On Friday, September 17, 2004, 11:53:07 AM, Patrik Nilsson wrote:
Chris Santerre wrote:
AS usual, I'm thinking different from everyone else :) I do NOT like the idea of more lists.
Neither do I. At least not more surbl-type lists that are served by surbl.org.
I'd prefer just one surbl.org-list, serving entries from a few sources all confirming to the strict "we do not want any FPs" philosophy of surbl. One manually checked list that can relatively safely be used to block/drop email, rather than just score email.
In principle all the lists except OB are hand-checked. In the case of SC, the checking is done by SpamCop submitters who can be a little inconsistent, which is why we add mechanisms to limit mistakes such as an inclusion threshold dependent on the number of reports.
In a practical sense there is one list which most people will use: multi.
I agree about working towards a list which is useful for dropping spams. Such a list needs to have very low FPs. Zero would be ideal, though that's arguably impossible.
Then I'd like to see a lot of surbl-type lists *not* served by surbl.org, that are provided based on different philosophies - more aggressive, accepting a higher degree of collateral damage, etc.
Just like we have with RBLs.
I agree that having a diversity of data sources is probably useful. Which is why I was glad to hear that the mailpolice lists could be used with SURBL code with some good results.
I want an SBL type surlb list, and I think surbl.org is the prime candidate for that.
But I also want a SPEWS type surbl list, and I don't think that it should or could be done/served by surbl.org.
Etc.
A very aggressive list could be useful for home users, but SURBLs will have the most impact if we get the data clean enough for large providers to use. It would be nice to stop spam before it ever reaches users, i.e. at the ISP level, but FPs get in the way of that. Therefore a list with lower FPs such as PJ is potentially quite useful.
Having more and more different surbl.org lists that we try to fit into the same basic philosophy of "no FPs" is just complicating things and confusing existing and potential users.
Patrik
Most SA users probably just use the default rules, so if we get PJ into the standard config file, there should not be much confusion. And we already have individual SUBRL lists like ws, sc, ob, ab.
Jeff C.