was a large e-tailer company in luton :blush: and the postmaster box used to have well over 1000 mails a day coming in. There is not a systems admin in the world who is going to sit there and go over that lot !!!

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I can see where you are comming from but I am pretty certain I have not lost any mails whatsoever. I dont have tons of email comming thru anyhow so it is very easy to manage

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

i believe this is what they are doing

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I said block at the server, but I think the option to opt out is something that should exist.

As I said on the other thread, from what I have read about my POP server providers Demons solution, this looks to be a sensible solution in that up to 17% of spam will get through, but the chances of incorrect flagging are virtually 0.

Brightmail the provider of the solution have set up e-mail accounts at hosts globally. These have never been publicised on the web. If a mail arrives in the in box of one of these accounts, by default it must be spam and is blacklisted.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

In both examples you use stuartbe the postmaster would be very fast (or should be) to pick up on a sudden increase in bounced traffic.

Failure to rectify the situation and also explain the problem to its users would also result in a fairly large drop in its user base in pretty short order too I would think.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Thats true m8 - he would pick up on it. BUT

1. We are talking about NTL mail admins - Doesn't inspire confidence when they cant even get the mail servers to run correctly.

2. The original email that was sent is still not going to arive at the correct destination. The admin would have to re-send every mail and change the from/to header. Even with only 100 mails this is a huge task. So the mail has gone and the sender will have to re-send, if he remembers to do this then fine but by this time a minimum of 24 hours will have passed and if the mail was urgent its pretty useless by then !!

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Not quite right i'm afraid.

Bounces should always go to the originator, any bounce that doesn't do so is incorrectly configured as you can't presume a postmaster account is active or available on every mail server there is.

The reason it looks like the bounce has gone to postmaster is usually because
the postmaster account can be configured (or not) to recieve copies of every NDR (non delivery report) on the domain it serves.

Mis-addressed email should always get an NDR in reply to the originator.

I administer an exchange server and can vouch for the fact that postmaster accounts can be totally flooded.. but, if configured correctly your admins should be able to check it easily, as most of the traffic is caused by NDR reports that are automated and can be filtered out.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I didn't actually mention NTL in my post.. but my answer to that question is yes. Because the blacklist method I mentioned before (spamhaus) is maintained and updated by the blacklist operators.. not NTL.
All they would need to do is make sure the list is updated from the blacklist servers periodically (hopefully even NTL's admins can't get that wrong).. and job done, roberts your mothers brother.

I agree with you on having an opt out option though.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Exactly m8 - " any bounce that doesn't do so is incorrectly configured "

You are counting on the mail server being correctly configured and as you and I both well know - this is rarely the case. Have you seen how some of these bounce messages are worded (when they do come through) I have trouble understanding them so I am not sure how a normal EU is going to cope !!!

The point I am trying to make is that there is allways a risk that genuine email will get blocked. Even if the delivery rcpt goes back to the user they are going to have to resend. What hapens if the server is still blacklisted ? It comes back again. By the time the user actualy gets to send the mail it about a week old.

Until there is a way to be 100% sure that a mail is spam then we cant bounce them only flag them. An average user can cope with setting up a rule in outlook to move them to a diferent folder.

I dont know why everyone does not start to use digital sigs. If we all used them then spam could be blocked - block all mails that dont have a sig on them !!!

There simply is not an out of the box solution to spam. We need to track the spammers and boil them in oil. The methods discused here only deal with the problem and not the cause.

We must not forget that this thread is about NTL blocking mail. If people like you and I ran all the mail servers we would not have all the problems we have now. Do you trust NTL to manage blocking correctly - I dont !!!!

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

The real problem is the swamping of the networks with spam and flagging "suspect" mail the way you are suggesting does absolutely nothing at all to address that problem at all.

Anything which simply makes it less productive for the spammers to use known tactics will help reduce the traffic significantly.

Simple fact remains until not just NTL but all ISP's take some direct action the fundamental cause will not be removed.

That "cause" is just how easy it is for spammers to operate as things stand now.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Im not sugesting that flaging is a perfect solution only a way for users to filter the crap in there mailbox.

