[Spambayes] Offtopic - getting bounce messages for spam

[Tim Peters]

[Paul Moore]
> Sorry, this is offtopic, but I'm hoping that the concentration of spam
> experts on this group may be able to help me.
>
> I've just started receiving undeliverable message reports for spam,
> sent to people I've never heard of.

It's even more fun when real people write to you demanding to be taken off
your porn (whatever) list.

> It looks to me like someone is managing to impersonate me when they
> send spam out.

Stare at the headers:  it's usually a very shallow impersonation.  For
example, the Received headers are likely to point back to machines you've
never heard of -- or even countries.

> I'm fairly sure I'm not running an open relay (is there a way of
> checking for certain?),

Turn your machine off for a week and see if it stops <wink>.

> so I guess someone is spoofing headers or something. I've
> heard of this sort of thing before, but never experienced
> this myself.
>
> Two questions, really:
>
> a) Is this something I should worry about (am I likely to end up on
>    blacklists or the like)?

Not on a well-run blacklist.  This kind of spoofing is common.

> b) What can I do about it in any case?

Nothing that I know of, unless you want to pee away hours digging thru the
headers for clues.  By the time you find the perpetrators (if ever), they
will have moved on.

your-email-address-is-just-a-string-of-characters-ly y'rs  - tim