Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath

Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath
Robert Lemos, SecurityFocus 2006-05-17

Israeli anti-spam startup Blue Security decided on Tuesday to shutter its aggressive anti-spam service, citing threats of further--and more malicious--attacks on its service and users.

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-17
DoCtOr ByTe

Solution is simple, but US legislators are too indebetted to the spammers to do any meaningful legislating...

Central DNS should check black hole list before service a computer, then add any botnet computer to the blacklist. Every time a computer asks for a DNS give them a single IP that says "...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-18
Anonymous

This is a sad statement of the state of the world. I hope someone will be brave enough to pick up the torch that Blue Security has dropped....

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-18
Spider Jerusalem

Score one for the bad guys. This kind of thing is only going to lead to real-world escalation. Mr. Doctor Evil wannabe chortling "my spam or no internet!" in his lair is inviting some TLA agency to make an example of him; there's a certain threshold you cross in which the ineffective (or outright ...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-18
Anonymous (7 replies)

Let me make sure I understand this...

A company that did an ongoing DoS attack against a spammers is getting pitty because they got DoS'ed back? And we should feel sorry that they could not stay in business after the attack?

Burning down a sex offender's house is still arson. DoS'ing a spammer...

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-19
Anonymous (4 replies)

Absolutely. Blue Security's tactics were irresponsible, vigilantism, pure and simple. It also demostrated their lack of forward planning and risk management....

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Re: Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-19
Anonymous

I applaud the next company that decides to do this...we should all welcome software that does this...I'd use it...or even pay for it. It will also force ISPs and email providers to disable open SMTP relays....

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Both comments above are from spammers 2006-05-19
Andrew (1 replies)

Give me a break! Obviously the comments above are from spammers, seriously, who sticks up for the spammers? You two are freaks, really. How about this, let me forward all my spam to your email address and then let?s see how you like it. Your comments are not worthy of reading. Have you ever hea...

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Re: Both comments above are from spammers 2006-06-05
Anonymous

Man! have you reread what your post said...?

quote"How about this, let me forward all my spam to your email address and then let?s see how you like it."unquote if they are spammers...the only thing your gonna get is DoS!

if they are spammers...sending spam to themis gonna be nothing....that'slike...

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Re: Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-20
Anonymous (1 replies)

The tactics where working though.

The spammer himself is inresponsible for starting the darn thing after all.

His attack which in short is blackmail at first and then initialising a dDos attack is not something you expect from spammers. So Blue Security is not to blame. However, a criminal like ...

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Re: Re: Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-27
Anonymous

Make it 300 years at least. A creep like that should never be allowed anywhere near the Internet again.

I just want to see PharmaMaster slammed....

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Re: Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-21
informed citizen

"Pure and simple" if you don't know anything about the service. All Blue Security did was automate the process of complaining about each spam you get. One spam = ONE complaint on the advertized website (a complaint they are REQUIRED BY LAW to accept and respect). Why in the world should we not be...

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-19
Who Cares

It's not a DDoS they did. They merely replied on behalf of their clients to be taken of the e-mail list that was used to get them a spam e-mail.

It was a good application of the prisoners dilemma (in this case chained together) where the most profitable reaction is to mimic what the other party did...

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-19
Anonymous

Using that line of logic, I will assume you also object to jail time for kidnappers....

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-21
informed citizen (1 replies)

They weren't DoS'ing the spammers. They were automating the complaint process so that if the companies advertised in the spam refused to honor remove requests (they were given 2 weeks after first spamming blue frog members), each member who got 1 spam would submit 1 complaint to the advertized webs...

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Re: Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-23
Anonymous

I totally support Blue Securities objectives and tactics. I personally believe the time is now to return to cruel and unusal punishment. I think that people especially crimminal elements that push spam or attacks on our PC's should be sought out and severely punished. The amount of time and money...

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-21
Anonymous

Would be hard to DoS someone when each computer sends out only one opt-out request, and the total number of subscribers they claim to have is just 500,000. That WOULD be enough to fill up their database with junk, and drive up thei bandwidth prices, but I doubt it's enough to take a server offline....

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-06-09
Anonymous

I think you misread the article. Blue went after the sponsors, not the spammer. And if sending unsubscribe requests, automated, is DDoS, what's spamming people? Automated sending to a list.

It's the same thing. The sponsors get inundated with unsubscribe requests and told by hundreds of thousands...

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-06-23
Tea

They didn't DOS or DDOS they contacted spammers and asked them to stop sending spam to their clients.

It won't be long until someone starts up another Anti-Spam project. We're all getting *very* sick of this....