The problem with quick fixes like ip blocking ect is that they are floored. The source ip and server on a mail can be spoofed. This type of mail would go right through ip blacklist filters. You may make life slightly more inconvenient for the spammer but you create other problems at the same time.

The solution lies with the IPS's and can be solved simply.

Block spoofed packets at the gateway. This can be done on a cisco router for example by adding only 3 lines to an acl. Spammers will then only be able to send mail that can be traced so they can be dealt with.

Asuming that ntl are using ip based blacklists (we dont know this for sure) there will be no protection against mail that is sent via trojan relays and spoofed ip mails.

The world's governments and leaders need to get of there backside and do something about this before the net becomes unusable. This is not for from hapening.

You could always change your email address to :-

dgr474%^^%ghghgG^DhgbiyGD^t@fjhdkjhfkjdhssdh232.co m

I cant see any spam software guesing that one !!
It would be bit of a mare for my granny to remember though :D

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

so lets face it then, now that the poll has swung the other way, ntl cant win. they try and reduce the amount of spam clogging up the mail servers - which is supposed to improve the email service and ppl winge about it. Having said that there are far fewer ppl winging about this than if there is a massive mail outage. So who do you think they are going to listen to? ppl moaning about mail server problems or ppl moaning about email filtering?

it's a no win senario for ntl, but email filtering is here. it has obvoiusly had a positive impact (judging by my mailbox) so it's likely that it is here to stay.

edit: typos

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

I can't believe that 90% of voters want to trust NTL with the responsibility of handling spam :eek: Have you forgotten that NTL always makes a mess of what ever it does - nothing ever goes right? This site is stuffed with complaints about NTL yet most of you are still quite happy to trust them. :confused:

I voted to leave spam alone. Not because I want spam left alone but because I want NTL to leave spam alone. I know they'd made a mess of it - bouncing loads of legit emails or marking them as spam. At the moment I use SpamPal and it's regex filter. All my spam is caught with very few false positives.

We should be stopping the spam at source before it's even sent rather than relying on ISPs to configure their networks to block it. That approach doesn't make sense and isn't a long-term solution.


john

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

spam isnt going to go away - it is pretty much here to stay. ntl have the right idea, other ISP's use similar methods to block spam.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Well that's the sort of attitude that allow spammers to keep on spamming :) If NTL could guarantee that they would never delete an email as spam and would only mark emails as spam and would be at least 90% accurate in doing so, then I would be happy. What I know for certain is that if and when NTL start dealing with spam there will be people on here complaining about lost emails and/or emails marked as spam. And it'll be the same people who wanted NTL to deal with spam. NTL make a mess of everything. This we know. So why people want NTL to manage their inboxes I don't know!


john

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

ntl have had email filtering in place for a month now.

Attitude is not going to stop spam, legistlation is not going to stop spam, laws are not going to stop spam. blocking it from entering the network will, however, stop most of it

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Sorry John I disagree completely it is ISP's not doing anything that allows spammers to thrive.

Marking e-mails as spam but still allowing them through the network does nothing to reduce the traffic at all even if it would make it slightly easier for users to dump the content the issue is about getting this traffic completely off the net in the first place.

As most spammers make sure they stay away from locations where they could be dealt with at source the only possible solution is for ISP's to deal with it server side. Once spammers know their efforts wont get results they may well be forced to change their ways.

As for trust in NTL they may mess up now and again but overall they are managing to maintain the network at a reasonable level for the vast majority of users. So no, I wont be back here complaining if a few odd emails get caught by any new system I will be praising them for the efforts they are making and trying to work with them to resolve any issues that arrise in a constructive way instead.

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Your faith is admirable :)

If NTL start bouncing emails because they've decided they are spam, then I'll be forced to look elsewhere for an email provider. I simply cannot have important emails, such as those related to job hunting, being deleted. And I don't trust NTL to do anything right.

And how do you propose email senders should contact NTL to have their blacklisted email address/server removed from the list? NTL's own customers have trouble contacting NTL and getting them to do anything, so I can hardly see non-customers getting very far when it comes to being un-blacklisted!

