Re: [Asrg] Adding a spam button to MUAs

Steve Atkins <steve@blighty.com> Fri, 05 February 2010 16:57 UTC

Return-Path: <steve@blighty.com>
X-Original-To: asrg@core3.amsl.com
Delivered-To: asrg@core3.amsl.com
Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by core3.amsl.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id 7B05F3A6F45 for <asrg@core3.amsl.com>; Fri, 5 Feb 2010 08:57:23 -0800 (PST)
X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at amsl.com
X-Spam-Flag: NO
X-Spam-Score: -6.443
X-Spam-Level:
X-Spam-Status: No, score=-6.443 tagged_above=-999 required=5 tests=[AWL=-0.000, BAYES_00=-2.599, RCVD_IN_DNSWL_MED=-4, SUBJECT_FUZZY_TION=0.156]
Received: from mail.ietf.org ([64.170.98.32]) by localhost (core3.amsl.com [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id 1YBXhLxm8Zq3 for <asrg@core3.amsl.com>; Fri, 5 Feb 2010 08:57:22 -0800 (PST)
Received: from m.wordtothewise.com (fruitbat.wordtothewise.com [208.187.80.135]) by core3.amsl.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id B61FD3A6F44 for <asrg@irtf.org>; Fri, 5 Feb 2010 08:57:22 -0800 (PST)
Received: from platterhard.wordtothewise.com (184.wordtothewise.com [208.187.80.184]) by m.wordtothewise.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id 7020A4F81DD for <asrg@irtf.org>; Fri, 5 Feb 2010 08:58:13 -0800 (PST)
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v1077)
From: Steve Atkins <steve@blighty.com>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.GSO.4.64.1002050659560.5587@nber6.nber.org>
Date: Fri, 05 Feb 2010 08:58:13 -0800
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
Message-Id: <190AE56F-D69E-437F-88D1-E1B373732F44@blighty.com>
References: <20100204232046.53178.qmail@simone.iecc.com> <4B6B5F78.3070607@nortel.com> <Pine.GSO.4.64.1002050659560.5587@nber6.nber.org>
To: Anti-Spam Research Group - IRTF <asrg@irtf.org>
X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.1077)
Subject: Re: [Asrg] Adding a spam button to MUAs
X-BeenThere: asrg@irtf.org
X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.9
Precedence: list
Reply-To: Anti-Spam Research Group - IRTF <asrg@irtf.org>
List-Id: Anti-Spam Research Group - IRTF <asrg.irtf.org>
List-Unsubscribe: <http://www.irtf.org/mailman/listinfo/asrg>, <mailto:asrg-request@irtf.org?subject=unsubscribe>
List-Archive: <http://www.irtf.org/mail-archive/web/asrg>
List-Post: <mailto:asrg@irtf.org>
List-Help: <mailto:asrg-request@irtf.org?subject=help>
List-Subscribe: <http://www.irtf.org/mailman/listinfo/asrg>, <mailto:asrg-request@irtf.org?subject=subscribe>
X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 05 Feb 2010 16:57:23 -0000

On Feb 5, 2010, at 4:09 AM, Daniel Feenberg wrote:

> 
> 
> On Thu, 4 Feb 2010, Chris Lewis wrote:
> 
>> John Levine wrote:
>>>> In any case it hardly matters because POP3 and IMAP are completely different
>>>> protocols with different constituencies. You'd never have a standards effort
>>>> that lumps them together in a million years, and even if you did you'd do
>>>> nothing more than needlessly confuse the programmers of their respective
>>>> code bases.
>>> Actually, we've seen a reasonable suggestion a few messages back that
>>> would work equally well with POP and IMAP: extract a reporting address
>>> from the message and send it an ARF report.  It has the admirable
>>> characteristic of being completely agnostic about how the mail is
>>> delivered, since there are plenty of delivery techniques other than
>>> POP and IMAP, such as WebDAV, uucp (still handy for intermittent
>>> connections), fetchmail, and just reading the local mailstore.
>> 
>> If we want to sidestep the issue of how to deal with senders wanting their FBLs, the very simplest method of all is to have the TiS button send an ARF to a specific address, and let that address figure out everything else.
>> 
>> I could live with that even in my odd-ball architecture (which probably resembles other very large infrastructures).  I already do that (without the ARF format), and the recipient address has to be manually configured in the MUA.
>> 
>> I'd only add that I'd prefer _not_ to have to have the user configure the MUA where to send the ARFs to.  The receiving mail server inserts it.  Meaning that the MUA has to be able to determine it's valid.
>> 
> 
> I haven't been following this thread very closely, but why not just establish a standard role account on the MUAs designated POP or IMAP server? Such as arf@pop.example.com? It effectively "preconfigures" the MUA since "arf" is standard and "example.com" is already known to the MUA. The less configuration the better, I think.

POP and IMAP servers don't receive email. If you're planning on mandating that all POP or IMAP servers listen on port 587, that's a fairly big requirement. 

Or are you suggesting something MXish or SRVish (which isn't implausible, though it's got the usual namespace pollution problems to dodge)?

Cheers,
  Steve