Challenge–response Spam Filtering
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Challenge–response Spam Filtering
A challenge–response (or C/R) system is a type of anti-spam techniques (e-mail), spam filter that automatically sends a reply with a challenge to the (alleged) sender of an incoming e-mail, e.g., using the RCPT TO command and then closing the session without actually sending a message, rather than using the VRFY command. It was originally designed in 1997 by Stan Weatherby, and was called Email Verification. In this reply, the purported sender is asked to perform some action to assure delivery of the original message, which would otherwise not be delivered. The action to perform typically takes relatively little effort to do once, but great effort to perform in large numbers. This effectively filters out spammers. Challenge–response systems only need to send challenges to unknown senders. Senders that have previously performed the challenging action, or who have previously been sent e-mail(s) to, would be automatically whitelisted. The challenge in challenge–response syste ...
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Anti-spam Techniques (e-mail)
Various anti-spam techniques are used to prevent email spam (unsolicited bulk email). No technique is a complete solution to the spam problem, and each has trade-offs between incorrectly rejecting legitimate email (false positives) as opposed to not rejecting all spam email (False positives and false negatives#False negative error, false negatives) – and the associated costs in time, effort, and cost of wrongfully obstructing good mail. Anti-spam techniques can be broken into four broad categories: those that require actions by individuals, those that can be automated by email administrators, those that can be automated by email senders and those employed by researchers and law enforcement officials. End-user techniques There are a number of techniques that individuals can use to restrict the availability of their email addresses, with the goal of reducing their chance of receiving spam. Discretion Sharing an email address only among a limited group of correspondents is one ...
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Digital Millennium Copyright Act
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a 1998 United States copyright law that implements two 1996 treaties of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It criminalizes production and dissemination of technology, devices, or services intended to circumvent measures that control access to copyrighted works (commonly known as digital rights management or DRM). It also criminalizes the act of circumventing an access control, whether or not there is actual infringement of copyright itself. In addition, the DMCA heightens the penalties for copyright infringement on the Internet. Passed on October 12, 1998, by a unanimous vote in the United States Senate and signed into law by President Bill Clinton on October 28, 1998, the DMCA amended Title 17 of the United States Code to extend the reach of copyright, while limiting the liability of the providers of online services for copyright infringement by their users. The DMCA's principal innovation in the field of copy ...
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Blacklist (computing)
In computing, a blacklist, disallowlist, blocklist, or denylist is a basic access control mechanism that allows through all elements (email addresses, users, passwords, URLs, IP addresses, domain names, file hashes, etc.), except those explicitly mentioned. Those items on the list are denied access. The opposite is a whitelist, allowlist, or passlist, in which only items on the list are let through whatever gate is being used. A greylist contains items that are temporarily blocked (or temporarily allowed) until an additional step is performed. Blacklists can be applied at various points in a security architecture, such as a host, web proxy, DNS servers, email server, firewall, directory servers or application authentication gateways. The type of element blocked is influenced by the access control location. DNS servers may be well-suited to block domain names, for example, but not URLs. A firewall is well-suited for blocking IP addresses, but less so for blocking maliciou ...
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Whitelist
A whitelist or allowlist is a list or register of entities that are being provided a particular privilege, service, mobility, access or recognition. Entities on the list will be accepted, approved and/or recognized. Whitelisting is the reverse of blacklisting, the practice of identifying entities that are denied, unrecognized, or ostracized. Email whitelists Spam filters often include the ability to "whitelist" certain sender IP addresses, email addresses or domain names to protect their email from being rejected or sent to a junk mail folder. These can be manually maintained by the user or system administrator - but can also refer to externally maintained whitelist services. Non-commercial whitelists Non-commercial whitelists are operated by various non-profit organizations, ISPs, and others interested in blocking spam. Rather than paying fees, the sender must pass a series of tests; for example, their email server must not be an open relay and have a static IP address. The o ...
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Domain Name System
The Domain Name System (DNS) is a hierarchical and distributed name service that provides a naming system for computers, services, and other resources on the Internet or other Internet Protocol (IP) networks. It associates various information with ''domain names'' (identification (information), identification String (computer science), strings) assigned to each of the associated entities. Most prominently, it translates readily memorized domain names to the numerical IP addresses needed for locating and identifying computer services and devices with the underlying network protocols. The Domain Name System has been an essential component of the functionality of the Internet since 1985. The Domain Name System delegates the responsibility of assigning domain names and mapping those names to Internet resources by designating authoritative name servers for each domain. Network administrators may delegate authority over subdomains of their allocated name space to other name servers. ...
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IP Address
An Internet Protocol address (IP address) is a numerical label such as that is assigned to a device connected to a computer network that uses the Internet Protocol for communication. IP addresses serve two main functions: network interface identification, and location addressing. Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) was the first standalone specification for the IP address, and has been in use since 1983. IPv4 addresses are defined as a 32-bit number, which became too small to provide enough addresses as the internet grew, leading to IPv4 address exhaustion over the 2010s. Its designated successor, IPv6, uses 128 bits for the IP address, giving it a larger address space. Although IPv6 deployment has been ongoing since the mid-2000s, both IPv4 and IPv6 are still used side-by-side . IP addresses are usually displayed in a human-readable notation, but systems may use them in various different computer number formats. CIDR notation can also be used to designate how much ...