And what about the scenario where someone's email address/server keeps on been re-blacklisted? The sender will just give up trying to get their address un-blacklisted.


john

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Know exactly what you mean, there should be the option of a user controlled server side spam filter.
Well yes, but you then have to download the e-mail and run the filters on it. What you really want is something like SpamAssassin which does the same as SpamPal but on the server side.

SpamAssassin has given me no false positives and has missed a tiny amount of spam, which probably could have been caught if I had tweaked the settings.
Exactly!

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

My guess is they will find it as easy as NTL themselves did when they needed to get themselves off just such a blacklist in the past.

Out of interest you seem to be saying you are an NTL customer right now so how does that square with your total lack of trust in their ability as a supplier right now?

Just wondering. :)

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

i would try the proper channels if server or email address is being blacklisted all the time then the owner of the address/server should take more steps to secure their servers or stop sedning spam!!

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

There's no comparison between a major company making a request and a single user. The former has much more muscle.

I'm about 3/4 of the way through the minimum 12 month contract :) I've had two encounters with customer service. They still have my address wrong AFAIK - I don't get any letters from them so how would I know :D The second encounter involved sending out two engineers just to replace a stolen cable modem and fit a new connector on the end of the cable. Modem didn't work of course because the old modem was still registered - you can only have one modem. So more calls to customer service. The woman I spoke to sounded terrible - very depressed and a heavy smoker judging by the voice. It makes you wonder. The new modem cost me something like £80, which I had to claim back from my insurance agency. I wasn't amused. Then there was (is) the email chaos. Then the DNS chaos. I've now discovered that the transparent cache doesn't work properly neither, but from what I can gather I should be more surprised if it did :)


john

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

Assuming of course that the person/company has done something wrong and that NTL hasn't just blacklisted them by accident or on a whim or at the request of a muppet user (if the blacklist is public).


john

Re: How should NTL handle spam ?
 

as if they would! :D

NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

I am currently receiving several hundred spam messages a day sent to my ntlworld.com address (a purely private, personal, non-commercial address -- I'm a retired public servant). I am forced to spend long periods of every day wading through all the spam in search of the occasional genuine message, wasting time that I can ill afford. If I am away from a computer for more than a couple of days, my NTL mailbox becomes completely unmanageable, overflowing with a thousand or more spams waiting to download. Many others must be having the same dismal experience.

Some of the spam I receive has been addressed to dozens of ntlworld addresses listed in alphabetical order, mine among them. This strongly suggests that someone has sold the NTL address lists to a spammer who has of course sold them on to other spammers, and so on by compound multiplication. There appears to have been a serious failure of security at NTL.

Other ISPs, including for example Yahoo (which, unlike NTL, is free), have installed reliable spam filters which they keep up to date and which identify and separate spam so that it can be checked at leisure and deleted. When is NTL going to perform the same essential service for its subscribers?

I also receive around a dozen virus-infected messages addressed to my ntlworld.com address every day. Again, other providers automatically scan all incoming messages for viruses and sidetrack those found to be infected. NTL simply passes them on, unchecked. NTL just can't, it seems, be bothered.

I live in the heart of south London and use NTL cable (since NTL has a total monopoly) for my telephones, digital TV and internet access. My NTL exchange has still not been enabled for broadband and NTL refuses to say when or even whether it is going to be upgraded. BT can't, or won't, supply broadband to my area, either. I'm stuck with dial-up.

When is NTL going to wake up? (I hope that despite having shamefully closed down the old nthellworld.com forum after buying it up in order to suppress it, someone at NTL has the wit to read messages here and get a sense of what is infuriating their customers... If so, why not post a considered reply to this message?)

Brian

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Hi m8 and :welcome: to the site :)

Sadly you are far from alone with this one. There are some programs about that will help reduce the junk that you get. I bit more detailed advice can be found on this fab post by one of our members - http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/sh...ad.php?t=10441

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

I appreciate your frustation, but at the moment, the fact is that ntl don't implement and spam/ antivirus filters, although whether this will change in the near future, nobody knows!

