Usenet server i2pn2 carries comp.lang.c without the Thai SPAM, but with
normal GG articles. You can check via anonymous read-only access at
news.i2pn2.org:119 , but you must registed to post:

https://www.i2pn2.org/?page_id=9

[Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]

Usenet server i2pn2 carries comp.lang.c without the Thai SPAM, but with
normal GG articles. You can check via anonymous read-only access at
news.i2pn2.org:119 , but you must registed to post:

https://www.i2pn2.org/?page_id=9

[Registration is free, of course, like E.-S. & others.]

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Anton Shepelev <anton.txt@gmail.moc> writes:

> [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]

Next repetitions please to alt.dev.null ... thanks.

Less ads, more C please.

--
|rom The Future. +++ Breaking News From The Future. +++ Breaking News F|
| The USoA are switching to the binary number system because |
| having more than 1+1 distinct digits is far too woke. |
|+ #MABA + #makeAmericaBinaryAgain + #USA + #USoA + #woke + #MABA + #ma|

[comp.lang.c retained]

yeti:

> Less ads, more C please.

This is not an ad, I am not in any way affiliated with that
server. I do not even use it myself (so far least), but have
taken the trouble to test it in read-only anonymous mode.
Whereas the majority of posters in this NG seem to be
affected by the SPAM, I thought that using a server that
does a good job of filtering it out is a genuinely useful
advice, the server-side filtering mechanism beging, of
course, much more powerful than the kill-file. And my
client (Sylpheed) does not support a kill-file at all,
algthough I have submitted a feature request that it be
added. I prefer Sylpheed because it is a light, beatuful,
and cross-platform combined e-mail & Usenet client.

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On 2023-10-08, Anton Shepelev wrote:
> [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]

.... or just set your killfile properly?

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|O|O|O| PGP: DDAB 23FB 19FA 7D85 1CC1 E067 6D65 70E5 4CE7 2860

On 08/10/2023 21:02, Dan Purgert wrote:
> On 2023-10-08, Anton Shepelev wrote:
>> [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]
>
> ... or just set your killfile properly?
>
>

What filters did you use to deal with 2400 spam posts a day?

This is something that needs to be dealt with at source not with
individual kill files. Which in the case of Thunderbird, had no way of
dealing with all those shape-shifting posts in exotic alphabets.

On 2023-10-08, Bart wrote:
> On 08/10/2023 21:02, Dan Purgert wrote:
>> On 2023-10-08, Anton Shepelev wrote:
>>> [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]
>>
>> ... or just set your killfile properly?
>>
>>
>
> What filters did you use to deal with 2400 spam posts a day?

I just burned anything sent in with a (source) Message-ID including
"googlegroups.com". Alternatively, others have stated killing the
posting User-Agent "G2/1.0" also works.

Yes, this does mean that I might catch a few legitimate posters in the
dragnet, but I don't know of any offhand.

> This is something that needs to be dealt with at source not with
> individual kill files. Which in the case of Thunderbird, had no way of
> dealing with all those shape-shifting posts in exotic alphabets.

Shame that it seems Google doesn't care enough to address. As for
Thunderbird, I don't know what it exposes in terms of allowing you to
filter by. Hopefully it's slightly better than just the posting email
address ...

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On 08/10/2023 21:37, Bart wrote:
> On 08/10/2023 21:02, Dan Purgert wrote:
>> On 2023-10-08, Anton Shepelev wrote:
>>> [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]
>>
>> ... or just set your killfile properly?
>>
>>
>
> What filters did you use to deal with 2400 spam posts a day?
>
> This is something that needs to be dealt with at source not with individual kill files. Which in the
> case of Thunderbird, had no way of dealing with all those shape-shifting posts in exotic alphabets.

I just look for about half a dozen specific (Thai) characters in the subject. You don't need to
understand Thai language just to reject it! That covers 99% of the specific Thai language spam. If
I searched for those characters in the From header it would be around 99.9%, but there's nothing
inherently wrong with a poster having a Thai name so I'm reluctant to do that. Sure, I've never
seen any genuine poster with a Thai language From header, but maybe one day...! As opposed to the
Subject header - in english speaking groups I can't think of any good excuse for use of Thai
characters in the subject.