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Domain Name
In the Internet, a domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority, or control. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as websites, email services, and more. Domain names are used in various networking contexts and for application-specific naming and addressing purposes. In general, a domain name identifies a network domain or an Internet Protocol (IP) resource, such as a personal computer used to access the Internet, or a server computer. Domain names are formed by the rules and procedures of the Domain Name System (DNS). Any name registered in the DNS is a domain name. Domain names are organized in subordinate levels ('' subdomains'') of the DNS root domain, which is nameless. The first-level set of domain names are the ''top-level domains'' (TLDs), including the ''generic top-level domains'' (gTLDs), such as the prominent domains com, info, net, edu, and org, and the ''country code t ...
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Envelope Sender
{{Redir, Return path, the term in electronics, Return path (electronics) A bounce address is an email address to which bounce messages are delivered. There are many variants of the name, none of them used universally, including return path, reverse path, envelope from, envelope sender, MAIL FROM, 5321-FROM, return address, From_, Errors-to, etc. It is not uncommon for a single document to use several of these names. All of these names refer to the email address provided with the MAIL FROM command during the SMTP session. Background information Ordinarily, the bounce address is not seen by email users and, without standardization of the name, it may cause confusion. If an email message is thought of as resembling a traditional paper letter in an envelope, then the "header fields", such as To:, From:, and Subject:, along with the body of the message are analogous to the letterhead and body of a letter - and are normally all presented and visible to the user. However, the envel ...
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Bounce Address Tag Validation
In computing, Bounce Address Tag Validation (BATV) is a method, defined in an Internet Draft, for determining whether the bounce address specified in an E-mail message is valid. It is designed to reject backscatter, that is, bounce messages to forged return addresses. Overview The basic idea is to send all e-mail with a return address that includes a timestamp and a cryptographic token that cannot be forged. Any e-mail that is returned as a bounce without a valid signature can then be rejected. E-mail that is being bounced back should have an empty (null) return address so that bounces are never created for a bounce and therefore preventing messages from bouncing back and forth forever. BATV replaces an envelope sender like mailbox@example.com with prvs=''tag-value''=mailbox@example.com, where prvs, called "Simple Private Signature", is just one of the possible tagging schemes; actually, the only one fully specified in the draft. The BATV draft gives a framework that other p ...
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Domain Name System-based Blackhole List
A Domain Name System blocklist, Domain Name System-based blackhole list, Domain Name System blacklist (DNSBL) or real-time blackhole list (RBL) is a service for operation of mail servers to perform a check via a Domain Name System (DNS) query whether a sending host's IP address is blacklisted for email spam. Most mail server software can be configured to check such lists, typically rejecting or flagging messages from such sites. A DNSBL is a software mechanism, rather than a specific list or policy. Dozens of DNSBLs exist. They use a wide array of criteria for listing and delisting addresses. These may include listing the addresses of zombie computers or other machines being used to send spam, Internet service providers (ISPs) who willingly host spammers, or those which have sent spam to a honeypot system. Since the creation of the first DNSBL in 1998, the operation and policies of these lists have frequently been controversial, both in Internet advocacy circles and occasional ...
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Email Spam
Email spam, also referred to as junk email, spam mail, or simply spam, refers to unsolicited messages sent in bulk via email. The term originates from a Spam (Monty Python), Monty Python sketch, where the name of a canned meat product, "Spam (food), Spam," is used repetitively, mirroring the intrusive nature of unwanted emails. Since the early 1990s, spam has grown significantly, with estimates suggesting that by 2014, it comprised around 90% of all global email traffic. Spam is primarily a financial burden for the recipient, who may be required to manage, filter, or delete these unwanted messages. Since the expense of spam is mostly borne by the recipient, it is effectively a form of "postage due" advertising, where the recipient bears the cost of unsolicited messages. This cost imposed on recipients, without compensation from the sender, makes spam an example of a "negative externality" (a side effect of an activity that affects others who are not involved in the decision). The ...
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Backscatter (e-mail)
Backscatter (also known as outscatter, misdirected bounces, blowback or collateral spam) is incorrectly automated bounce messages sent by mail servers, typically as a side effect of incoming spam. Recipients of such messages see them as a form of unsolicited bulk email or spam, because they were not solicited by the recipients. They are substantially similar to each other, and are delivered in bulk quantities. Systems that generate email backscatter may be listed on various email blacklists and may be in violation of internet service providers' terms of service. Backscatter occurs because worms and spam messages often forge their sender addresses. Instead of simply rejecting a spam message, a misconfigured mail server sends a bounce message to such a forged address. This normally happens when a mail server is configured to relay a message to an after-queue processing step, for example, an antivirus scan or spam check, which then fails, and at the time the antivirus scan or ...
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