There are a number of things that you can do yourself to combat spam; i only receive about 1-2 spam messages per week so i don't think the problem lies entirely with ntl.

The first thing that i suggest is to download a programme such as mailwasher, which will filter the spam on your pc, so you won't have to go through all of it to find the genuine messages.

The other thing is that if i a piece of spam contains an 'unsubscribe' link DO NOT use this! it just validates your address for the spammer, and will lead to just more spam!

No matter, how much we rant and rave, when ntl want to implement spam/ virus filtering they will, and before that, they wont!

for advice on dealing with spam at your end, see the post here

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

one thing they could do which would be fairly quick, easy and cheap to do is block the web sites that these SPAM mails refer to... If the ISP can't access them then there is no point to the spam and it should be reduced.. AOL do this already as well as having spam filtering..

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

i know a friend of mine had over 2000 spam messages surly NTL CAN SOMETHING other providers do so why cant NTL

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

A lot of people would object to that sort of activity.. for example.. would you let your postman go through all your post and filter out the ones he deemed inappropriate? probably not.

The problem is that no-one is going to be a perfect judge of what is and isn't spam... as a result many users like to reserve that priviledge for themselves.

Personally, I'm in favour of blacklisting.. (blocking email from known spammers, not whole domains) on the server side. But I am aware that many people don't want to hand over that responsibility, which you can't really argue against.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

[QUOTE=monkeybreath]
[snip] There are a number of things that you can do yourself to combat spam; i only receive about 1-2 spam messages per week so i don't think the problem lies entirely with ntl.
The first thing that i suggest is to download a programme such as mailwasher, which will filter the spam on your pc, so you won't have to go through all of it to find the genuine messages.
The other thing is that if i a piece of spam contains an 'unsubscribe' link DO NOT use this! it just validates your address for the spammer, and will lead to just more spam! [snip]

Thanks. I never reply to spam messages, never click on the 'unsubscribe' link, and try not to give any indication that my e-mail address functions. I have investigated a number of spam filter programs but most of them either require you to compile your own list of Reply To addresses from spams received (not a practical proposition considering that I'm receiving several hundred a day) or else have their own criteria for identifying spam which are usually so broadly drawn that they are liable to eliminate genuine messages too. I appreciate the difficulty of spotting definite spam in an automated program, but Yahoo (and nowadays Hotmail, I suspect) manage it, and I don't see why NTL shouldn't manage it too.

And for minimal expense NTL could certainly filter out virus-infected messages instead of blithely passing them on. How many ntlworld.com customers take the trouble to update their virus definition files every day (I do, and a great bore it is)? Again, others do (and send you a message telling you that such-and-such a message has been detected with a virus and has been deleted): why shouldn't NTL?

As for broadband, why does NTL give evidence to parliamentary committees boasting of their commitment to bring broadband to all their customers in the UK, and then do nothing whatsoever to supply it to their customers in the nation's capital? NTL boasted of its experiment with WHAM (Wireless High-speed Access Modem) which was a triumphant success -- I had broadband via WHAM for a year or so, and it was almost faultless -- so NTL wound it up without a word of explanation and never offered it on a commercial basis. Get the political credit for it, then close it down. Yuk.

Brian

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

That's a splendid post for guidance on tracking down and reporting the originators of heavily disguised spams. But it's just not practicable if you're getting hundreds of the damn' things every day!

Incidentally I manage to divert about one-third of the spams I receive into a separate folder in Outlook Express by writing lots of Message Rules based on phrases and names that keep on cropping up in spam. But the spammers mostly work round that sort of filter by changing the tell-tale words slightly: V1agra instead of Viagra, or V*i*a*g*r*a, or whatever. It's a losing battle to keep up with the wretched nasties.

Brian

Brian

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

brian. if you have a flood of spam.. i suggest you install "mailwasher" as suggested above by monkeybreath ..

*do NOT turn on the "bounce" feature though

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

I appreciate the suggestion, and I have looked at the mailwasher website to see what's involved, but it looks to me as if I would still have to look at each incoming message individually to determine whether it is spam or genuine, and I can do that already (indeed I am forced to do it) using Outlook Express and some message rules. But users of mailwashers may be able to explain that it's more useful than it seems.