Of course, there's more to the current spam than just Thai language characters - it seems they've
recently branched out into purely english spam posts which will be much harder to filter. (Perhaps
the Thai spammers are increasing income by accepting paid-for spam from others?)

You're right that the real problem needs to be fixed by Google - after all, they're the ones
accepting the spam at its Usenet entry point, and once it's in it's harder to deal with. You'd
think they could apply some of their deep learning AI technology to spot spam posts BEFORE
publishing them if they put their mind to it. Or at least fix their Gmail account registration so
it can't be so easily automated. (All the spam seems to be from Gmail registered users. There are
about a dozen posts per user, and then a new account takes over - is that because Google lets the
dozen posts through before deciding the user is a spammer and blocking the account??? Such a
strategy completely fails when new account setup can be completely automated by the spammers, as
seems to be the case with the current spam...)

Just my thoughts,
Mike.

On 2023-10-08, Dan Purgert <dan@djph.net> wrote:
> On 2023-10-08, Bart wrote:
>> On 08/10/2023 21:02, Dan Purgert wrote:
>>> On 2023-10-08, Anton Shepelev wrote:
>>>> [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]
>>>
>>> ... or just set your killfile properly?
>>
>> What filters did you use to deal with 2400 spam posts a day?
>
> I just burned anything sent in with a (source) Message-ID including
> "googlegroups.com". Alternatively, others have stated killing the
> posting User-Agent "G2/1.0" also works.

I'm really bad at writing killfiles, write once then forget a bit like
Perl. My SLRN has this which seems to works as I don't see any of the
mentioned spam:

[*]
Score: -9999
Injection-Info: googlegroups
Message-ID: googlegroups\.com
X-Trace: posting\.google\.com

Would I just add:

User-Agent: G2/1\.0

per your example?

> Yes, this does mean that I might catch a few legitimate posters in the
> dragnet, but I don't know of any offhand.

The same compromise I have made. If it really is a good post normally a
non-google account will follow up so I'll see the message that way. I
can then decide to add From as an exception.

--
Don't be afraid of the deep...
--[ bbs.bottomlessabyss.net | https | telnet=2023 ]--
--[ /query geeknix on libera.chat | tilde.chat ]--

On 2023-10-09, Mike Terry <news.dead.person.stones@darjeeling.plus.com> wrote:
> I just look for about half a dozen specific (Thai) characters in the
> subject. You don't need to

I switched to blocking Google Groups before this spam broke out.

Therefore, I have not seen even a single instance of it, and have no
idea what characters it contains, or what characters tomorrow's wave of
Google Groups spam will contain.

--
TXR Programming Language: http://nongnu.org/txr
Cygnal: Cygwin Native Application Library: http://kylheku.com/cygnal
Mastodon: @Kazinator@mstdn.ca
NOTE: If you use Google Groups, I don't see you, unless you're whitelisted.

On 09/10/2023 02:31, Mike Terry wrote:
> I just look for about half a dozen specific (Thai) characters in the
> subject.  You don't need to understand Thai language just to reject it!

Looks like they have now switched to using latin characters, they
adapted quite promptly.

I have noticed a sudden rise (in the last few days) of spam in general,
not just in newsgroups, but also e-mail. Has anyone else as well?

On 2023-10-09, Geeknix wrote:
> On 2023-10-08, Dan Purgert <dan@djph.net> wrote:
>> On 2023-10-08, Bart wrote:
>>> On 08/10/2023 21:02, Dan Purgert wrote:
>>>> On 2023-10-08, Anton Shepelev wrote:
>>>>> [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]
>>>>
>>>> ... or just set your killfile properly?
>>>
>>> What filters did you use to deal with 2400 spam posts a day?
>>
>> I just burned anything sent in with a (source) Message-ID including
>> "googlegroups.com". Alternatively, others have stated killing the
>> posting User-Agent "G2/1.0" also works.
>
> I'm really bad at writing killfiles, write once then forget a bit like
> Perl. My SLRN has this which seems to works as I don't see any of the
> mentioned spam:
>
> [*]
> Score: -9999
> Injection-Info: googlegroups
> Message-ID: googlegroups\.com
> X-Trace: posting\.google\.com
>
> Would I just add:
>
> User-Agent: G2/1\.0
>
> per your example?

