Spam Solution?

Is anyone aware of work being done on making email 'payable?'

Gates suggested it a few years ago - but the happy recipient of the funds would be Mr. Gates (surprise!)

The 'problem' with spam is, of course, that email is free so spammers can send out a gazillion on the odd chance ONE will buy something.

My thinking is that ISP's could be set up to charge for email - small amounts but enough that a 'gazillion' adds up to a significant cost. There would be an annual fee to cover administrative costs - 10,20,30 dollars - Euros - whatever.

Legitimate users would then get a refund annually or monthly on the per unit charge. What is 'legitimate' of course is 'dicey' - but surely tthere would be a way to filter out spammers. (Just the filters used to give 'refunds' would work wonders - also if spammers hacked around the payment system they would be convicted immediately of fraud when caught - now they often get away because of free speech irregularities)

Only ISP's with such a registration system would be allowed in - the 'free email' sites could set up to give the per unit email costs to charity from a list of possibilities (if any trustworthy and/or efficient charities exist anymore). Or some kind of charge and refund could be set up with credit card systems.

The per unit charges I am talking about would only mean some 30-50 dollareuros a year - but it would be enough to keep the abusers of totally free mail out.

But as I ask in the first sentence - maybe someone has this all worked out - or worked out to say why it won't work.

 

From that article it wouldn't seem it's going to be a viable solution - MS is again going to put proprietary characteristics which continue to promote MS

It would be another matter if some group like OSF really got behind something effective

But once again it will be open to hacks and work arounds.

Pure user filter systems are out there by the gazillion - I use Mailwasher, for example - but it still doesn't even come close to solving the problem.

I was away last week for 4 days - when I got back there were 586 emails - 42 of them were 'legitmate' - so went thru Mailwasher and checked if the blacklisted items were really bad (all ofhtem were save one) - and hit 'process mail' - but that should not be an every day routine!

And here I am only talking about that level of bother - there is the next level of viruses, hijackings, etc.

So I am just thinking the way to get at the problem is via the soft underbelly of 'free email' - and not let it be free - but a pay and refund system - with a small cost for administration. It would also solve the legal problem of prosecution because if the spammers hack the payment system they are criminals right off the bat.

 

Just as the canspam act had no real effectiveness in decreasing spam, likewise charging for sending email would not help either.
All it would do would increase the number of spyware and trojan applications placed on computers through drive by installs and social engineering. This is the result which the canspam act led to . When the government made a law allowing them to fine spammers, the smart spammers stopped sending spam using their own computers and accounts. Instead, they use social engineering (click here for free ****, get our free internet accellerator software, you have problems with your computer - click here to fix them automatically) and exploitation of unpatched holes in browsers etc to install software on unsuspecting victims computers. These then become "spambots" or Zombies. They open ports on the computer which allow the installed software to check for and download spam and mailing lists and send it out without the use of an ISP.
SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) does not require anything unique about the sending machine. It does not have to be an ISP mail server; you can set up an smtp server on your own machine. This is exactly what the spammers do. To add insult to injury, they can spoof the headers and make it appear to be coming from somewhere totally different; they can insert one harvested address as a sender and another as recipient just as most viruses do ; and even use simple IP whois software to spoof the header correctly.
So if your plan were implemented, the result would be that unsuspecting individuals would be presented with massive bills for outgoing emails which they have no knowledge of and probably did not even have anything to do with; and the spammers would be laughing all the way to the bank.

 

Thanks comprehensive answer

What's been missing from my 'knowledge' - was that one can send email without ISp's - 'private' or of the Yahoo ilk. Thanks!

I would still point out that I had not suggested 'payment' to be permanent (except some kind of nominal administrative fee) - rather the 'per unit' charges were to be refunded.

So it seems the only avenue really left is effective legislation with tough language - but clearly a political problem as well as international (though I dare say similar legislation in US, EU and Japan - could make operations difficult for the 'spammers')

 

robfwoods--There is a way to try to go after the spammers yourself
http://email.about.com/cs/spamgeneral/a/spam_headers.htm
but it will take plenty of time if you get lots of messages. I am not sure but that sometimes you only wind up telling the spammer you are a valid email target.

 

You might wish to take a gander at WGIG's Final Report. 'Tis interesting reading and, depending on how things progress, might eventually result in solutions to a number of problems.