blacklist headaches - ASK flaw

I do not use Active Spam Killer, but it has caused me much headache.

Somebody sent a spam to somebody else using my domain in From:. Active Spam=
 Killer then sent an email to my mail server to an account that doesn't exi=
st asking for a reply, I presume without doing any reverse dns checks to se=
e if it would be reasonable to ask for a reply from my domain. Upon receivi=
ng no reply, several ASK users have added my domian to a blacklist. The spa=
mmer keeps sending mail pretending to be from my domain. ASK, rightly so, d=
oes not deliver it. But at this point, ASK adds to the problem of useless i=
nternet traffic by sending more emails to my mailserver. Each one, being fo=
r an invalid user, prompts my mail server to send an error back, rightly so=
=2E ASK then sends ANOTHER nasty-gram. And my mail server, rightly so, send=
s an error because the user is still not a valid user (surprise!). And ANOT=
HER nasy-gram comes. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera; wasting my resources =
and the ASK user's resources, and leaving the spammer to happily send more =
spam, unecumbered.

I realize that this situation does not occur if the user adds my domain to =
their ignore list, but many users it seems either do not understand ASK or =
do not understand that the From may be faked. In either case, it is not res=
ponsible to ever send automated nastygrams, as it will give no positive res=
ult. A spammer is not going to get your nasty-gram and stop spamming.

I am currently dropping all emails coming in with a subjects of "Please sto=
p sending me emails" and "Por favor pare de enviar emails" . If this fails =
to curtail the problem, I will have to resort to blocking any email with th=
e X-AskVersion or X-ASK-Auth headers, and will have to explain to ASK users=
 that their program is flawed.

Regards,

Stephen Byrne
[email protected]


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