public blacklists

[Jay Moore]

On Thu, 2004-12-09 at 20:35, Scot L. Harris wrote:

> > Ain't that the truth. When greylisting becomes sufficiently popular,
> > spammers are going to start using software that retries properly.

Maybe, but doing so will consume a chunk of their time*bandwidth
resource. Every re-try represents an opportunity they must forego. If it
takes 3 or 4 re-tries to deliver each message, that adds up to a lot of
wasted resources. 

Most MTAs re-try temporary failures 'automatically' (by default
configuration). Many spammers' MTAs are set up to try once, then move on
to the next target.

> Actually I am doubtful that the spammers will do anything differently. 
> They get paid to send millions of messages, as long as they say they
> pushed so many millions of messages they get paid.  The fact that most
> of those get blocked and dropped is not going to make much difference to
> them.  <<< snip >>>

Oh come on  :)  Do you really believe the sleazy Viagra and porn
peddlers who are funding the spamming machines pay these guys for
trying? If that were the case, there would be no incentive for them to
adapt and survive - and they have certainly done that.

Jay