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-19
Anonymous

I will divulge the secret to stopping spam in its tracks...simply click this link here..

www.iwantmypctobeazombie.net

...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-19
FixitDave (3 replies)

It is sad that the company has stopped trying to do what everybody wants them to do (except the spammers)...If anyone threatens you with a gun, the police are able to shoot at them before they harm anyone...this is the same...fight fire with fire and lets welcome the next company that tries to do th...

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-19
Anonymous (1 replies)

I certainly hope you are kidding.

Fighting fire with fire only leaves a bunch of burned down houses.

Fighting DoS with DoS only results in a lot of companies being included as collateral damage.

The intelligent person fights fire with water (unless it is an oil-based fire, then use sand).

DoS ...

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Re: Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-27
Anonymous

I completely agree.

On the same note, ISP's need be held liable for not taking a more proactive role in the prevention of mass denial of service efforts, as it is their responsibility to the entire internet community. Proper ingress and egress filtering, flow control, and coordinated traffic ano...

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-20
Anonymous (1 replies)

unfortunately, the internet or SMTP was NEVER intended for the way we use mail today.. We will never get rid of spam, unless All the ISPs agree and work diligently on removing it, if not I fear that with the ever increasing damages caused due to SPAM and the resulting DOS attacks on both sides, Law ...

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Re: Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-26
Anonymous

Yes, we can get rid of SPAM. And it is actually quite simple. It has been thought of before and should be brought back into the limelight. Only legitamate companies willing to be scrutinized can have access to the relay ports by large ISP's. This removes the so called SPAM bot net. Then the companie...

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No more fighting fire with fire 2006-05-21
informed citizen (1 replies)

"If anyone threatens you with a gun, the police are able to shoot at them before they harm anyone"

Not true. The police are *not* free to start blowing people away just because a gun has been waved; they are supposed to diffuse the situation if at all possible without any violence. Escalating v...

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Re: No more fighting fire with fire 2006-06-01
Anonymous

They didn't say "... a gun has been waved...", they said, "...threatened with a gun." In England and Wales, Section 3 of the Criminal Law Act 1967 provides that a person may use such force as is reasonable in the circumstances in the prevention of crime. Common Law recognises that it is lawful for...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-19
Anonymous (1 replies)

The solution to spam is simple:

Stupid people, stop buying all products being advertised to you in this way!...

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-31
Anonymous

So far your suggestion makes the most sense. The spammers are in the game for the money. If all the really stupid people quit buying their products, then the money dries up and the spammer gets poor and goes away! Unfortunately, my experience in the world has shown me that the world is full of st...

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This is the saddest thing that could happen 2006-05-19
Hawkeye

This is the saddest thing that could happen. I'd been having problems with Blue Security for the last few weeks. Spams mails that I used to forward to them daily were bouncing off, and I somehow guessed that they might be facing a DOS attach. Today I though I'd get to the bottom of the whole thing.....

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-20
Anonymous

I'm not sure why anybody reasons that BlueFrog acted similar to a DDos attack against spammers and that they somehow deserved to have an actual DDos attack. The BlueFrog client allowed users to submit a message to BlueSecurity's review team. It was reviewed to verify it was spam, then "opt-out" in...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-22
Ectox

Ok heres a thought

The spammers can send out all that mail, Yet when they recieve such a small fraction back it causes a Dos? WTF? upload is harder than download people, check your ISPs settings (download rate is likely 3-4x upload rates). I cant see how a 1-1 ratio could cause Dos when they had ...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-22
anonymouse (1 replies)

blue security should have planned this from the start. when you send 1 reply per 1 spam. you'll piss off people (both customers and spammers alike) they should have prepared their network resources for such an attack.. always nice to wear a kevlar vest... i guess they didn't ...

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-22
Anonymous1

The term is "flash mob". It is as much a DDoS as the Slashdot Effect or even being linked by the front page of USAToday.com.

While an individual involved in a flash mob did nothing wrong, there is a difference between an individual and an organizer. Blue Security *organized* the flash mob. Thi...

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Reshef backs off and we have to pay for the consecuences 2006-05-22
Anonymous (1 replies)

We trusted a supposedly "serious" company trying to solve our problems with spam.

Now they backed off leaving us having high loads of spam and without any protection against it.

They got the money after all and we, useful idiots, have the problem.

Mr. Reshef, don't blame the spammer only, you tur...

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Re: Reshef backs off and we have to pay for the consecuences 2006-05-24
Anonymous

So, you paid enough to Blue Security to ensure they would remain in business, huh?

...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-23
Sasha

They did not think that spamming now is a criminal business. Often zombie networks serve not only to send spam, but to blackmail web sites, threatening with DDoS attacks. And organized criminals have resources to destroy someone who interfere their activity. They must have been reported this to poli...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-23
Anonymous

The fact that Blue frog was attacked shows that their system worked. And the spammers were getting a taste of their own and didn't like it. There should be alot more companies like Blue Frog. The backbone providers themselves should be accountable to police the system and track down the spam compani...