Brian

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

For an instant solution - change your email address! It's not as painful as it sounds.

1) Visit:
http://www.ntlworld.com/help/custome...ilOptions.html

2) Follow 'add extra email boxes' and set up a new email account.

3) Go to the same page but now follow 'set up an autoreply to your email'. Enter your old account details and then set up a message that says something like 'Sorry about this.... spam.... aaagh... please use my new email address which is xxxx at ntlworld dot com'. Anyone that sends an email to your old address will receive this message. Humans will be able to act on it but spam engines will just throw it away. Sorted.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

That really does look like a possible solution -- except that it's the e-mail address that I have been using for a long time as my authenticating address, e.g. for ordering things online, etc. So when I place an order, or arrange to renew a subscription, etc., a message automatically goes to that address and I have to reply to it, or click on a link in it, to prove that it's really me placing the order or renewing the subscription or whatever. Clearly the automatic message sent to me wouldn't read or act on the automated reply explaining that I have changed my e-mail address...

Still, it might be worth setting such things up all over again with the new address, I suppose. Thanks, anyway.

Brian

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Why should it be up to ntl to filter spam and virusses?

Their email service is bad enough as it is with it without the filtering. Imagine what it would be like with the filtering! Knowing what ntl are like legit messages would probably end up getting binned as spam.

Also think about how much it would cost and how much time it would take for such a solution to be designed and deployed. Not all customers use their full allocation of email addresses but if they were to.

Each ntl internet customer has 15 email addresses. Multiply that by 1,000,000 (which is supposedly how many internet customers ntl has) and you will see what a huge task it is! Same thing for antivirus - scanning emails for each would be impractical given the scale of it all.

If you wish to filter out the virusses then you should install some antivirus software that allows you to scan the emails upon downloading from the POP3 server. Most do nowadays but its not always switched on by default.

- - -

As you have 15 email addresses available to you, why don't you try this?

Have one for each website you order stuff from or have one which you have to give out in order to download software or whatever...

e.g. if your main email you get tons of spam on now is joe.bloggs@ntlworld.com, then set up a new address for each site/purpose you use...

If you trade on ebay then joe.bloggs.ebay@ntlworld.com

If you buy off amazon then joe.bloggs.amazon@ntlworld.com

If you need to fill in your email address onto sites then use joe.bloggs.trashcan@ntlworld.com

etc.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

You offer some good advice on tackling spam. But I think NTL could provide some filtering to block emails from known spam relays. If other ISP's can do it, why can't NTL. Other ISP's have as many inboxes to cope with.

I run software to deal with spam, and it automatically blacklists certain senders by comparing the header with its own central database without me doing anything. NTL could run something like this. It will not stop everything but it might stop some. I've just deleted 16 emails for the last 12 hours....all spam.

Unfortunately, I rely on my main email address now, so changing it is really not an option for the most part. I can and do use modified addresses for certain sites and the Usenet, but once on the spammers lists it is impossible to get off, without an address change, so come on NTL....give us all some help.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

I use Cloudmarks Spamnet.It's really good as it learns as you go what is spam and as you block more and more spam and upload your spam to Spamnet ,it gets more and more efficient at detecting the spam.I note it is now available for Outlook Express as well as for Outlook and it really isn't that expensive.It's very easy to use(easier than Mailwasher in my opinion)and I do recommend it.

Incog.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

hey guys,

I too have had a massive problem with spam, but I have found a way around it that works perfectly for me!

In outlook express I set up a message rule called "Spam Filter" and put in a hell of a lot of variations of the viruses/spam I am getting, all you need to do is put the subject, since I have done this only once every 4/5 days do I get a spam message, if I do I just add it to the list and voila.

You must set the message rule so it deletes the mail from the mail server as apposed to downloading it, works much better...

