Print this article | E-mail this article | Comment on this article

AOL Cans IM Spam, aka 'Spim'

By David Worthington, BetaNews

October 29, 2004, 3:04 AM

After tackling Spam, AOL is now waging a two front offensive against spammers. America Online has taken the fight to "Spim," which is crossing over the threshold of disruption.

Spim -- instant messages that contain a side of spam -- is a fairly new method for sending unsolicited bulk messages, but has become enough of a nuisance that AOL has filed a federal lawsuit against unnamed defendants to can it.

AOL claims that the defendants have violated numerous federal and state laws by sending out thousands of spam-yielding instant messages to its members. In a September interview, an AOL spokesperson told BetaNews that it was already blocking such messages on the server level and grappling with the ever changing tactics of what it referred to as "disgruntled former spammers."

In the same interview, AOL left the door open for other tactics that it will use to police its networks such as cutting off network access to third party clients.

Although they are inherently related and the battle plans are coordinated, AOL's efforts to neutralize spam and spim are two separate undertakings largely due to differences in the underlying technologies between the two mediums. For instance, spim is generated by "bots" that randomly rotate Screen Names on the proprietary network.

However different, AOL has vowed to do whatever its takes to protect its customers whether they are receiving e-mail or chatting with buddies.

Add a Comment (4 Comments)

BetaNews reserves the right to remove any comment at any time for any reason. Please keep your responses appropriate and on topic. Foul language and personal attacks will not be tolerated.

By azwillnj

posted Nov 1, 2004 - 11:12 PM

Ya, they get angry when other people do it, but when they put annoying audio ads on your computer thats ok. AOL sucks get GAIM.

Score: 0

By Djarum

edited Nov 1, 2004 - 3:26 PM

I think some clarification is needed for the second to last paragraph of this article. Yes, the method nowadays is bots. However, it needs to be made clear that these bots are not connecting using AOL clients. There exist a myriad of tiny programs that are capable of signing on a dozen screen names at a time to the AIM service. Registering names for the AIM service takes seconds. A single person can sign 12 names for free onto AIM and using a small program send those names in and out of chat rooms to acquire screen names. The names land in a big list and the bots begin sending them the spam (spim) messages.

Tech tricks aren't going to do anything here. What will they do? Kill multiple connections? The company that just publicized linking AIM names will no dump it? I don't think so. The point is AOL owns the service and can track open connections. Legal action is the only way to do this. Of course it is a free service so it's not quite as easy as if this were on AOL itself. Obviously loading 100 names onto Paid AOL is a costly and inefficient way (who wants to get busted for credit card fraud) of doing this so the AIM service is the target of choice.

Other services have the same problems. Sadly it will likely end up with AOL services only being accessible by AOL created clients permanently. Goodnight GAIM etc.

Score: 0

By ryanb0885

posted Nov 2, 2004 - 3:24 PM

"Sadly it will likely end up with AOL services only being accessible by AOL created clients permanently."

I'm sure a lot of people will start using other messaging services if the developers are unable to overcome the blocks (they haven't failed yet, fortunately). However, which service(s) would this be? I could imagine MSN, Yahoo, and ICQ (owned by AOL) implementing similar blocks into their services if AOL's was effective. Other than Jabber, the hardly-known open-source technology, I can't see a lot keeping users from having to go back to native applications - or just being really lonely online. :/

Score: 0

By Neoprimal

edited Nov 6, 2004 - 9:36 PM

The real issue behind AOLs blocking technology/strategy is that AOL's chatrooms are one of it's top notch strong points - without it, many many people would drop AOL.
Look at MSN - I have NO problem with spim on MSN because I block any user not on my list. I don't care for MSN chatrooms, so I don't accept IMs from strangers, period. The very same goes for yahoo - any user that wants to IM me MUST be on my list OR get authorization, otherwise, IMs don't come through. This isn't a problem for me, because I don't have use for the yahoo chatrooms - even if I did, requiring authorization for a user to add me/message me helps tremendously.
Successfully blocking SPIMmers on AOL unfortunately also blocks chatroom users (or any user not on your list) as well as anyone using the AIM client. This has to do with the feature rich chatrooms AOL offers. If you want people to be able to just private message you without any hassle, then you're also going to allow spimmers to message you....on the other hand, when I see that I can't PM someone, I often don't bother talking to them at all, since I may not want to add them to my list; each and every AOL chatroom user knows this, thus the paradox.
I don't see how they're going to get rid of the problem other than to either weed out the spimmers, disable outside/3rd party connectivity to the AOL service or radically change their chatroom technology.

Score: 0

Oct 6 - 12:01 PM ET Mono, the open source .NET counterpart, releases 2.0

Oct 6 - 10:21 AM ET Real suspends RealDVD in wake of MPAA lawsuit

Oct 4 - 3:11 PM ET Verizon study: User error the cause of more IT breaches

Oct 3 - 6:49 PM ET Bill to investigate video content-blocking passes Senate

Oct 3 - 6:19 PM ET New Sony Reader includes touch, but no wireless

Oct 3 - 6:07 PM ET Was the Yahoo/Google deal a ploy to weaken Yahoo?

Oct 3 - 5:48 PM ET A mixed week for citizen journalists as Steve Jobs declines to die

Oct 3 - 4:56 PM ET Payment standards body will let failed security protocol lapse

Oct 3 - 3:38 PM ET DC Metro transit system finally gets some bars

Oct 3 - 3:35 PM ET Apple seeks dismissal of Psystar's 'monopoly' counterclaims