The fight against spam: Phe Anti

Source: SecurityLabs

Eran Reshef had an idea (thought it would be successful) in the fight against spam: Using spam to smash spam. But today, Eran officially released his weapon.

Reshef's company is located in Silicon Valley, named Blue Security. At first, Blue Security only urged spammer to stop sending spam to their customers.

Of course, these calls are always ignored. "Hot", Blue Security decided to fire the fight: bombing the spammer with requests from all 522,000 of its customers, at a time.

Flooded in a "rushing" data stream no less than DDoS attack, spammers no longer have the ability to email any other victim. Heavy losses, some well-known spammers had to "push" and accept a call to stop Ble Security's original spam.

When the spammer countered

But in early May, a spammer in Russia countered. Using thousands of computers that have hijack (zombie computers), this spammer has engulfed Blue Security in huge access data streams.

Users cannot access Bluesecurity.com and many other sites. The spammer left a message: Stopping the activity or Blue Security's customers will be the target of virus attacks.

Helpless and helpless, today, Reshef will wave white flags (of course virtual) and surrender. His company will close this morning, and BlueSecurity website will announce this to all customers.

Reshef's company is located in Silicon Valley, named Blue Security. At first, Blue Security only urged spammer to stop sending spam to their customers. Of course, these calls are always ignored. "Hot", Blue Security decided to fire the fight: bombing the spammer with requests from all 522,000 of its customers, at a time. Flooded in a "rushing" data stream no less than DDoS attack, spammers no longer have the ability to email any other victim. Heavy losses, some well-known spammers had to "push" and accept a call to stop Ble Security's original spam. But in early May, a spammer in Russia countered. Using thousands of computers that have hijack (zombie computers), this spammer has engulfed Blue Security in huge access data streams. Users cannot access Bluesecurity.com and many other sites. The spammer left a message: Stopping the activity or Blue Security's customers will be the target of virus attacks. Helpless and helpless, today, Reshef will wave white flags (of course virtual) and surrender. His company will close this morning, and BlueSecurity website will announce this to all customers.

" Withdrawal is the only thing we can do to prevent a large-scale website war from happening, " Reshef said sadly.

Step backward disappointed

Observers said the event marked a disappointing step back in the battle of users, businesses and security forces against spam. According to Symantec, more than 50% of all emails sent in the second half of 2005 are drug advertising, pornography and quick enrichment.

Alan Paller, research director of the SANS Institute, said the "brutal" and "punitive" attacks conducted by the spammer have exploded in the past few years.

In Blue Security's case, the attacker demanded that the company stop interfering with its "multi-million dollar" business. But this is just one of many "dealings" of this kind.

The Russian spammer counter attack created a huge amount of data to the extent that BlueSecurity not only hangs, it also affects many other sites like Six Apart. This site is running millions of sub sites through the TypePad and LiveJournal blog services.

In addition, the operation of Tucow, an ISP Cananda, to manage Blue Security's site, had to be suspended for 12 hours.

Forever is grasshopper stone car?

Tucow's chief executive called the attack "big never in the history of the company", and the number of companies that had the infrastructure to withstand such an attack could only be counted on the fingers.

Investors have commented on the Blue Security event as "not surprising but very sad". Blue Security's "Mr. Stickman" initiative has attracted a lot of attention from investors in 2004, when they received up to $ 4 million in capital.

But all it does, is once again proven: The spammers always win, and the tiny lead soldiers always fail miserably, no trumpet is not empty .

Thien Y