1. Open Outlook Express
2. Go to Tools Menu > Message Rules > Mail
3. Click on the "new" button and under "1. Select the Conditions for your rule:" go down the list till you find "Where the subject line contains specific words" and tick the white box to the left of that text.
4. under the "2. Select the Actions for your rule:" list, scroll down until you find "Delete it from server" (at the very bottom of the list) and tick the white box before that text
5. in the "3. Rule Description" box click on the underlined blue text and it will pop up a box entitled "Type Specific Words", in that window type in all of the following list, making sure you do one at a time and pressing add every time, you cannot type all of them at once and then click add, it will not work that way!

***MAKE SURE YOU DO NOT USE THE "s when typing out these subject lines***

"Re: Approved"
"Re: Your text"
"Re: Here"
"Re: Your picture"
"is that your finger?"
"Re: Your music"
"Re: Your software"
"Re: Thanks!"
"Re: Your details"
"Re: Details"
"Re: Your website"
"Re: Excel file"
"Re: My details"
"Re: Your archive"
"Re: Re: Message"
"Re: Your document"

you must make sure you get the spacing right between Re: and the key words!

once all these are done and are all listed in the Words box then click ok then go to the "4. Name of the rule" box and type in Virus Blocker and click ok.

Next time you check your email the green bar will go up and then says "receiving email" the green bar prior to that checks the messages on the server and deletes any that have the above subjects or any additional that you want to block.

Hope this helps, if you have any questions or any problems setting it up let me know :)

Kind Regards,

Simon

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

ntl do in fact filter for spam, and have done since christmas. i used to get about 20 - 30 a day now i get a few a week. the most i had was 2 yesterday. and they have in the past filtered for some viruses. for instance i believe they filtered for some variants of the beagle virus

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Hi all

I agree that spam *is* extremely annoying - some of my accounts attract dozens a day, others only a few a month. Perhaps we'll never totally defeat the spammers, but a few interesting points have thus far been raised in this discussion.

1: NTL's mta's have one overriding function, and that is to deliver mail. Would customers be happy if an important email was dumped by NTL as spam, when it wasn't? probably not. Are they happy with being spammed? No. The provider is between a rock and a hard place :)

2: NTL *do* employ both spam and virus filters. The virus filters currently block in the region of 400,000 netsky and bagle mutants every day. These viruses mutate quickly - it's a difficult job to catch them. NTL could block *.exe and *.zip in addition to the commonly blocked extensions - this would cut down virus activity considerably, but with in excess of 25 million messages being sent and received on the platform each day, a number of customers would end up with a degraded service.

Additionally, spamhaus RBL lists are updated on a daily basis - but open relays crop up faster than they can be blocked, not to mention indian, brazilian and chinese "pay per spam" services that have become so popular with our common enemy.

3: As much as I empathise with people over the horrendous amounts of spam that can be targetted at their inboxes, it's not a one-way thing. People should run their own virus and spam filters *in addition* to the ones the ISP has in place - is it fair to blame the manufacturer if your car breaks down, but you forgot to top up the oil? The amount of viruses propagated by unprotected NTL customers is phenomenal.

4: There is light at the end of the tunnel. The new mail platform is being built, and should take over within the next few months - with far more draconian spam and virus filters in place. I know you've probably heard this before, but let's wait and see.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Why would spam filters block important mail? I use MailWasher, which marks a lot of spam as "Blacklisted" from it's own database. I have NEVER had to keep anything that is blacklisted. NTL, perhaps wouldn't even need to be as strict as this list, and they still could be a lot better than they are now.

They may block some stuff, but not nearly enough. I'm sure NTL could do better without blocking legitimate emails.

I agree about running our own filtering and anti-virus software is an absolute must, but at the end of the day NTL Broadband is no longer the very cheap option it was compared with other packages. If other ISP's can offer better filtering, why can't NTL?

If it works well, and is thought out properly, then this new filtering will be very much welcomed.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Hi

Even the very best spam filters aren't 100% perfect - even if 1 in 10000 mails (0.01%) were marked incorrectly, that translates to 2500 wrongly-diagnosed emails a day (if blocked at the NTL MTAs, which typically handle ~25 million messages in 24 hours), which is unacceptable from an organisation's point of view.

