Facebook Vs. Adam Guerbuez And Atlantis Blue Capital
Facebook won an immense judgement against Montreal, Canada spammer and phisher Adam Guerbuez.
Guerbuez has a storied history, having been found arrested for uttering threats in 1997, charged with murder in 2000, faced marjuana charges in 2004 and perhaps most interestingly his online presence which began in 2003, he interviewed in the Montreal Mirror about his bum-fighting (homeless people paid to beat one another) websites crazypricks.com and bumvision.com. Currently he runs ballervision.com
Facebook's lawyers submitted this affidavit to the court outlining the character of Mr. Guerbuez, including his involvement with Neo-Nazi groups, and his criminal past.
CAUCE has been quoted today in the aftermath
CAUCE President John levine also has some commentary on his personal blog
The Globe and Mail quotes Federal Task Force on Spam member Michael Geist regarding the lack of Canadian spam law and enforcement.
The Montreal Gazette makes note of Guerbuez' notorious past
Mr. Guerbuez's personal blog refutes any notoriety.
Defined tags for this entry: adam Guerbuez, Atlantis Blue Capital, ballervision.com, bumvision.com, canada, canspam, crazypricks.com, facebook, Guerbuez, identity theft, john levine, media, michael geist, north america, privacy, spam, united states
McColo and the Difficulty of Fighting Spam
CAUCE's own Ray Everett-Church writes:
It may be a truism that “little things mean a lot,” but in the world of spam, flipping a single switch can have huge consequences that span the globe.
We saw that concept reinforced this past week when McColo Corp., an Internet hosting firm based in San Jose, Calif., had its Internet connection shut off by its upstream connectivity providers on suspicion that McColo was serving as a command and control center for various spamming “bot net” operations as well as a base of operations for various other unsavory activities.
Of course everyone, even McColo, is innocent until proven guilty. But in the days following the disconnection, global spam volumes have reportedly dropped by nearly two-thirds. I suppose it could be a coincidence...
Read the rest here.
Thursday, November 13. 2008
It may be a truism that “little things mean a lot,” but in the world of spam, flipping a single switch can have huge consequences that span the globe.
We saw that concept reinforced this past week when McColo Corp., an Internet hosting firm based in San Jose, Calif., had its Internet connection shut off by its upstream connectivity providers on suspicion that McColo was serving as a command and control center for various spamming “bot net” operations as well as a base of operations for various other unsavory activities.
Of course everyone, even McColo, is innocent until proven guilty. But in the days following the disconnection, global spam volumes have reportedly dropped by nearly two-thirds. I suppose it could be a coincidence...
Read the rest here.
Defined tags for this entry: California, criminal activity, email, mccolo, Media, north america, perspective, security fix, spam, spam gangs, United States, world
Should I Stay or Should I Go?
If I stay there will be trouble … If I go there will be double – Joe Strummer (1952-2002)
“We can be heroes, just for one day” - David Bowie (1947- )
Working in the anti-spam and online malware fight can be depressing or at best invoke multiple personality disorder.
We all know things are bad on the net, but if you want a dose of stark reality, check out Brian Kreb’s fantastic ‘Security Fix’ blog on the Washington Post site. Written with both technical accuracy and readability ‘for the rest of us’, a rare thing indeed, Brian is the current raving-fav among the security set, due to his high profile, and willingness to call a spade a spade.
He has shone the spotlight of national media on some real embarrassments, situations like ICANN dragging their feet regarding the decertification of rogue registrar EstDomains (a service much-favoured by malware authors and spammers), (they are now offline), Atrivo, a California-based ISP which played a pivotal role in sustaining the Storm botnet, (they are now offline) and Krebs played a part in the latest victory for us good guys on the net, noting McColo was a host for botnet command-and-control technologies (yes, they too are now offline!)
So why the ambivalence Neil? Good question! Speaking to an old friend who asked me what I was doing these days, I recently likened the fight against this relentless onslaught to having one’s pinky in a dyke, and there are days when I don’t even think we have a dyke! We’ve certainly seen dedicated anti-spam/anti-malware volunteers suffer from burn-out, and drop off, over the years, a loss to all of us as an Internet community.
CAUCE Executive Director Neil Schwartzman on CTV Newsnet speaking to Canadian Inactivity regarding Spam Laws
CAUCE Executive Director Neil Schwartzman appeared on CTV Newsnet November 07, 2008
http://watch.ctv.ca/news/latest/spammed-out/#clip110343
The Root of All Email
This week, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) published a number of what they call "RFCs," which originally meant "Requests for Comment" -- the standards documents which specify the technical underpinnings of the internet. Two of these, numbered 5321 and 5322, replace earlier documents defining the very core of internet email. On the surface, each of these seem surprisingly simple; one aims "...to transfer mail reliably and efficiently," while the other defines itself as "...a definition of what message content format is to be passed between systems." Yet without general industry-wide acceptance of (and compliance with) these standards, internet email simply would not exist.
This week also marks ten years since the death of Jon Postel, who arguably had more influence over the creation of the internet than any other single person. One of Jon's most enduring recommendations is to "be conservative in what you send and liberal in what you receive," which Vint Cerf (who had only slightly less influence over the early internet), described as "...a reminder that in a multi-stakeholder world, accommodation and understanding can go a long way towards reaching consensus or, failing that, at least toleration of choices that might not be at the top of everyone's list."
This philosophy is the root of all email, from the earliest standards discussions to the latest theories of authentication, reputation, and deliverability.
This week also marks ten years since the death of Jon Postel, who arguably had more influence over the creation of the internet than any other single person. One of Jon's most enduring recommendations is to "be conservative in what you send and liberal in what you receive," which Vint Cerf (who had only slightly less influence over the early internet), described as "...a reminder that in a multi-stakeholder world, accommodation and understanding can go a long way towards reaching consensus or, failing that, at least toleration of choices that might not be at the top of everyone's list."
This philosophy is the root of all email, from the earliest standards discussions to the latest theories of authentication, reputation, and deliverability.
