Any Ideas on Turning off the Spammer?

Must be just me, but I never have one iota of trouble with these
"issues" and can't figure out why people seem to be so bothered by them.
I've always used forums by scrolling through headers until finding
something I decided from that header was something I might want to read
or answer. If the header was suspect or didn't pique my interest, I just
keep scrolling on down. No biggie at all.
Trolls, idiots, morons, and Mensa dropouts will always be a part of any
Usenet forum. These things are so unimportant to me and take so little
time to wade through that I just accept them as part of the "game" and
don't bother even using filters.
Anyone looking for the "perfect" news reader or an answer for every
unpleasant aspect they find on a Usenet forum will in my opinion find
their Usenet experience very frustrating.
FWIW, I just tell people to read the headers, use the scroll wheel, and
stay loose on Usenet. Enjoy the good, and just deal with the bad.
Personally, I have absolutely no trouble at all dealing with Usenet, and
am always in awe of all the fuss about filtering :-))
All this being said, I'm not trying to put anyone down with this post.
I realize this is just me and the way I deal with things, and I respect
everyone else doing whatever they feel they have to do to deal with Usenet.
Dudley Henriques

Larry Dighera wrote:
On Mon, 13 Aug 2007 07:01:00 -0400, "Kyle Boatright"
wrote in
:

I'm seeing a huge number of spam postings in this group. I'm sure they are
from a bot, but since the address keeps switching, I don't know how to block
the messages in OE.

Suggestions?


It would seem that the rec.aviation.piloting newsgroup, like many
other newsgroups, is being targeted for a "sporge" flood. In this
first flood, the articles were injected into Usenet from 13:30 to
11:21 (local), about ten hours. It is unclear to me at this time why
this is occurring, but it may be more than a malicious prank. ...

While I have not yet found a method of filtering out the sporge
articles, I have found some promising leads:

Each article is crossposted to the sci.crypt newsgroup.

The 'Path:' header field always contains:
news.isoc.lu!news.grnet.gr

The 'Subject:' header field always begins with a lower-case letter

Perhaps filters can be successfully written to exploit these
consistencies.

My fear is that newsgroup subscribers who are unable to filter out the
sporge articles may become so frustrated as to discontinue to
participate in newsgroup discussion in the future.

--
Dudley Henriques
President Emeritus
International Fighter Pilots Fellowship

On Mon, 13 Aug 2007 14:29:24 GMT, "Tom Conner"
wrote in .net:

Supernews is apparently filtering it all; I'm not seeing it.

Supernews could be the spammer. Someone posted last week that this group
was scheduled for a sporge flood and Supernews could filter it. Great
marketing technique.

News.individual.net is apparently also successfully filtering the
sporge.

Larry Dighera wrote:
On Mon, 13 Aug 2007 07:01:00 -0400, "Kyle Boatright"
wrote in
:

I'm seeing a huge number of spam postings in this group. I'm sure they are
from a bot, but since the address keeps switching, I don't know how to block
the messages in OE.

Suggestions?


It would seem that the rec.aviation.piloting newsgroup, like many
other newsgroups, is being targeted for a "sporge" flood. In this
first flood, the articles were injected into Usenet from 13:30 to
11:21 (local), about ten hours. It is unclear to me at this time why
this is occurring, but it may be more than a malicious prank. ...

While I have not yet found a method of filtering out the sporge
articles, I have found some promising leads:

Each article is crossposted to the sci.crypt newsgroup.

The 'Path:' header field always contains:
news.isoc.lu!news.grnet.gr

The 'Subject:' header field always begins with a lower-case letter

Perhaps filters can be successfully written to exploit these
consistencies.

My fear is that newsgroup subscribers who are unable to filter out the
sporge articles may become so frustrated as to discontinue to
participate in newsgroup discussion in the future.

