Has anybody thought of using BOINC to fight spammers? I'm sure many e-people would love the idea of lending their PC's resources to visit spammers' web sites all at the same time to induce some type of an immense load, so they can stop loading us with their unsolicited junk.

Bluefrog from Blue Security has a similar concept and I'm using it but I'm not sure the number of users is large enough. BOINC would definitely make the difference in bringing the evil guys and their sites down to their knees.

So you think we (the users) should use the power/numbers in boinc to launch a DOS (denial of service) attack on someone? Would two wrongs make a right?

This is solely my thoughts and do not represent anyone or any organization.

From my point of view very much, indeed.
I return most junk snailmail business reply envelopes empty. We should do something similar with junk email. We don't need to entirely bring them down, but we need to find a way to increase the cost. Once their cost approaches the profits, they will cease the activity. Until then, we will have to withstand these parasites.

I was so excited when I heard about the Lycos' antispam screensaver, but it was stopped before it could touch any spammer. Why let them abuse us??? Hence my post - I think this would be an ideal media to fight the spammers.

And a bit childish answer for the end: yes, with proper operation involved, two negative numbers can produce a positive result.


I don't represent anybody either. I'm just an end user fed up with tons of unsolicited spam, willing to support creative ideas and to do something about it. By the way, I've been faithfully running Seti at Home for 7 years and I love the concept of distributed computing and contributing to the benefit of all humans (spammers and similar pests excluded).

So you think we (the users) should use the power/numbers in boinc to launch a DOS (denial of service) attack on someone? Would two wrongs make a right?

This is solely my thoughts and do not represent anyone or any organization.

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I don't like spam either, heck I know of noone who does. I'm surprised that more people haven't added their 2 cents here.

tony

Adding my empty aired hands here. I can't even spend two cents on it.
It's a bad idea. It'll put BOINC in a bad daylight.

If you want revenge against spammers, then use the options there are.
Not that it will help, but go ahead.

Besides, BOINC can at most upload&download 2 results per every 300 seconds. So fat chance you can use it for a DDoS attack. :)

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Would almost certainly be illegal in the UK. Someone was convicted recently for adding ..\\..\\ to the end of a URL because he wasn't sure whether he was at a real web site or a spoofed one.

Keep in mind that many 'spammers' systems are naive end users who don't know how to secure their systems properly. End user systems have been found involved in the entire process, from sending out the spam, being a DDOS relay, to hosting the fake bank websites...

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I return most junk snailmail business reply envelopes empty

Thats just plain silly why are they Empty??

Stuff a load of paper or even all the junk mail back into and send it off, the company are paying for it so make it as heavy as possible, more cost for them

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nice idea - few problems tho.
Consider that if the server the spammers are on is a shared server?
Also consider if the bandwidth to the hosting center is maxed out and there are non spammers located there?

There is a thing called lad vampire - try searching on google.

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"Keep in mind that many 'spammers' systems are naive end users who don't know how to secure their systems properly."

If your house, car, computer or cell phone is being used for any criminal activity without your knowledge, the police will for sure (at least temporarily) confiscate it. Ignorance is bliss; not an excuse.

"Keep in mind that many 'spammers' systems are naive end users who don't know how to secure their systems properly."

If your house, car, computer or cell phone is being used for any criminal activity without your knowledge, the police will for sure (at least temporarily) confiscate it. Ignorance is bliss; not an excuse.

First off who are you quoting?

I dont know which country you are in but confiscate a house?! any crininal activity - better not park illegally then...

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Bluefrog from Blue Security has a similar concept and I'm using it but I'm not sure the number of users is large enough. BOINC would definitely make the difference in bringing the evil guys and their sites down to their knees.

BlueFrog is now dead

Web attacks end anti-spam effort

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