Microsoft's anti-spam plan 'hijacked by zombies'

Spinner

Security experts have said that Microsoft's plan to reduce spam by forcing an email sender's machine to solve a puzzle may be defeated by the Internet's army of zombie PCs. Zombie PCs for the most part are essentially innocent home computers that have been infected by a virus or Trojan and as a result have become controlled by organised criminals.

Microsoft's chairman Bill Gates has been calling for the IT industry to work together and eradicate the spam problem. About six months ago he unveiled an initiative called Penny Black, which was a method for reducing a spammer's ability to send large volumes of unsolicited emails using Hotmail and MSN accounts. He suggested making the senders' computer process a complicated mathematical puzzle, which takes approximately 20 seconds, before each message is released. The puzzle's result is attached to the email's header, so that a receiving gateway can recognise emails that have been through the process and allow them to pass.
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Simon Perry, the vice president of security at Computer Associates, warned that if a consumer's machine was taken over by a Trojan that used Hotmail to send spam, it would cause serious problems.

Source: Zdnet

DanG

They should make systems process a single WU for Team SM before each message can be sent.

EyesOnly

DanG wrote:

They should make systems process a single WU for Team SM before each message can be sent.