"Secure Resolutions" Sends Spam

Update June 19: VerticalResponse has confirmed that Secure Resolutions's account is now closed and banned. Well done, guys.

Yesterday, I got email from some company called Secure Resolutions.

We are contacting you because you are currently a customer or you have been a customer and we would like to continue to be your supplier of anti-malware and backup protection. I would like to take this opportunity to introduce you to our award winning, patented technology...

etc., etc., etc.

Trouble is, I've never heard of them, and the role account they sent it to is incapable of being a "customer" of anyone. Yes, friends: ergo, this email was spam.

(Incidentally, there seems to be some connection between this company and Panda Security, who I've also caught spamming.)

The company uses VerticalResponse to send this spam, so I shot a note to their abuse alias and got an encouraging note back from their Email Delivery & Policy Enforcement team. VR says it has "completely disabled" the Secure Resolution's account and "opened an investigation."

Watch this space for updates.

Anyone else had problems with this sender?

Scott Richter Settles Another Spam Suit

Oh looky, it's our "friends" Steve and Scott Richter in the news again. This time, they've settled with MySpace for $6 million after being accused of spamming thousands of MySpace.com users -- and using phished accounts to do it (see today's IT Blogwatch for more).

Of course, Scott gave up spamming some time ago. Or did he? Brian Krebs today offers an interesting investigation into domain registrations of spamvertised Web sites:

More than three quarters of all Web sites advertised through spam are clustered at just 10 domain name registrars ... Out of the 15,000 spam-advertised domains we examined, nearly half -- 7,142 names -- were registered through a Broomfield, Colo. company called Dynamic Dolphin ... the seventh most-popular registrar among spammers ... [and] owned by a company called CPA Empire, which in turn is owned by Media Breakaway LLC. The CEO of Media Breakaway is none other than Scott Richter, the once self-avowed "Spam King" who claims to have quit the business. Anti-spam groups also have recently implicated Media Breakaway in the alleged hijacking of more than 65,000 Internet addresses for use in sending e-mail and hosting commercial Web sites.

Remember kids, Rule #1: Spammers lie.

The Top 25 B-to-Z List Blogs

My piece at the "new" Industry Standard is finally up, with additional additions from Ian Lamont.

"These are the blogs you won't see on the Techmeme Leaderboard, Technorati's Top 100 blogs, or the CruchBase BloggerBoard ... at least not yet. They include VCs, entrepreneurs, coders, experts, and observers, and they bring a delicious mix of insight, experience, and passion to their blogs. While they may not have the right amount of link love, they need to be on your radar screens."

Hello, BlackBerry Bold and its Sexy New UI

Wow, from the look of this video, Research in Motion has really done a great job of sprucing up its user interface. Looks speedy, too.

I've always been a PalmOS fanboi (I know, I know) and have gone through a succession of devices: original Pilot, Palm V, Treo 180, 270, 600, 650 -- but this could be the device that finally weans me off of PalmOS.



Disclosure: RIM is a client.

More of this nonsense in today's IT Blogwatch.

Hat tip: Kevin Michaluk.

Lost in Translation? Bill Gates in Korea...

Something very wrong here...

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates said there will be a vast shift in Internet technology over the next decade as he met Tuesday with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak.

"We're approaching the second decade of (the) digital age," the software mogul and philanthropist told Lee at the start of their meeting at the presidential Blue House, according to a media pool report.

"The Internet has been operating now for 10 years," Gates said. "The second 10 years will be very different."

Excuse me? “The Internet has been operating now for 10 years”???

Uhh, tell that to the National Science Foundation, who switched on the Internet as we know it today in 1983, migrating from the old ARPANET, which had been going since 1969.

He can’t possibly mean the Web, as that’s been going for over 15 years. He can’t even mean Internet Explorer — the first version of which was released in 1994.

Bizarre.

Your Reputation in Peril: Use Outbound Spam Filtering

Whether or not you or I believe Borderware's amazing claim that it filters 98% of spam using reputation alone, it's clear that reputation is increasingly important.

No surprise there, but what's the implication on legitimate email users?

As more and more spam filtering relies on your reputation as an email sender, your reputation gets more and more important. Lest we forget, most spam is sent by malware-infected zombies, some of which could be on your network.

That's why outbound spam filtering is increasingly important. It's not just about being a good 'net citizen -- you need it to protect your reputation.

If you don't keep a lid on spam exiting your network, your reputation will be trashed. In crude terms, your outbound IP addresses will be blacklisted, meaning your ability to send email to your legitimate business contacts will be severely limited.

If a few of your users are unwittingly sending spam, then all of your users will have serious trouble sending legitimate email.

Of course, an outbound spam filter can't, by definition, use sender reputation. It has to rely primarily on content filtering. Those that claim that reputation is the be-all-and-end-all of spam filtering are missing an important point.

With thanks to Proofpoint's Andrew Lochart and David Stanley, for a stimulating conversation last week.

The Media is Bored with Spam?

I moderated a Ferris Research webinar earlier this week. It was intended to be a press-only event, to support a client's press release. Inevitably with these things, a few non-press register, but that's perfectly OK.

The client is a new spam filter vendor, that seems to have an interesting new twist on the problem (I'm reasonably convinced that it's not just a silly FUSSP).

The thing that really surprised me was how few press people turned up. In fact, non-press outnumbered the press folks two-to-one. What's up with that?

I also heard from the client's PR person (hi, Donna) that nobody has anything spam-related on their editorial calendars.

Doesn't the mainstream media care about spam any more? Certainly their readers do, as evidenced by the continuing churn in the spam filtering marketplace.

Any thoughts? Click the comments link below: I'm all ears.