On Mon, 13 Aug 2007 10:34:47 -0400, Dudley Henriques
wrote in
:

Must be just me, but I never have one iota of trouble with these
"issues" and can't figure out why people seem to be so bothered by them.
I've always used forums by scrolling through headers until finding
something I decided from that header was something I might want to read
or answer. If the header was suspect or didn't pique my interest, I just
keep scrolling on down. No biggie at all.

With a flood of articles like this, it's like looking for the
proverbial needle, isn't it? You have to read so many sporge headers,
that you give up trying to find legitimate articles.

Trolls, idiots, morons, and Mensa dropouts will always be a part of any
Usenet forum. These things are so unimportant to me and take so little
time to wade through that I just accept them as part of the "game" and
don't bother even using filters.

This is not about trolls; it's about a flood of junk articles drowning
out the legitimate articles.

Anyone looking for the "perfect" news reader or an answer for every
unpleasant aspect they find on a Usenet forum will in my opinion find
their Usenet experience very frustrating.

It has been brought to my attention that Forte Agent 4.x will filter
on the 'Newsgroups:' header.

FWIW, I just tell people to read the headers, use the scroll wheel, and
stay loose on Usenet. Enjoy the good, and just deal with the bad.

That has always worked in the past, but there haven't been any sporge
floods in this newsgroup in the past.

Personally, I have absolutely no trouble at all dealing with Usenet, and
am always in awe of all the fuss about filtering :-))
All this being said, I'm not trying to put anyone down with this post.
I realize this is just me and the way I deal with things, and I respect
everyone else doing whatever they feel they have to do to deal with Usenet.
Dudley Henriques


It has been suggested that the free nfilter program will permit
filtering on any news header field to be used with any news reader:
http://www.nfilter.org/ . I haven't tried it yet.

On 13 Aug, 15:34, Dudley Henriques wrote:
Must be just me, but I never have one iota of trouble with these
"issues" and can't figure out why people seem to be so bothered by them.
I've always used forums by scrolling through headers until finding
....
Dudley Henriques

hmmm. sci.crypt got 18,000 messages on 10 May.
A _lot_ of scrolling.

http://netscan.research.microsoft.co...ng=sci.cryp t

Still clearly the issue is not a show stopper here
at present.

Sadly microsoft have stopped this project now and 31 May
is the last day of data.

Keep in mind I'm not taking a dig at anyone. This is just my way of
dealing with Usenet. If the situation changed as the poster below has
indicated by saying 18K posts have been spammed on one forum, I would
for sure be taking a close look at solving that in whatever way was needed.
DH


Larry Dighera wrote:
Larry Dighera wrote:
On Mon, 13 Aug 2007 07:01:00 -0400, "Kyle Boatright"
wrote in
:

I'm seeing a huge number of spam postings in this group. I'm sure they are
from a bot, but since the address keeps switching, I don't know how to block
the messages in OE.

Suggestions?

It would seem that the rec.aviation.piloting newsgroup, like many
other newsgroups, is being targeted for a "sporge" flood. In this
first flood, the articles were injected into Usenet from 13:30 to
11:21 (local), about ten hours. It is unclear to me at this time why
this is occurring, but it may be more than a malicious prank. ...

While I have not yet found a method of filtering out the sporge
articles, I have found some promising leads:

Each article is crossposted to the sci.crypt newsgroup.

The 'Path:' header field always contains:
news.isoc.lu!news.grnet.gr

The 'Subject:' header field always begins with a lower-case letter

Perhaps filters can be successfully written to exploit these
consistencies.

My fear is that newsgroup subscribers who are unable to filter out the
sporge articles may become so frustrated as to discontinue to
participate in newsgroup discussion in the future.

On Mon, 13 Aug 2007 10:34:47 -0400, Dudley Henriques
wrote in
:
Must be just me, but I never have one iota of trouble with these
"issues" and can't figure out why people seem to be so bothered by them.
I've always used forums by scrolling through headers until finding
something I decided from that header was something I might want to read
or answer. If the header was suspect or didn't pique my interest, I just
keep scrolling on down. No biggie at all.

