Re: Strange E-mails

[Matthew Gracie <graciem () CANISIUS EDU>]

Pete Hickey wrote:
> For many many years, I've received similar emails.  All the symptoms of spam
> but selling nothing and no attachments, either.
>
> I don't know.
>
> If testing the address, why not have a real payload (spam) anyway.  It doesn't
> cost any more.  Its content isn't really something to elicit a response either.
> Also testing the validity the address is most frequently (and successfully) done
> by including a unique URL which contains the email address as parameter.
>
> I've been receiving things like this from time to time for over 10 years
> now, and I don't have a satisfactory answer.

I don't know how credible it is, but I have read theories that the point
of these "plain, normal text" spam messages is to reduce the efficacy of
spam filtering technology. You get a bunch of messages that just say
"have a nice day", you mark them as spam, you start getting more false
positives from your filter because of the training effect, and
eventually the filter gets turned off.

--Matt

--
Matt Gracie                         (716) 888-8378
Information Security Administrator  graciem () canisius edu
Canisius College ITS                Buffalo, NY
http://www2.canisius.edu/~graciem/graciem_public_key.gpg