RE: spam support

I would like to clarify this as regards Level 3's position on spam. The
company AUP (available on our web site) does not permit any customer to
distribute spam through their Level 3 services. Any cases reported to us,
such as that below, are investigated and the AUP is enforced if necessary.

The specific issue mentioned is still under investigation. While I do not
want to go into detail on this particular case I will clearly state it is
naive to assume asking to be removed from a list does not carry the risk of
opening that address up to mailbombing however in this instance we had
reassurance this would not happen. 

I would be extremely interested to hear if anyone else has had cause to
investigate this organisation at emaillistclub.com.

I will also state I have received an apology from CactuSoft for sending this
communication without the situation coming to any final solution. 


Regards

Caroline

Caroline Skene
Internet Services Manager
Level (3) Communications
+44 (0)20 7954 2908

-----Original Message-----
From: paul@localhost [
	    
	    
]
Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2002 12:04 PM
Cc: Skene, Caroline
Subject: spam support


We recently became aware of a spam support service here thanks to a posting
in a newsgroup:

www.emaillistclub.com

The guy is based in Portsmouth, England and basically trawls the web
compiling lists of email addresses, then selling them (with spamming
software of course) to those guys who live in trailers in Florida and send
the $5 to 5 people scam, etc.

This site was hosted by Claranet in the UK, but they closed it down within a
couple of days after being notified. It then moved to a company downstream
of Level3.com. The actual hosting company is called VideoNext.com and they
have not closed the site despite frequent messages we have sent to Level3
and VideoNext. The site is in breach of Virginia law, which is where the
site is hosted.

We eventually contacted the Internet Services Manager in the UK who said the
following:

>I have contacted the organisation which run the actual web site for
>emaillistclub.com directly. I have been assured you can remove your email
>address from their list by following the instructions on their web site. It
>will take 24 hours to filter through. This will only stop spam directed
>through their list and not spam from any other source. I suggest you remove
>your address from their list and see what happens to the number of spam
mail
>you receive. As I stated I believe it it far more effective to target the
>direct source, if known, of any spam issue.

>Let me know what happens with mail volumes tomorrow.

>Regards

>Caroline

>Caroline Skene
>Internet Services Manager
>Level (3) Communications
>+44 (0)20 7954 2908
>
	    
	    


So there you have it. Level3 is quite happy for this guy to sell illegal
spamware on their network, in breach of their own AUP and Virginia state
law. Not a compliance officer in sight. It's up to us to ask spammers to
remove us.

Perhaps some of you folks might want to contact Caroline Skene to explain
what spam is. I don't think she has a clue. I'm sure she'd be happy if you
forwarded all those 'send $5 to these 5 people' emails you receive to her.
After all, she can always ask to 'be removed'.

It might also be worth blocking Level3 IPs. Maybe they will change their
mind about hosting these kinds of people if it starts to inconvenience them.