On 02 Feb 2002, Jason Lim (of Zentek?) wrote: > Unfortunately, Spews and OSIRUS (they use Spews' list, so essentially the > same applies) have listed many ISPs in Hong Kong and around Asia
Because they run open relays or insecure proxies, host spamware or spamvertised web sites, and ignore abuse reports. Just like rogue ISPs in Europe and the Americas are listed. I am not surprised if Zentek is blocked. In Q1 2001 I received many UCEs advertising sites hosted at zentek.net, and last week I even started getting spam to message-ids of abuse reports I had sent to zentek.net! http://spews.org/html/S475.html > That is why we suggest that businesses use ORDB (http://www.ordb.com) as > it blocks most spam, but ONLY blocks spam and very rarely legitimate > emails (we use this list for our personal emails too). ORDB (ordb.ORG) lists open relays, SPEWS lists spammers. Using ORDB is very effective for blocking spammers who abuse open relays, but SPEWS can stop the direct spammers and their hosts. Unless one's customers are clueful enough to be able to report spam I would recommend using relays.ordb.org and relays.osirusoft.com (or bl.spamcop.net when it is ready). I have found that my users are more understanding of the possibility of a legitimate e-mail being bounced when it comes from a bad source, than their e-mail address on a web site resulting in all sorts of dubious offers. > Spews is supposedly > "early warning", hence if the owner of Spews "thinks" there "may" be spam > coming from a certain place, they block if off first, whether or not spam > will really come through there or not. Not in my experience. They block networks owned by spammers and they block networks which host spammers. I have yet to see SPEWS block a responsible user on a clean network. It is all too easy for spammers to spew from one location while hosting at another, and SPEWS recognises that. > automated testing to block mail servers, rather than rely on the decision > of one or two unaccountable people with their own ideas. SPEWS is accountable to every person who uses SPEWS. If we don't like their decisions we don't use their list. At the moment it seems the number of people who use SPEWS is growing, because it is proving very effective at blocking spammers and encouraging networks to be more responsible. -- Mark