Loads of 'Undelivered mail return to sender' emails - assume Spam?, how to stop?

BlondeHeadOn

I have a spam filter with my ISP which usually works well, but for the last couple of weeks I have been getting lots (like about 50 a day) emails that are apparently returned as falied or undeliverable - but I haven't sent any messages to these addresses. Also they are using my .co.uk address, but with random letters for the first name - so e.g. 'abcxyz@xxxxx.co.uk'.

Most of these have links in which I am not opening! and I have been deleting them on my ISP server directly (I use BT Internet so I can do this), rather then downloading them to Outlook which I do with all the okay emails.

Is there something else I should be doing though, and can I stop these?

NB I have also had a rash of the porno-type emails of the 'big juicy xxxx' variety, which seems to have happened at the same time - these are more likely to be identified as spam by my ISP though.

Any help gratefully accepted....

MrsTinks

Well it sounds like somehow that address ended up on a spam list... Just out of interest is the address xyz@domainname.co.uk? (ie do you own a domain or is this a main line isp like BTopenworld.co.uk?) On my websites I find that the amount of Spam really depends on the popularity of the website and I get spam for bob@xxxxx.com (there is no account set up for a bob but all unknown addresses end up in my admin folder).

If this account is a standard account with say BT and it's only the "intended recipient" that is random then the possibilities are that you have a virus that is sending out spam OR someone else has your address in their address book and the virus has harvested it to use a the send address. This is very common and is to prevent the virus being detected easily and tracked and therefor shut down.

The only thing you can do is scan your machien with an online virus scan to check it isn't you, and if you're clean then there is not much you can do to stop the return mails. You COULD contact your ISP and ask them to try to track the mails (it is possible) to see where they originate from

Hope it helps

BlondeHeadOn

Hi, and thanks for the reply. I own a domain and a website, and the emails are to that domain name (i.e. xyz@domainname.co.uk) not to the ISP address (which is an xxx@btinternet.com one). I run McAffee virus suite on my main PC, and have no reported viruses, also the emails happen whether or not I have my PC attached to the internet, so I think the source is not my PC.

Because of that I think your suggestion that "someone else has your address in their address book and the virus has harvested it to use as the send address" is more likely (?) - which I hope is true as this is much less worrying than if my own PC has a virus!

I thought that the 'Undeliverable email' message might be quite a sneaky way of trying to spread a virus, as people are more likely to open these emails to find out what hasn't been delivered .. and then there is a URL to click on.... which I never have!

Ho hum, I suppose I will just have to keep deleting the emails and marking them as spam....

Many thanks for your response.

:T

MrsTinks

Yep if they are a domain address then to be honest there is little you can do Depending on what facilities yoru hosts provide you might be able to tweak the spam filters to stop more of the spam.

If it's the domain mail then chances are you will get TONNES of spam... main reason is because they target these as no matter what name they send it to then 99.9% forward all incorrectly addressed mails to that domain to the admin account. If you are sure you only get mail to a certain address you could check with the hosts if they could stop mails defaulting to the admin account and instead return it to sender as "unknown" Worth asking

cwoodham

BlondeHeadOn, I'm in exactly the same boat as yourself. I have my own domain for my business but about a year ago started getting spam emails supposedly coming from my own domain! Like [EMAIL="hlirg@xxxxx.com"]hlirg@xxxxx.com[/EMAIL]. I asked what I could do about it on this forum and the suggestion was that the email address had been harvested by spammers. The spammers use my domain name in the 'From' field of their spam so that if anyone bounces the email it comes back to me.

Someone here suggested trying cloaking my email address on the website (giving it a special code so that the spammers wouldn't see it in the website and wouldnt be able to harvest it). I did that but it was too late.

Now I am getting about 50 emails a day from people who think they are bouncing the spam (supposedly from me) back to the sender but because the spammers have forged my domain address in the 'From' field it all comes back to me not the spammer.

I read somewhere that they will use this forged domain name for a while and then move on to someone else. I hope their right. I have been getting about 50 a day like yourself for about 3 weeks now.

It just goes to show the futility of bouncing spam. It doesn't go back to the real sender.

I use MailWasher to intercept all the junk on the server, but I really wish there was a real solution to all this. Maybe some day.

billy_the_kid_2

Same here, although my mail is coming from hdfehf@myname.freeserve.co.uk so not a domain name. I have checked my system for viruses and malware but found none. Most of the messages are for Stocks in C**p companies.

Is now driving me up the wall. Spam filter gets about 75% of them, leaving me with about 50 or so every couple of days in my inbox.

onzey

I have the same problem with my freeserve email address. I've emailed freeserve (wannado) but they say there is nothing they can do about it. Why can't they filter everything that is not addressed to my full email address. I think all the rubbish is using my username, the bit after the @, but with something else in front of the @.

I use outlook express but can't see a way to do this in the message rules bit. Anyone know if it would it be possible with a different email program?

MrsTinks

Use a spam program (i'm sure there are free ones out there) they will basically mark the unwanted mails as Spam and then you can set up a rule in outlook to put anything with "Spam" in the title to the deleted folder

BlondeHeadOn

Thanks everyone for your replies, it is at least nice to know that I am not alone!

I do have a spam filter already, and am trying to train it to identify all the variations of 'undeliverable mail' 'Returned mail' etc.

I never had any problems before I had a website, what price progress eh?
Ho hum.....

:T :T :T :T :T :T :T :T
(No Thanks button, so Smilies instead)

onzey

I have been in email contact again with Wanadoo and I suggested that (I thought) it just required a simple piece of programming to filter out every email using my username (the bit after the @) in the email address, if it did not have the correct bit in front of the @ (I only use one unique email address with my username).

The reply I (eventually) got was as follows (in " "):


"There is no way to filter them out because emails are filtered, sent and
received by everything after the @sign on the email address.

What you are suggesting is not a simple piece of programming, as the
world's email traffic system would have to be completely scrapped and
rebuilt.

This would cause too much disruption and cost to ever be implemented."




Is this really true? Is it impossible for ISPs to apply any email filters at their end which are based on anything in front of the @ in an email address?

amcluesent

>Is this really true? <

I have my domain registered with NSDesign; domains have a web-based control-panel for e-mail forwarding where you can define exactly what happens to every mail address.

It's been easy to set-up incoming mails to "myname@mydomain.co.uk", "enquiries@mydomain.co.uk" etc. to be forwarded, leaving a default to catch "spamgibberish@mydomain.co.uk" to be deleted without forwarding.

Yes, it's possible that someone may misspell a pucka address, in which case I'd never see their e-mail, but that's better than all the spam!