Internet Security and Programming

The subject line from the e-mail that just landed in your inbox indicates the message was returned because it could not be delivered. Upon closer inspection, the message — hawking cheap designer watches — doesn’t look like any message you’ve ever sent. What’s going on here? Is there a ghost in your machine? Has it been commandeered by criminals and enslaved as a spam zombie? These are questions that I’ve been asked many times, and while I may not have a definitive answer, there may be a simple explanation for what’s really happening with your e-mail account. Spammers blast their junk mails out to millions of e-mail addresses that are usually purchased in bulk and/or scraped from various Web sites and forums. But some spammers also use those lists to fake or “spoof” the address in the “From:” field of each e-mail sent. That means that if they spoof [...]

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