# I received an "illegal" SPAM e-mail



## STXJim (Apr 22, 2002)

I just received this e-mail:

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Subject: Satellite Cards
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To member: stxjim
From member: d*k*o*p
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Hi. I appreciate your interest in Cable Descramblers and cable eguipment.

If you are interested in a brand new DIGITAL CABLE DESCRAMBLER that decodes and receives ALL CHANNELS and is compatible with ALL "DIGITAL" and "ANALOG" CABLE SYSTEMS then please get back yo me.

Thats right. This Descrambler works with DIGITAL cable.

Let me know.

John
>
>
>
>
This email was sent by an eBay member via eBay's email forwarding system.
(then the rest of eBay disclaimer)
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I have never bought anything "cable" ralated from eBay so why did he choose my address?
When I saw the subject of this message I thought it was from someone here.
This is the first SPAM I have ever received asking me to buy something illegal.
I wonder why this guy would think that I would be interested in this? Especially since the only thing that I have bought off of eBay is motorcycle parts and DVDs.
:shrug:


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## Steve Mehs (Mar 21, 2002)

Report this guy to the Ebay administration, Ebay frowns upon illegal cable and satellite tv equiptment


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## James_F (Apr 23, 2002)

Yea, don't reply to him, or he'll know you have an active email address...


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## gopherscot (Mar 25, 2002)

I don't know how they got my name but I received a similar advertisement. I can't remember the details as I deleted right away.


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## MarkA (Mar 23, 2002)

Just random spam. Best you can do is block the address, and ignore it. As others have said, I can agree the last thing you want is for them to know they've reached a real email address and aren't wasting their bandwidth.


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## STXJim (Apr 22, 2002)

> _Originally posted by James_F _
> *Yea, don't reply to him, or he'll know you have an active email address... *


Whew...Thanks for the advice James:
I was just about to ask him for the specifications of this device and how much it cost.
Thanks man;
I almost made a mistake. :lol:


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## MarkA (Mar 23, 2002)

Jim, many people send emails back to spammers asking to be removed from their mailing list. I'm sure this is what James was talking about. The spammers use these emails to confirm they aren't wasting their time and bandwidth by sending to non-existant addresses.


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## James_F (Apr 23, 2002)

Nah, didn't want Jim to get that order before I did!


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## PeterB (Jul 25, 2002)

I get about 2-3 of those a week, if not cable TV stuff, but access cards as well..all becuase ive bid on old DTV recievers before..sheesh.


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## Mark Holtz (Mar 23, 2002)

Heh heh heh. I'm working on a new SPAM information page that says EXPLICITLY that following the removal instructions may result in even more SPAM.


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## DishDude1 (Apr 13, 2002)

speaking of spam, is there anyway to keep those annoying popup advertisements from coming up when you go to a website? To me that's worse than e-mail spam!


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## MarkA (Mar 23, 2002)

DishDude, either disable JavaScript, or get a "popup killer" program if you REALLY hate them.


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## James_F (Apr 23, 2002)

Or use Mozilla... 

The other good program to stop pop-up ads is the Google Toolbar... It has the ability to suppress the onload javascript function that most of the popup ads use, and its about the coolest browser add on ever...

http://www.google.com/options/toolbar.html


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## MarkA (Mar 23, 2002)

"Or use Mozilla... "

Nope, I use it. It supports JavaScript also - still get them.

"Google Toolbar" Won't work with Mozilla


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## James_F (Apr 23, 2002)

Go to preferences and select "Advanced". Then choose "Scripts and Windows" and uncheck the "open unrequested windows" option. Then you won't have popup windows anymore in Mozilla. This doesn't work with Netscape....


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## MarkA (Mar 23, 2002)

Thanks James, I hadn't even noticed that!

P.S. It's not called "Scripts and Windows", it's called "Scripts and Plugins". I hadn't even bothered to look there before! Thanks a million!


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## James_F (Apr 23, 2002)

I'm on a Macintosh right now... Thats what it says on the Mac... :shrug:


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## Karl Foster (Mar 23, 2002)

Back on the subject, when I receive e-mails like that (I have received a few over the past year), I immediately forward it to Directv and let them call or e-mail the individual back. 

Forward it to your local cable company's customer service. Even if you believe cable is evil, people aren't entitled to steal from them.


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## STXJim (Apr 22, 2002)

> Hi. I appreciate your interest in Cable Descramblers and cable eguipment.
> 
> If you are interested in a brand new DIGITAL CABLE DESCRAMBLER that decodes and receives ALL CHANNELS and is compatible with ALL "DIGITAL" and "ANALOG" CABLE SYSTEMS then please get back yo me.
> 
> ...


I just received this exact same SPAM again.
Word for word.
Except from a different eBay member and a different e-mail address.
:shrug:


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## mnassour (Apr 23, 2002)

Anyone who bids in on any item in the Cable/Satellite area is going to get one of these. It's probably the same scammer under several different account names.

Report *ALL* addresses to Ebay....death to these scammers!


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## ERSanders (Apr 24, 2002)

....or download "Pop-Up Stopper" from http://www.panicware.com/ . It is free and allows you to "miss" all of the pop-up unless you press the "control" key ...about once a week you want one of the pop-ups for your own.


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## ERSanders (Apr 24, 2002)

...while I'm at it you may want to also download "mailwasher" from www.mailwasher.net [New Zealand origin].

It lets you preview your mail and define "blacklists" including entire domains as well as "friends" [from which you continue to receive mail normally when you hit "Process"].

When you blacklist a Spam you can also choose to send a "bounce" message back to the site telling them, in essance, that your e-mail does not exist...they usually remove you from their mail list!


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## Mark Holtz (Mar 23, 2002)

If you are running a Unix mail server, you might want to consider SPAM Assassin to mark and delete e-mails.


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## Guest (Sep 8, 2002)

I just typed "cable descrambler" on ebay and came up with a ton of listings. Apparently, selling descramblers on ebay is legal.


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## MarkA (Mar 23, 2002)

That's probably because owning cable descramblers is perfectly legal provided you don't use them to steal service (as it should be). Digital media don't have the same rights (because of the DMCA)

-update-

To clarify, what I said above applies EXLUSIVELY TO COMPLETELY ANALOG SYSTEMS. Decoding, or decrypting digital cable or owning the equipment to do, or even figuring how to do so, or figuring out how to do something that could one day be developed further to possibly do so, or looking in the wrong direction, is illegal under the DMCA. (Of course, I don't think that's constitutional. What the DMCA does is punish people for crimes the government assumes they intend to commit in the future! Not a huge leap, IMHO, from the DMCA to DNA testing to determine if someone has a "violent gene" and put them in jail for murder before they do anything. Of course, I freely admit I don't trust the government or big business    )


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## JohnH (Apr 22, 2002)

My ISP has SPAMCop, so I do not know how much SPAM is actually sent to me, but I still receive 3 to pieces a day and I just delete them as replying to them would be self defeating. Most of the actual sender addresses are not trackable anyway and you sometimes would open a can of worms if you replied.

My ISP also has virus checking for all Email and they tell me when they have trashed an Email with a virus in it.


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