It is not required to have both, in fact my killfile entry for them is
simply:

%BOS
[*]
%no more gg spam!
Score: =-9999
Message-ID: .*@googlegroups\.com.*$
%EOS

The alternate approach would (to my understanding) be:

%BOS
[*]
%no more gg spam!
Score: =-9999
User-Agent: G2/1\.0
%EOS

NOTE: the above are typed out in the message here, I might've missed
some (required) indentation.

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|O|O|O| PGP: DDAB 23FB 19FA 7D85 1CC1 E067 6D65 70E5 4CE7 2860

Dan Purgert <dan@djph.net> wrote:
<snip>
> I just burned anything sent in with a (source) Message-ID including
> "googlegroups.com". Alternatively, others have stated killing the
> posting User-Agent "G2/1.0" also works.

I do something similar.

> Yes, this does mean that I might catch a few legitimate posters in the
> dragnet, but I don't know of any offhand.

Yes, people posting from google's WEB site are caught, I
wish these people would just start using a proper news
reader and site. A simple google search will list many free
USENET providers. But this spam pushed me over the edge.

FWIW, many legitimate people posting to
rec.games.roguelike.nethack tends to post from google :(

For people posting from googlegroups, time to leave google,
eventually many people here who know a lot will no longer
see any questions you have.

John

On 2023-10-08, Bart <bc@freeuk.com> wrote:
> On 08/10/2023 21:02, Dan Purgert wrote:
>> On 2023-10-08, Anton Shepelev wrote:
>>> [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]
>>
>> ... or just set your killfile properly?
>>
>>
>
> What filters did you use to deal with 2400 spam posts a day?

I finally broke down and killed @gmail\.com for all of comp.lang.c

That did the trick.

Ben Collver:

> I finally broke down and killed @gmail.com for all of
> comp.lang.c

Did you kill me, too? Please, unkill, and filter by:

User-Agent: G2/1.0

On Sunday, October 8, 2023 at 4:27:44 PM UTC+3, Anton Shepelev wrote:
> Usenet server i2pn2 carries comp.lang.c without the Thai SPAM, but with
> normal GG articles. You can check via anonymous read-only access at
> news.i2pn2.org:119 , but you must registed to post:
>
> https://www.i2pn2.org/?page_id=9

Thank you.

I never used newsreaders, or, may be, used them, but it was so many years ago
that I completely forgot about it.
So, being Firefox user, downloaded Mozilla Thunderbird. Found it unusable. Uninstalled.
Downloaded MicroPlanet Gravity. So far it looks fine, at least for reading.

On 2023-10-09, Anton Shepelev wrote:
> Ben Collver:
>
>> I finally broke down and killed @gmail.com for all of
>> comp.lang.c
>
> Did you kill me, too? Please, unkill, and filter by:

You're (allegedly) posting with the email address <foo@bar.baz>, so
presumably not.

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Dan Purgert to Anton Shepelev:
> > Ben Collver:
> >
> > > I finally broke down and killed @gmail.com for all of
> > > comp.lang.c
> >
> > Did you kill me, too? Please, unkill, and filter by:
>
> You're (allegedly) posting with the email address
> <foo@bar.baz>, so presumably not.

That was a very rare exception.

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On 09/10/2023 21:09, Anton Shepelev wrote:
> Dan Purgert to Anton Shepelev:
>>> Ben Collver:
>>>
>>>> I finally broke down and killed @gmail.com for all of
>>>> comp.lang.c
>>>
>>> Did you kill me, too? Please, unkill, and filter by:
>>
>> You're (allegedly) posting with the email address
>> <foo@bar.baz>, so presumably not.
>
> That was a very rare exception.
>

But, gmail.moc != gmail.com

Michael S:

> I never used newsreaders, or, may be, used them, but it
> was so many years ago that I completely forgot about it.

Congratulations on degoogling your Usenet experience!

> So, being Firefox user, downloaded Mozilla Thunderbird.
> Found it unusable. Uninstalled.

It is tolerable e-mail client (if you can tolerate bloated
software), but a rather poor newsreader.

> Downloaded MicroPlanet Gravity.

