A few weeks ago, I noticed a new odious SPAM technique. I started receiving email with the real name of someone from my "friend" list at Facebook with little or no text in the email -- just a link -- sent from a spammy random yahoo email address. At first, I just ignored them. I have hundreds of friends at Facebook, very few of whom routinely send me mail. Then I got an email marked as coming from "Philip Brewer" with just a link. Phil and I use google chat frequently during the day to exchange links and, when one or the other isn't online, we sometimes send a link via email so that it doesn't get lost -- sometimes with little clarifying text being necessary, since its often just part of an on-going discussion. It turns out that on iPhone, the email client doesn't show you people's email addresses: just their name. So, one day, I actually clicked on one of these links. Big mistake. Evidently, the spammers now know which name "works" for me, because I now get email frequently with his name matched up with different yahoo spammy email addresses. For the moment, I've set up procmail to flag any email coming from yahoo.com with a [SPAM???] in the subject line, to warn me. In the long run, Yahoo should be shut down for running such an insecure mail service. And spammers should be consigned to the lowest circle of hell.
- Steven D. Brewer's blog
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