list archive updates

[Peter Abrahamsen]

Here's a vote for obfuscation. Also, if we write UW addresses as "bob at u",
"jane at ee", etc, that's going to be pretty hard for spam harvesters to grok,
but pretty easy for us. Doesn't do much for non-UW folk, but it's good for a
lot of us.

Peter

On Mon, Dec 30, 2002 at 12:34:27PM -0800, M. Hornung wrote:
> There are lots of people on the list that don't have UWNetIDs, and it
> seems like a Nice Thing to let strangers see the threads.
> 
> So far it's a tie (not counting Cere cuz I can't tell which way your email
> might be leaning).  Two for address obfuscation, and two against.  If we
> count my vote then it's three against.  Personally my bias is toward no
> address changing whatsoever.  I don't feel it's appropriate to use a
> middle-of-the-ground approach like Steve suggested.  While it initially
> seems like a good workaround, I have a sneaking suspicion that spammers
> have ways of circumventing such tricks.  It seems the goal is to make
> addresses human-readable but not able to be parsed by a spammer's toolset.  
> The problem is that as soon as a human readable obfuscation system is used
> it is then "known" to the bad guys and can be parsed.  Remember that
> address harvesters probably don't really care if they initially get false 
> positives.
> 
> People will get your address sooner or later, so pretending that you can
> hide it from spammers probably isn't the most honest outlook.  Better to
> prepare for the spam (Spamassassin is working pretty well for me too, with
> some drawbacks) and not obscure your published address.
> 
> =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
>   -=<(| mike at boobaz.net |)>=-          http://www.boobaz.net/key.html
>            81CE 668E BC9D EDFE 08ED  D8D7 84A7 4F32 54C2 68F8
> 
> 
> On Mon, 30 Dec 2002 at 12:11, Cere M. Davis wrote:
> 
> |why don't you put in behind the UWIDNet system?  Or am I missing something
> |here...
> |>
> |> On Mon, Dec 30, 2002 at 11:32:07AM -0800, M. Hornung wrote:
> |> > Hiya.  I'm planning to do some New Year updating to my linux at u archive
> |> > (more useful format, software update, general cleanup, etc).  It's been
> |> > brought to my attention that some people might like it if email addresses
> |> > of subscribers were obscured in the archive.  How do people feel about
> |> > that?  I'll go with the consensus.
> |>
> |> I'm really opposed to it.  There have been a number of times when I've
> |> found some information on a mailing list archive through google, wanted
> |> to follow up on it, and was unable to because there was no way to mail
> |> them.
> |>
> |> Hiding your address is just a temporary measure against spam.  If you
> |> keep and use the same address for long enough you'll eventually get
> |> spam, and it's better to deal with that as a certainty than try to avoid
> |> it.
> |>
> |> (All IMHO, of course. :P)
> |>
> |>
> |
> |- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
> |		        Cere Davis
> |		Unix Systems Administrator - CSDE
> |            cere at u.washington.edu   ph: 206.685.5346
> |         https://staff.washington.edu/cere
> |
> |GnuPG Key   http://staff.washington.edu/cere/gpgkey.txt
> |Key fingerprint = B63C 2361 3B9B 8599 ECC9  D061 3E48 A832 F455 9E7FA
> |
> |
> |
> 
> 
> 
> 

-- 
Peter Abrahamsen
University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
Key 0x039922C0 : 259E 19C4 6FB4 1CA2 AC9D 75CE 8B5F 993D 0399 22C0
  Brown Eyes and I were tired / We had walked and we had scrambled
  Through the moors and through the briars / Through the endless blue meanders
  And we saw St. Elmo's Fire / Splitting ions in the ether
    -- Brian Eno, _St. Elmo's Fire_