Spam and the UDP

[Steve Hoffman]

Anti-Spam Group Threatens to Block ISP

Matt Richtel
NY Times 2/21/98


PALO ALTO, Calif. - One of the world's leading Internet companies
said on Friday that it expects to win a last-minute reprieve from the
ultimate sanction - the "death penalty." 

The company, Netcom Online Communication Inc., has been threatened
with the punishment after becoming the origin for mountains of spam
aimed at Usenet, the Internet's network of discussion and news
groups. On some days over the past several months, as much as 90
percent of the tens of thousands of news postings originating from
Netcom were unsolicited bulk advertisements, most of them
pornographic. 

That was the measurement by Usenet's volunteer anti-spam patrol,
which guards Usenet's 40,000 groups against unsolicited bulk
advertisements. So late last week, the vigilantes threatened Netcom
with the dreaded Usenet Death Penalty (UDP), which effectively would
mean that none of Netcom's 600,000 members would be able to post
messages to Usenet news groups. 

The anti-spammers gave Netcom until Monday to clean out the
spammers, but the San Jose-based service said it met its obligation
by Friday. The anti-spammers agreed Netcom had made "major changes"
but said they would not revoke the threat of death penalty before
Monday. 

"Their numbers are down dramatically - a measure of magnitude or
more," said Rick Buchanan, an anti-spam volunteer. He added that the
death penalty likely will not be enforced. "My guess is it's not
going to happen."

This is not the first time the anti-spam vigilantes have threatened
a major Internet company with the UDP. Last year, the group imposed a
death penalty against CompuServe and UUNET, but lifted the penalties
in less than 48 hours in both cases. In the Netcom case, unlike the
previous cases, anti-spammers gave the company a five-day notice for
the death penalty.. 

As to Netcom, Gene Shimshock, company marketing vice president,
acknowledged that the problem with Usenet spammers has been "huge."
But he added that Netcom has been working hard to shut the spammers
down, and has been at fault for not communicating its efforts to
anti-spam forces. 

Shimshock said the problem is complicated because Netcom doesn't
monitor or censor the e-mail messages or news posts of its
subscribers. At the same time, he said, the Netcom requires its
members to respect the customs of Usenet, which does not allow
spamming. 

It's okay for someone to "write the most foul, repulsive piece and
put that on any Usenet group, but the behavior of posting one piece
to thousands of sites indiscriminately is not appropriate,"
Shimshock said. "The ISP position is in a tough position." 

Still, other Internet companies face similar balancing acts and few
have had the same spamming problems. In the past several months,
Netcom has consistently been among the sources of the most spam
coming onto the Internet. On Valentines Day, for example, 69,654
news postings from Netcom - 86 percent of all Netcom postings that
day to Usenet - constituted spam, according to an automated program
run by the anti-spam forces. 

Copyright 1998 The New York Times Company
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