Yet Another Spam Prevention Plan (This One Involves Money)
from the the-capitalist-voting-system dept
Well, at least we can say that there's no shortage of people and companies coming up with ideas to stop spam - even if very few of them seem likely to work. The latest is the plan from IronPort Systems to create a trusted mail service. It's an interesting concept. Any company sending out bulkmails could post a cash bond with a neutral party to "secure" their trustworthyness. If people receiving the emails felt they were spam, they could make a claim and collect some money. This way, legitimate bulk email companies wouldn't receive claims, and wouldn't lose money. But, any spammer who put up a bond would obviously end up losing money. Of course, no spammer would ever sign up for such a program... So, the next step would be setting up mail systems only to accept bulk email from companies that have put up a bond, thus blocking all spammers. Again, it's a different (and interesting) idea, but I'm sure spammers will figure out some way around it. Also, it would create quite a nuisance for legitimate emailers. There's also the question of how do you deal with frivolous claims from people who just want money.
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