So ever since my ISP merged with another ISP, I've been recieving what I would consider "More than a reasonable amount" of spam.

 

Now, it's not really a big deal for me. I'm relatively computer literate. I know how to write my own email filtering rules. But for every person like me out there, there's another 400 or so who do NOT have those skills.

 

Now, I'm not going to go into a rant about computer illiterates. No, I have a far more annoying gripe to go on a tirade about. It's about ISP-level spam filtering, or the lack thereof.

 

So as I study my incomming spam, I immediately notice something...odd. EVERY SINGLE PIECE of spam has had it's subject line prefixed with [Bulk]. So clearly, my ISP can identify this as spam and block it, yet they clearly do not. Confused, I called up the tech centre, figuring maybe they had their filter set incorrectly. Well, I learned two things about my ISP today (actually 3, but I'll get to the third in a minute). First, they automatically assume that their customers know absolutely nothing about computers. I know this because the first thing out of not only the call centre's operators, but the engineers as well was "Well, spam filters can't possibly keep up with all of the spammers' tricks"

 

"Listen " I say, "I'm looking at the spam in question right now, and it has clearly been identified as spam, as evidenced by the big [Bulk] you tacked on to the mail's subject line.

 

The second thing I learned about my ISP is that their network engineers REALLY don't like being proven wrong. (I didn't actually learn that on this particular call. I actually learned it about 4 years ago, when I had to explain to their chief network administrator how to configure his backup equipment correctly so the company's customers would quit losing connectivity for 3 hours every night while the main equipment performed it's backup.) This tool tried everything from the aforementioned "spammers are smarter than us" crap to the old standby "I have a degree and you're just a useless eater. Now shut up and consume." nonsense. Finally, I managed to convince him to accept some forwarded spam that had eluded their "filter". So I forwarded him about a week's worth of spam.

 

All 7,381 of them.

 

This is where I learned the third item about my ISP. They are utterly humourless about their customers getting uppity. This little snot actually threatened to have my account suspended for mail bombing him!

 

Anyway, about 2 hours on hold and 5 minutes of actual talking later, I finally get hold of someone above this asshole in the food chain. The woman was very reasonable. She was deeply concerned about the disciplinary reccomendation on my account and wanted to know why I was mail bombinb my own ISP.

 

I said "Your chief network administrator asked me to forward any spam I had which might have evaded the spam filter, so I sent them all."

 

Since I still have an internet connection, I can only assume that the disciplinary action has been dropped. Also, I haven't recieved a single spam yet, but it's only been about 9 hours.

 

I really do wonder though...what happened to the snotty network admin...