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True anti-spam never dies 2006-05-23
Tortanick

Blue Frog is allready being rebuilt as a peer to peer network.

As we speek talented coders are engaged in discussions about design.

The days of spam are numbered, never give up hope. you can find us at www.Okopipi.org...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-25
Anonymous (1 replies)

Won't Blue Frog still work, though? It won't forward spam messages to Blue Security, but can't it still send the opt-out message? If so, I'll keep right on using it....

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-28
A random computer geek (1 replies)

Think... the servers are down, the Blue Security infrastructure is gone. Obviously it's not going to work. If there's nowhere to send the reports, then there's no point in using the software.

Granted, yes, in a sense, one could look at it as a form of DoS, due to the possibility that one company ...

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Re: Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-06-01
Anonymous (1 replies)

Big Brother? That's ironic. On the contrary, I'd call it the legitimate voice of protest by thousands of individual sufferers to stop harrassing them. If they wont listen they have to forced to listen. Stuff them!...

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Re: Re: Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-06-14
Anonymous

My feeling in forcing them to listen is that a international agency are willing to step up and enforce fines to businesses using these spam services, the spammers won't have any client's email to send out and money will not be made. With this agency, the power to prosecute in ANY country in the wor...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-05-27
Blue Frog user

It seems that in princle the solution is to decentralize the blue frog concept. Automate the the opt-out exercise at the individual user's computer so he/she can effortlessly send the opt-out. Then there is no central site to take. down. ...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-06-01
Anonymous (1 replies)

I propose a kudos to the Israeli anti-spam company for their efforts be it in vain. However the fact that people arent noticing the obvious solution is beyond my comprehension. Personally i think we should bitch-slap all the idiots who leave their systems unprotected and the wannabe system admins wh...

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Re: Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-06-11
WastedNeurons

Hmmmm.... comments such as this make my neurons start to burn. "bitch-slap" all the idiots, eh? While I appreciate the depth of your anger at the "idiots" who unknowingly allow themselves to become exploited and made part of the problem --- the statement itself reveals the issue - they are idiots ...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-06-02
Ex-Blue Frog User

I joined blue frog kind of late in their fight, around 1 and a half months before their "death", but still saw a remarkable decrease in spam, and a huge increase with their decision to stop. I reported every spam email I recieved and felt good about doing it, I could submit opt-out requests easily a...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-06-03
xaKira

I hope this is not too off topic. I think email clients need to get smarter. I would like to have an option for "New email requires password". Then anyone not already in my contacts list will get bounced unless there's a password included. This could utilise the CC or BCC field, i.e. only accept...

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securityfocus cowards hide the truth 2006-06-05
bluesecurity IS spamming (2 replies)

I posted the truth that this company created this entire fraud, and they themselves spammed advertisment, feigning victimization to draw attention. People are so caught up in the anti-spam fever they won't even listen to reason or look at the evidence. What a fantastic marketing fraud!! Since I c...

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Re: securityfocus cowards hide the truth 2006-06-08
Anonymous (1 replies)

"How nice to get away with something like that and create something from nothing." -- ?????!!!!!!!!!

Thousands of messages daily is NOT nothing !

Hey, if you forcefully come to my house and try to tell me that that's alright and I should be quite, then be prepared to get hit by something big and...

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Re: Re: securityfocus cowards hide the truth 2006-06-23
Tea

There should definatley be legal action taken against spammers. For example, the FBI breaking into their houses and ARRESTING THEM. Internet crime is still crime, and it's time for law enforcement to get cracking....

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Re: securityfocus cowards hide the truth 2006-07-06
Barbed_wire83

To put things into perspective..

I was a Blue Frog user and I saw a DRASTIC reduction in spam being sent to an email account of mine. How does that coincide with blue security being a spammer? Usually when one is a spammer, the email addresses available to them see drastic INCREASES in garbage...

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Blue Security folds under spammer's wrath 2006-11-04
Alkaril

I was not used Blue Security service, but I say NO for any spam. I NEWER read it. I send it direct to TRASH. The only time I spend is to MARK and DELETE. I was surprized with Tucows helping for spammers - is there "hidden" cooperation with spammers? More traffic - more money (even traffic is SPAM). ...

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WHY are there still centralized DNS servers? 2007-06-14
Mike

Both of the most successful attacks weren't even targeted on the site itself, but on DNS servers for the site. I don't understand --- WHY do these things even exist anymore? There are 4,294,967,296 conceivable four-byte domain names, with a sizable fraction disqualified technically. Four bytes - ...

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