Forum Moderators: phranque
I know there were a few problems with the php mail form that nobody seemed to be able to fix but how can they shut the site down?
When I go there I get the hosting splash page. Can they really do this or is my hosting company feeding me B.S.?
Remove the PHP mail form and either ask the hosting company if they will let you back, or get a new host.
I threatened to pull all my sites off their server unless they turned these three back on ..... they're back on.
The php form script has been disabled for now while I look for an alternative.
Do these "Spamcop" people have the power to shutdown a server? Or was my hosting company feeding me crap?
I will be seeking alternative hosting anyway, I just hate the way these #@$#@$# have the power to pull down your sites whenever they please.
Do these "Spamcop" people have the power to shutdown a server?
They have the same power (I'd call it freedom) that any one does: to report a source of spam to the responsible ISP.
If they did that -- and were correct in identifying the source -- then an ISP's natural response will be to shut down the offending website. Any other action may be seen as illegally aiding the distribution of spam.
And the site was almost certainly (assuming it was a source of spam) breaking the ISP's terms of service. If spamcop hadn't told them, someone would eventually.
Once the problem is fixed, and the ISP is confident that you website was spamming (assuming it was) due to insufficient security rather than commercial gain, and that you now have sufficient security, they may turn you back on. That's their choice.
Feel lucky you are not being sued or prosecuted by the people you site spammed (still assuming it did, of course).
Just curious: what kind of mail form was it?
Just a basic php script to send the contents of a form via email. There was a thread a while back which a few of us contrbuted to after having these forms used by spambots to distribute their stuff.
Nobody could find a solution. I am now using a massive script to do the same simple task as these spammers managed to takeoever my old one.
[edited by: physics at 11:25 pm (utc) on Dec. 13, 2005]
[edit reason] Language [/edit]
So whose responsibility would that fall under if I didnt have a maintenance contract with the owner of the website? The host, ISP or site owner?
As far as responsibility, since he was the one that made the script, it was his responsibility. I found some articles on how people were exploiting and how to fix it. He changed it and everyone was happy.
The hosting company has to protect itself. If their email IP ended up blacklisted, it would cause a lot of problems for them
-Corey
So whose responsibility would that fall under if I didnt have a maintenance contract with the owner of the website? The host, ISP or site owner?
These Spamcop people put all their effort into tracing the originating server or ISP but do nothing about tracking down the actual spammer
This is because most of them use compromised resources to do their dirty work, trying to "track them down" is often an endless loop of hacked servers. It's not their fault the developers using their servers put faulty programs on them.
As for responsibility - being a programmer myself (of sorts,) my ethics are that if I installed it, it's my responsibility, even if I didn't write the thing. If you install a script that has security flaws, this was your doing, no one else's, and very likely the client trusted you to know what you're doing. Claiming ignorance holds no weight, either not knowing about the holes in that free script you installed or not knowing enough to write a good one - it's the same deal as if your mechanic's apprentice installs brakes that fail and someone loses a life.
I often go back and fix up things I did a year ago that expose the clients to security flaws. It's not required, there's no legal ramifications, and most developers **won't** do this, but IMHO it's the right thing to do.
This is an extension of the larger picture of what's wrong with the world, everyone looks for someone to blame when the fault usually lies closer to home if we just look for it.
This is because most of them use compromised resources to do their dirty work, trying to "track them down" is often an endless loop of hacked servers.
If the machine is hacked, it is only right that the ISP takes action. Yes, its painful for those affected, but if it is not, the situation would have been worse.
I got tired of it with my site, constantly the bs about this rule and that, but it wasn't so much that I was breaking a rule per se, it's that I felt I was always being fed some baloney instead of the plain truth. It is one thing to know what I have done wrong so I can fix it, it is quite another to be shut down when I'm paying the bills.
Before you get too excited about getting a dedi, keep in mind it takes 60-90 days to get it all setup and running good, thou you can have sites live on it really within hours, it does involve a learning curve which, once over the top of the hill, the usual issues with hosting haven't bothered me since.
just a thought... my dedi runs me 89 / month, I could host 5 or 10, maybe 20 or 30 sites on it easy... But all I ever wanted was to do my thing without someone having their nose up my business, just one site is enough for me, peace and quiet.
Today, I have that.
but if someone were to follow the money trail they could get to the bottom of a lot of it.
There are groups out there who put a lot of effort keeping track of the spammers and getting the ISPs to shut them down. People running vulnerable scripts really doesn't help.
I got tired of it with my site, constantly the bs about this rule and that, but it wasn't so much that I was breaking a rule per se, it's that I felt I was always being fed some baloney instead of the plain truth.
This is what I was mostly annoyed about, if these spamcop people are genuinely stopping spam then fairplay to them.
If my host is feeding me BS then thats another story. I have actually been transfering a few of my sites away from them and over to a dedi, but yes, its a lot of work.
Do these "Spamcop" people have the power to shutdown a server?
Only if you have a naive host.
Accusations of "spam" are increasingly being used for furthering commercial interests among competitors and to service personal grudges.
Matt
What happened to us is that one of OUR own staff uses Spamcop as a service, and the Spam he reported was accredited to OUR server! So our own employee, by simply reporting Spam to Spamcop, managed to get our own mailserver onto their blacklist three times in a row! Ultimately we had to threaten with legal action to have the problem resolved in the end. The best we got in terms of a "We're sorry" was that they admitted that it was entirely their fault.
