RE: Who is Ivan?

["Tom Hansen" <thansen@moscow.com>]

Greetings Visionaires -

My response to "Ivan" was to reply to him/it with a virtual "flood" of
garbage mail (approximately 30 megabytes).  I did this 5 times.  I believe
that once "Ivan" finally does download 150 megabytes of garbage mail, he/it
will get the message.

My best to all and take care.

Tom Hansen

>-----Original Message-----
>From: Bob Hoffmann [mailto:escape@alt-escape.com]
>Sent: Sunday, January 06, 2002 10:08 AM
>To: vision2020@moscow.com
>Subject: Who is Ivan?
>
>
>At 08:34 AM 1/6/2002 -0500, Nance Ceccarelli wrote:
>>Who is IVAN?  and why do I (via the vision 2020 mail list)
>continue to receive
>>emails that make absolutely no sense to me???  I keep reading
>that these are
>>"re: >>>topic of interest<<<" - and then find out that it is a waste of my
>>time.  PLEASE STOP - or be selective in your "to" line.
>
>According to the "Who Is Listening" page of Vision 2020,
>cyclone@panet.co.yu has "No Name Available."  The email address is from
>Yugoslavia, although this may be faked.
>
>It is my belief that Ivan is either a spammer (purveyor of unsolicited
>commercial email), or someone with a virus on his computer, or
>both.  There
>are cases where list serves (like Vision 2020) and moderated email
>newsletters are targeted by spammers, as they are a rich source of active
>email addresses.
>
>Here is some advice that will reduce the problem, but not eliminate it:
>
>Don't cc: (send a copy to) someone who is already on the list.  This will
>result in them receiving two emails, one addressed to v2020, and one
>addressed directly to them.  And then they'll probably receive double the
>messages from Ivan and his ilk.
>
>Don't include email addresses in the body of the message you
>send.  Including cyclone@panet.co.yu, for instance, might guarantee that
>Ivan sends one of these obnoxious emails to himself (although the email
>address is probably a fake).
>
>There are some technical solutions to reduce the use of list serves by
>spammers, but most system administrators and moderators don't have -- or
>take -- the time to implement them.
>
>The "List Maintainer" of Vision 2020 can be reached at
>owner-vision2020@moscow.com.  While v2020 is an unmoderated list, I think
>it is reasonable to point out any misuse of the list, technical problems,
>apparent spammers & virus-plagued list members, etc., to the List
>Moderator.
>
>Those of you with more interest or technical expertise in this issue might
>like to see the documents posted at
>http://blank.org/memory/busted/index2.htm.  Briefly, a group of spammers
>was causing difficulties for an Internet Service Provider, so he hacked
>into their computers, disabled their spamming software, and copied their
>internal documents, posting them on the Internet to expose and embarrass
>them.  "Not exactly legal," but fascinating.
>
>Enjoy,
>
>Bob Hoffmann
>846 Mabelle St.
>Moscow, ID  83843
>
>Tel: 208 883-0642
>