26.11.2004 16:43 << Previous | Next >> Lycos users are to attack spammers In its campaign "Make Love, Not Spam", Lycos Europe is now sending a very special screen saver to its users. This program for Windows or MacOS constantly visits websites for which spam has been sent. "The more users download and use the screen saver, the lower the performance of the sites sending out the spam, and the greater the costs for the operators," Lycos explained. Apparently, the portal operator is banking on a large number of its European users - 20 million according to its own figures - to actually download the screen saver. If it is activated, it shows a map indicating where the web server currently being attacked is located. Various permanently displayed live data show how many users are currently taking part in the attack and whether the performance of the server under attack is suffering to the extent desired. Currently, Lycos is waging war against the notorious spammers blacklisted at Spamcop. According to Joerg Heidrich, a legal consultant at Heise Zeitschriften Verlag, Lycos' call on people to take matters into their own hands is questionable at best. The general consensus among lawyers is that an intentional DoS attack with the aim of taking servers out of commission constitutes a manipulation of data in accordance with Section 303a as well as computer sabotage in accordance with 303b of the German Penal Code. Heidrich did, however, doubt that these laws apply if the servers under attack are not shut down, but their performance merely inhibited, as intended in the Lycos project. Regardless of how the penal code will be interpreted in this case, Heidrich stated that Lycos is committing an encroachment of business operation according to Section 823 of the German Civil Code as well as malicious damage according to Section 826 of the German Civil Code. However, claims for damages based on the civil code would require the spammers to reveal their identity. (Craig Morris) / (anw/c't)
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Internet portal and mail-provider Lycos Europe has launched a program to increase spammers' bills by having thousands of voluntary users' computers repeatedly query websites from which spam originates. Such a tactic would increase the bandwidth costs for these websites. However, it also faces legal questions.

Spamming, the mass sending of unsolicited emails, is lucrative in part because each email can be sent for nearly insignificant costs. With such low costs, a commercial spammer needs only to have a very small number of recipients buy their product to make a profit. The goal of many anti-spam proposals has been to increase the cost of spammers sending messages. Lycos' approach is to make it more expensive to maintain servers that send spam.

Volunteers may download the screensaver from the  Lycos website for it. The program would run on a user's computer in the background and request about three megabytes (3MBs) of data every day. The screensaver shows which spam server is being targeted by the user, where the server is located, and how many others are attacking it at that moment. Target email servers are selected from blacklists from anti-spam organizations, with Lycos' own verification.

Legal issues arise over whether this can be interpreted as a denial of service attack. In such an attack, computers overwhelm a webserver with requests for data to the point where it does not have the resources to fulfill its normal function. Lycos, in explanatory material on the screensaver's dedicated website ( http://makelovenotspam.com ), claims that its technology closely monitors the screensavers' effects on targeted websites and prevents any of them from being completely shut down by information requests. 

Lycos Europe operates in Germany where, according to Joerg Heidrich of Heise Zeitschriften Verlag, less than completely shutting down a server is not clearly illegal under the penal code. It may, however, be actionable under the civil code. But Lycos may be betting that no one will file a suit, as that would require those participating in illegal spamming to reveal their identity.

The website no longer allows downloads of the screensaver, and users of the screensaver cannot connect to spam sites, but are instead given the message 'Stay Tuned'