[IP] Spammers Most Likely Users of Email Authentication
Begin forwarded message:
From: Randall <rvh40@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: July 12, 2005 6:27:31 PM EDT
To: Dave <dave@xxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Spammers Most Likely Users of Email Authentication
http://tinyurl.com/cnltn
Spammers Most Likely Users Of E-Mail Authentication
By Gregg KeizerMon Jul 11, 3:40 PM ET
On the eve of an industry summit to discuss how e-mail authentication
can stem the flood of spam, one security firm says that spammers are
already using the protocols -- to slip their junk mail past filters.
According to Denver-based message security vendor MX Logic, spammers are
continuing to adopt Sender ID and Sender Policy Framework (SPF), two of
the prominent e-mail authentication schemes that are actually intended
to stop spam.
MX Logic tracked a sampling of 17.7 million messages that passed through
its servers from June 19 through June 25, and found that of the 9
percent from domains with published SPF records, 84 percent was spam. Of
the even smaller number of messages from domains with published Sender
ID records (just 0.14 percent), 83 percent were spam.
"Spammers continue to leverage SPF and Sender ID with the intention of
making their messages appear more legitimate," said Scott Chasin, MX
Logic chief technology officer, in a statement.
All e-mail authentication schemes work in similar fashion -- by relying
on DNS records, either to obtain sending mail server addresses or public
keys for decrypting a digital signature -- and are designed to reduce or
prevent "spoofing," the spammer and phisher tactic of forging e-mail
From: addresses.
Microsoft recently reworked its free-of-charge, Web-based Hotmail
service so that all messages not using Sender ID are identified as such.
The Redmond, Wash.-based developer isn't, however, deleting non-Sender
ID mail or trashing it by placing it in a junk mail filter. Yet.
"As adoption of Sender ID and SPF records grows, and the lack of a
domain with an SPF record becomes the exception to the norm, we may
choose to investigate unauthenticated e-mail more closely before
deciding whether to deliver it to the users' inbox," said Craig Spiezle,
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2005/
jun05/06-22SenderID.mspx a director in Microsoft's safety group, when
the move was announced in late June.
MX Logic's Chasin saw a connection between spammers using SPF and Sender
ID and the Hotmail move. "[Spammers are trying to] avoid having their
messages delivered with an onscreen notification that a Sender ID record
was not found, a method Microsoft recently announced it will use on
Hotmail," he wrote.
That spammers have rushed to adopt sender authentication isn't the only
concern for the protocols. On Monday, the Message Anti-Abuse Working
Group, an industry group that includes AOL, Yahoo, Symantec, and
EarthLink, released a report detailing a six-month evaluation of SPF and
Sender ID. The report acknowledged problems with the protocols when
forwarding or re-sending mail, and noted that no authentication scheme
can guarantee a message really does come from who it says it came from.
"At best, SPF and Sender ID are comparable to a license plate issued by
a foreign country: they show that the vehicle is permitted to drive in
that country, but make no indication as to whether that country's
regulations are similar to yours, and we can only assume that the driver
inside is permitted to use that vehicle," the report concluded.
Also on Monday, Yahoo and Cisco submitted their combined authentication
standard, DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) to the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF) for consideration as a standard. The DKIM protocol,
which borrowed bits from both Yahoo's DomainKeys and Cisco's Internet
Identified Mail, was first announced in early June.
http://informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=163702984
It's expected that DKIM will be discussed at the IETF's Paris meeting
July 31 through August 5.
On Tuesday, a collection of e-mail analysts, providers, and users will
meet in New York for the Email Authentication Implementation Summit
2005, where Sender ID, SPF, DomainKeys, and DKIM will be put under the
microscope. Microsoft, for instance, will be presenting results of its
six-month use of Sender ID, while Bank of America will talk about
authentication in online banking.
In other e-mail and spam news, MX Logic said that in June zombies
accounted for a record 62 percent of all spam. In comparison, May's
tally was 55 percent, and April's 44 percent. "The continued
proliferation of zombie PCs has levied a heavy cost on ISPs and end
users," said Chasin. "Compromised PCs have resulted in millions of users
being unknowingly blacklisted, often through no fault of their own."
And the once-vaunted CAN-SPAM Act continues to be ignored by spammers,
said Chasin, who noted that just 4 percent of all unsolicited mail in
the first half of 2005 complied with the federal legislation. Since
CAN-SPAM went into effect in January, 2004, compliance has averaged
around 3 percent, with a high of 7 percent in December.
--
"We've got the hatemongers who literally hate this president, and that
is so wrong. . . . The people who hate George Bush hate him because he's
a follower of Jesus Christ, unashamedly says so and applies his faith in
his day-to-day operations." -- Rev. Jerry Falwell, on C-SPAN's
"Washington Journal"
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