By contrast, using the above figures, a personal account recieving 50 emails a day would typically drop 2 emails a year.

It boils down to being a numbers game.

cheers

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

can cloudmarks be use without using your e.mail settings the reason i am asking this because i have AVG scanning my e.mail and every antispam program i have tried has change my e.mail settings so when AVG does not work so does this work without chaning the settings for AVG

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

I don't know about Mailwahser, but I've use SpamPal for ages now, and it's pretty much install & leave to it, like all spam filters, it's not 100% but I would say 95% from install.
It checks each email against spam lists.
You can add you known contacts to a white list if needed (I think it can add your contacts from outlook express to its whitelist on install), and there is also a black list for ones that constatly slip thru.
It changes the subject of spam email to start with **SPAM** and you setup one outlook message rule to move these into a "spam" folder.
http://www.spampal.org

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Yes, but the point I'm trying to make is that NTL's spam filtering need not be nearly as strict as the filtering I use in MailWasher, but it can still be better than it is now. I'm sure there's some middle ground here, whereby a good deal of spam is blocked without blocking normal emails.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Good point - perhaps some sort of tiering solution is the way forward. NTL could perhaps use a sweeping brush filter, then customers fine-comb what remains. This would cut down on false-positives for sure.

cheers.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

The problem for the ISP is that they want 0 false positives.

Demon have put this in place it makes a noticable difference to my in box.

http://www.demon.net/pressreleases/2...3-12-10a.shtml

http://www.demon.net/helpdesk/faq/spamfiltering.shtml

http://www.brightmail.com/enterprise-as-benefits.html

Brightmail claim a 99.9999% false positive rate.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Sorry to be pedantic, but 1,000,000 is the number of broadband customers - there are also many dial-up customers, and customers who use TV Email through their STB. Plus tesco.net, virgin.net, Which? Online, etc...

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Also balance that with how many people actually use their 15 addresses ...

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Not many, thankfully. :D

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Actually-to be totally pedantic, ntl have 1 milion internet customers that do not use dial up. ;)

They use their 150k customers to inflate their BB figures, when 150k is nothing like BB IMHO. :angel:

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Hmm i cant see why ntl cant have spam filtering i have it on my domain email address it just came as standard with the hosting i bought

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

your domain hosting is probably with a far better company than NTL.. don't forget also that NTL are a TV company that added on the IT stuff afterwards so maybe they think didn't think about this stuff..

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

true but surly ntl could just put spam assassin on their servers

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

i can't beleive i defended NTL in a post :confused:

i wish they would but i think until the Goverment or EU force ISPs to do this then nothing will happen. I can't see NTL spending money on this or even installing anything for free unless they are forced into it.

Just think of that if all ISPs in the world had to have spam filtering then there would be no point in sending it and then the problem would go away.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Economically they are being driven to it.
Demons solution came soon after they had a massive POP server investment to deal with the increasing volumes of mail. Once the new servers were in place they put in spam trapping to reduce the volumes these servers handled thus increasing the estimated useful life (based on maximum volumes the servers could handle).

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

i guess Demon managed to put the cost of this in with an upgrade they were doing. NTL aren't doing any upgrade at the moment.

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

At the moment, no, but soon...

http://www.openwave.com/us/news_room...v_ntl_0115.htm

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

Ah is that 'coming soon' by any chance :erm:

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

:mad: SPAM :mad:

As the Monty Python sketch went "I DON'T LIKE SPAM"

I'm currently getting about 40-60 :mad: SPAM :mad: attacks a day AAARRRGGHHH

In the 3 months that followed Christmas I received well over 3000 (Yes 3000) e-mails and of those about 95% were :mad: SPAM :mad: an 10% has the :mad: NETSKY.B :mad: virus.

Thank God for :angel: NORTON ANTI-VIRUS & ANTI-SPAM:angel:

Come on NTL "GET BOB THE BUILDER IN!! HE CAN FIX IT"

Re: NTL inactive on spam, viruses and broadband
 

One way to stop spam is to be careful where on the internet you publish your email address.

Add extra characters to your email address to prevent email harvesters from spamming you afterwards.