Cool Mac Gear
• iPod Video
• iPod nano
• iPod 1G-2G
• iPod 3G
• iPod 4G
• iPod Mini
• PowerBook-iBook
• Garageband
|
|
By Applelinks Senior Editor John H. Farr
Either someone is going out of his or her way to make trouble, or as usual we overexposed Web writers find ourselves experiencing first-hand the latest spammer abuses. This one, however, could end up hurting a lot of people, but not the ones the perpetrators intend.
Basically, we now find ourselves signed up for everything under the sun: magazine subscriptions, newslists, porno pictures, you name it, none of which we ordered. In the process we have discovered how shockingly lax many legitimate business are about not requiring email or Web site confirmations for alleged subscribers. What we'd like to know, for example, is how a company like Meredith Publishing (Better Homes & Gardens) can allow people to order subscriptions online in this way, without any sort of double-check. And there are plenty of others.
At first we thought it was rightwing hoodlums at work, because we now find ourselves signed up for some really vicious neo-Nazi hate lists as well as Bush for President sites. But that can't be right --unless someone is covering the political spectrum to hide his or her tracks -- because we're also now apparently members of the UK Liberal Dems and Democrats of Australia, not to mention every sweepstakes and shopping discount site on the Web. A while back we received a series of threatening phone calls from a Coulter clone on crack who kept insinuating that something was about to happen to your editor's wife, so anything is possible. We've already cleaned the active email links from our Web sites. The next step is to change the address, if we have to.
This is hard to figure out, though. If no financial benefit is involved, then what, political harrassment? Whether the work of an individual or an organization, it's certainly actionable.If politically motivated, whoever's doing it is shooting themselves in the foot, however, because the domains in danger of being blocked as a result of our digital counter-offensive include some that a potential opponent wouldn't want shut down. Our overall sense is that this assault is ideologically-based, in which case it just may backfire.
The reason? So far all the left-of-center, liberal, or basically centrist news sites, political groups, and activist newslists have required an email confirmation before adding our name. The "other side's" databases just suck up the address, no questions asked, and this has so far been quite consistent. The Green Party isn't going to see its domain blocked, in other words, but quite a few others may.
|
|
Page: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5
Server Racks
Online: |
Cool Mac Gear
• iPod 1G-2G
• iPod 3G
• iPod 4G
• iPod Mini
• PowerBook-iBook
• Keyboard Skins
• Garageband