With a flood of articles like this, it's like looking for the
proverbial needle, isn't it? You have to read so many sporge headers,
that you give up trying to find legitimate articles.

Trolls, idiots, morons, and Mensa dropouts will always be a part of any
Usenet forum. These things are so unimportant to me and take so little
time to wade through that I just accept them as part of the "game" and
don't bother even using filters.

This is not about trolls; it's about a flood of junk articles drowning
out the legitimate articles.

Anyone looking for the "perfect" news reader or an answer for every
unpleasant aspect they find on a Usenet forum will in my opinion find
their Usenet experience very frustrating.

It has been brought to my attention that Forte Agent 4.x will filter
on the 'Newsgroups:' header.

FWIW, I just tell people to read the headers, use the scroll wheel, and
stay loose on Usenet. Enjoy the good, and just deal with the bad.

That has always worked in the past, but there haven't been any sporge
floods in this newsgroup in the past.

Personally, I have absolutely no trouble at all dealing with Usenet, and
am always in awe of all the fuss about filtering :-))
All this being said, I'm not trying to put anyone down with this post.
I realize this is just me and the way I deal with things, and I respect
everyone else doing whatever they feel they have to do to deal with Usenet.
Dudley Henriques


It has been suggested that the free nfilter program will permit
filtering on any news header field to be used with any news reader:
http://www.nfilter.org/ . I haven't tried it yet.


--
Dudley Henriques
President Emeritus
International Fighter Pilots Fellowship

18K would indeed indicate a closer look at the situation :-)
DH



wrote:
On 13 Aug, 15:34, Dudley Henriques wrote:
Must be just me, but I never have one iota of trouble with these
"issues" and can't figure out why people seem to be so bothered by them.
I've always used forums by scrolling through headers until finding
...
Dudley Henriques

hmmm. sci.crypt got 18,000 messages on 10 May.
A _lot_ of scrolling.

http://netscan.research.microsoft.co...ng=sci.cryp t

Still clearly the issue is not a show stopper here
at present.

Sadly microsoft have stopped this project now and 31 May
is the last day of data.


--
Dudley Henriques
President Emeritus
International Fighter Pilots Fellowship

"Dudley Henriques" wrote in message
...
18K would indeed indicate a closer look at the situation :-)

How many have you receive here in the past 24 hours? I have seen around a
1000.

I am showing about 10 continuous headers all scrambled so nothing
monumental here as yet.
DH

Maxwell wrote:
"Dudley Henriques" wrote in message
...
18K would indeed indicate a closer look at the situation :-)

How many have you receive here in the past 24 hours? I have seen around a
1000.



--
Dudley Henriques
President Emeritus
International Fighter Pilots Fellowship

One thing that might or might not be different about my reader is that
I'm using an IMac Intel instead of a PC and my newsreader is Thunderbird
for Mac.
Don't know if this matters or not but thought it might be pertinent to
someone in the know with these things.
DH


Maxwell wrote:
"Dudley Henriques" wrote in message
...
18K would indeed indicate a closer look at the situation :-)

How many have you receive here in the past 24 hours? I have seen around a
1000.



--
Dudley Henriques
President Emeritus
International Fighter Pilots Fellowship

Larry Dighera wrote:



It has been suggested that the free nfilter program will permit
filtering on any news header field to be used with any news reader:
http://www.nfilter.org/ . I haven't tried it yet.

Great little freeware program. I use it, primarily for another forum
frequently plagued by abusive posts, for which one user has written
filter files that he shares with the group. I didn't bother with it
for this little incident, but if it continued, it would be easy for me
to add a filter based on the forums to which it was cross posted.
E.g., in the other forum I mentioned, filters used include cross posts
to a couple of unrelated forums that some of the abusers hit in
tandem, as well as any post crosss-posted to more than 4 forums.
--
Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked infrequently.