When we got back from vacation, I had nearly 2 MB of spam waiting. That’s after all the spam filtered out by blacklists, SpamAssassin, etc.
I should’ve left it in Hawaii. They like it there.
(Actually, they like SPAM—I seriously doubt they like spam any more than the rest of us.)
It’s always something. Apparently WordPress.org has been dabbling in black-hat SEO, hosting thousands of keyword-based articles on their high–page-ranked site and placing hidden links to them on their home page. Way to go, guys. This makes the paranoia over remote images almost look reasonable. What’s next, putting ads in the next default template?
The free/open source software world is based primarily on trust. Based on comments I’ve read over the last couple of days, WordPress has lost a lot of it. They’ve even been (mostly) dropped from Google. A sensible precaution while things are sorted out, but it unfortunately means the first top-level listing on a Google search for “wordpress” is wordpress.com, which looks like a cybersquatter. Not exactly an improvement.
In a support thread Matt answered last week, he referred to it as an “experiment.” He’s on vacation right now, but someone has taken it upon themselves to remove the bogus articles from the site.
My thoughts: Continue reading
The blog spammers must be getting desperate. The only other explanation I can think of is courtesy (keeping offensive language out of the posts), and I just can’t ascribe that motive to them.
The latest attack on this site consists of randomly-generated alphanumeric strings. Name? ah87fdfbqpo3q9483fhc. Email? ahsdhufs@q98hf4i4whfcia487f.com. URL? augfagfwi7832hr732rh8732fcfiuh.example.com. (I assume they have a wildcard DNS set up for random subdomains.) Content? Try something like “ads78shafi7 uigiutgw87n srgn743fnufc42.” (I’m typing my own gibberish, just in case the plan is to search for particular strings and see which sites have actually posted.)
The “advantage” of this approach is that there is no content to filter. No references to pills, poker or porn, no common phrases, not even empty generic statements like “I really like you’re site” and “Your an idiot” with links tossed in. It’s just a bunch of meaningless letters and numbers and a link. After all, the link is all the spammer needs, to get that coveted PageRank.
Oh, about that link? Easily identifiable. SURBL-style lists eat them for breakfast, and Spam Karma has been snacking on these all morning. *chomp*
One of those “international lottery” scams (very closely related to the Nigerian scam):
CONGRATULATIONS !!! YOUR E-MAIL HAS WON A MICROSOFT PRIZE
My e-mail has won a prize? Not me? Hmm, I can think of lots of Microsoft “prizes” my email has received: Mydoom, Netsky, Bagle…. Of course, it’s declined all of them!
Back in 2002, people all over the net started getting email from a “time traveller” looking for a dimensional warp generator. Most people assumed it was a joke, and some decided to play along by setting up fake stores or even arranging a drop-off. The “time travel spammer” was eventually identified as spammer Robert Todino, who, unfortunately, was quite serious in his belief that time travelers were interfering with his life. The fake store, the mock DWG made from old computer parts, the offers to supply his equipment, all unwittingly fueled his belief.
This all came out in mid-2003, and aside from immediate fallout and a brief spate of (probably copycat) AIM appearances late last year, the field seems to have been quiet.
Well, guess what showed up in the spam traps over the weekend!
Hello <address removed>,
I’m looking for a good trans_universal transportation unit. Do you have the Mccoy g series self generating watch or similar newer models available? I also need other items you may or may not have available. Please send a (separate) email to me at: <address removed> if available and let me know your terms on doing business.
Thank you
Paul
They’re baaack!
Other sightings: here [archive.org], here [archive.org], and here. Edit: Somehow it seems appropriate that these sightings are now only accessible via the Wayback Machine. (July 28, 2006)
