It has been quite an insane and busy week here. So I share with you what’s kept me going much of the week. Happy weekend. Next week I’ll have a multi-part series on confirming email addresses and some major companies trying to do the right thing with subscriptions, but failing. EDIT: Excuse any typos. Amelia has decided she doesn’t want to be a good cat and instead wants to walk...
Q3 Email intelligence report from Return Path
Return Path released their 3rd quarter email intelligence report this week. And the numbers aren’t looking that great for marketers. Complaints are a major problem for commercial mailers. In the data Return Path examined, commercial mail made up 18% of the total inbox volume. That same mail accounted for 70% of all email complaints. Additionally, 60% of the email sent to spamtraps was...
DKIM and Gmail
After they were a a little embarrassed by their own DKIM keys being poorly managed a few months ago, Google seem to have been going through their inbound DKIM handling and tightening up on their validation so that badly signed mail that really shouldn’t be treated as DKIM signed, won’t be treated as signed by Gmail. This is a good thing, especially as things like DMARC start to be...
Spammers are funny
Dear Spammer, If you are going to send me an email that claims it complies with the Federal CAN SPAM act of 2003, it would be helpful if the mail actually complies with CAN SPAM. In this case, however, you are sending to an address you’ve harvested off my website. The mail you are sending does not contain a physical postal email address. You’re also forging headers. Both of those...
Motion to dismiss in Penkava v. Yahoo case
Earlier this month Yahoo filed a motion to dismiss in the Penkava v. Yahoo. This is the class action lawsuit where an Alabama resident is attempting to sue Yahoo for violation of the California wiretapping law. Here’s the short synopsis. People send mail to Yahoo. Yahoo “creeps and peeps” on that mail so they can profit from it. Plaintiff doesn’t like this, and thinks that...
For the spammer that has everything
Sales are everywhere on Black Friday, even in the spammer underground.
HT: Brian Krebs
Thanks
It’s thanksgiving here in the US and most of us are off eating way to much food with family and friends. But that doesn’t mean I can’t take a few minutes to give thanks. I am thankful for reasonably effective spam filters. I am thankful for ESPs and ISPs who actually take action on complaints. I am thankful for the unsung folks who keep email useful. I am thankful for my readers...
Delivery emergencies and the holidays
There is a lot of contention between ISPs and senders at the best of times. As we move into the holiday season, retailers are increasing their email marketing, sometimes quite significantly. This causes more delivery issues as recipients and MTAs react to the increased volume. At many non retail companies, however, the pace of work slows down. There are distractions and office parties and people...
Collaboration key to fighting crime on the internet
The Pittsburg Post Gazette has a good article on the DNS Changer Working group and how it can serve as a model for future collaboration against cyber crime.
Yahoo changes
Thanks to tips by a couple blog readers and some clients, I have been looking into Yahoo disabling links in the bulk folder. It does appear Yahoo is no longer allowing users to click on links in emails that Yahoo places in the bulk folder. In fact, some of the spam in my Yahoo mailbox even has a notice about this. One of the interesting questions I’ve gotten about this is how it affects...