Re: Challenge-Response

"Now, I know that Challenge-Response is a major
component in Netwin's 
anti-spam toolbox"

It is? I've never used it. I use friends, but I don't have
the 
challenge/response turned on. I use: "Apply friends
list but don't block 
anything or request confirmation."
 I also have the option to "Add all outgoing email
addresses to list." 
turned on.

This means that I have a nice little white list after a
while. By 
setting the Aspam setting for 1+ that pretty stops
everything unless it 
is in the friends list.



Warren Michelsen wrote:
> At 7:34 PM -0500 4/21/08, Lyle Giese wrote:
>> Personally I absolutely detest the
Friends/Challenge system.  The 
>> biggest drawback is that users NEVER check to see
what was blocked. I 
>> have exactly three accounts here that have a
Friends/Challenge on 
>> them.  All the time, I am seeing the Challenge go
out and we get a 
>> challenge back.  And the other party never checks
their pending list 
>> and will never see our challenge.
>>
>
> <Opinion>
> "Friends" challenges are a rude, selfish
thing. It says, "I'm making 
> more work for you to save myself 
bother.</opinion>
>
> These challenges just add to the clutter that is email
these days. 
> While it may make things better for the challenger, it
does so at the 
> expense of others.
>
> Now, I know that Challenge-Response is a major
component in Netwin's 
> anti-spam toolbox and philosophy and that some on this
list embrace it 
> unreservedly, but I, as my server's admin, would prefer
 a way to turn 
> it off globally so that users are not offered the
ability to turn on 
> Challenge-Response at all.
>
> I have received challenges from mailing lists,
including this one, and 
> I have received a challenge in response to an off-list
message to a 
> poster who needed help. I never, ever, respond to these
challenges; I 
> don't want to encourage bad behavior. It used to be
that the rudeness 
> factor was my only objection but the
backscatter/clutter problem is 
> increasingly a concern.
>
>
>
>

At 9:03 PM -0400 4/23/08, Eric Vey sent email regarding Re:

[SurgeMail List] Challenge-Response:
>"Now, I know that Challenge-Response is a major
component in 
>Netwin's anti-spam toolbox"
>
>It is?

Yes, Netwin support has often encouraged its use.

>I've never used it. I use friends, but I don't have the

>challenge/response turned on. I use: "Apply friends
list but don't 
>block anything or request confirmation."

A great setting. I use it myself and encourage others to set
their 
Friends that way.



>I also have the option to "Add all outgoing email
addresses to 
>list." turned on.

I encourage that as well.


>
>This means that I have a nice little white list after a
while. By 
>setting the Aspam setting for 1+ that pretty stops
everything unless 
>it is in the friends list.

That's quite severe. I bet lots of legit email gets
rejected. Do you 
reject or Hold at +1?

At 9:03 PM -0400 4/23/08, Eric Vey sent email regarding Re:

[SurgeMail List] Challenge-Response:
>"Now, I know that Challenge-Response is a major
component in 
>Netwin's anti-spam toolbox"
>
>It is?

Further indication:

g_friends_only - Friends system

"An anti-spam feature which screens incoming mail to
ensure it comes 
from a human. For incoming mail from unknown addresses a
message is 
sent to this person requesting them to reply to confirm they
are 
human and the original message will be delivered. See this
page for 
more details."**

Syntax: g_friends_only bool

**
Clearly, "Friends" is intended as a
challenge-response system rather 
than simply a white list.

There are a lot of g_friends settings. I just came across
this:

g_friends_silent - Disable friends responses to users

"This setting is to simply disable the confirm emails,
not generally 
recommended as this makes friends a bit pointless."**

Syntax: g_friends_silent bool

Would setting this to True stop the sending of C/R
confirmation 
emails? Sounds like it does. If that's the case, SM already
has what 
I want (Friends w/o challenge-response) but this setting
probably 
does not remove the two 'Request confirmation' radio button
settings 
from users' Friends settings page.



**
That's what the help page says. Whomever at Netwin wrote
this is an 
obvious booster of challenge-response. I think the point of
Friends 
is as a white-list and that white-list is still very handy
(hardly 
'pointless') even without C/R.