I have never used it myself, no comments. It is a good idea
to check several newsreader at an early stage lest you
become inertially stuck with a bad one. I have only a few
recommendations:

1. XNews -- a GUI newsreader for Windows, and I can help
you set it up. On newer Windowses and with larger
displays, you will have to disable Microsoft's ugly
HDPI-awareness for this program:
<https://web.archive.org/web/20141227184804/http://xnews.newsguy.com/>
The documentation is large /and/ very good. For help,
consult news.software.readers .

2. tin -- a cross-platform text-mode newsreader, which I
have used with pleasure on my MacBook 2007:
<http://www.tin.org/>

3. HotDogEd -- a really working newsreader for Android,
but somewhat diffucult to get running, with various
hoops to jump through on different verisons and
flavours of the OS:
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.pushkin.hotdoged>
It being a combined Usenet and FidoNet client,
English-language support is provided in the FidoNet
echo `HOTDOGED'. The good new is that you actually
can access FidoNet from /any/ newsreader, via a
Usenet-to-FidoNet gateway, such as
<https://fidonews.mine.nu/>

> So far it looks fine, at least for reading.

I see you still post via GG. Have you meet with some
trouble posting from Gravity?

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Richard Harnden:

> But, gmail.moc != gmail.com

But was close, so I feared fuzzy matching. And of course I
care for GG posters who have not switched to a newsreader
yet.

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Dan Purgert:

> > [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]
>
> ... or just set your killfile properly?

I fear you missed my explanation in another post:

> I thought that using a server that does a good job of
> filtering it out is a genuinely useful advice, the server-
> side filtering mechanism beging, of course, much more
> powerful than the kill-file. And my client (Sylpheed)
> does not support a kill-file at all, algthough I have
> submitted a feature request that it be added.

Really, using the previously recommended server that filters
SPAM efficiently is a good idea, at least until other
servers start catch up.

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On 2023-10-09, Ben Collver <bencollver@tilde.pink> wrote:
> On 2023-10-08, Bart <bc@freeuk.com> wrote:
>> On 08/10/2023 21:02, Dan Purgert wrote:
>>> On 2023-10-08, Anton Shepelev wrote:
>>>> [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]
>>>
>>> ... or just set your killfile properly?
>>>
>>>
>>
>> What filters did you use to deal with 2400 spam posts a day?
>
> I finally broke down and killed @gmail\.com for all of comp.lang.c

That is egregiously stupid. Gmail isn't Google Groups.

Gmail is a very popular mail hosting service. Supposedly soething like
more that 25% of the e-mail users in the world are in Gmail. No idea
where that figure comes from, but it's in the realm of the credible.

Legitimate newsgroup participants on non-Google-Groups Usenet servers
use Gmail addresses in their From: headers.

> That did the trick.

Unplugging your network cable and turning off Wi-Fi will also do the
trick. So what?

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Mastodon: @Kazinator@mstdn.ca
NOTE: If you use Google Groups, I don't see you, unless you're whitelisted.

Dan Purgert:

> ... or just set your killfile properly?

This is an extensive and expert comment on your proposal:

Newsgroups: eternal-september.support
Subject: Server-side filtering (was: Articles from GROUP unavailable for XOVER)
Date: Mon, 9 Oct 2023 13:47:25 -0500
Message-ID: <s5g1qrkzwa4w.dlg@v.nguard.lh>

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On 2023-10-09, Anton Shepelev wrote:
> Dan Purgert:
>
>> > [Repeating this important message lest it drown in SPAM]
>>
>> ... or just set your killfile properly?
>
> I fear you missed my explanation in another post:
>
>> I thought that using a server that does a good job of
>> filtering it out is a genuinely useful advice, the server-
>> side filtering mechanism beging, of course, much more
>> powerful than the kill-file. And my client (Sylpheed)
>> does not support a kill-file at all, algthough I have
>> submitted a feature request that it be added.
>
> Really, using the previously recommended server that filters
> SPAM efficiently is a good idea, at least until other
> servers start catch up.

Definitely missed that. While I agree it'd be "nice" to have the
servers dropping Google Gr^H^H^H^H^H^H obvious spam, one would also
expect a "decent newsreader" allow the user to ignore things that make
it through the server-side killfile.

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