Network Solutions aggressively fights spam and malware

We laud and appreciate the efforts of Knujon and other organizations like APWG in their anti-spam/abuse efforts. Network Solutions is passionate in this war against spam and has a common goal to combat abuse on the Internet.

· We use reputable anti-spam and anti-virus solutions providers like Symantec and use their solutions to stop spam and viruses from entering the mailboxes of our customers.

· Network Solutions keeps adding additional tiers of protection (Here in the interest of transparency I was going to list the equipment we use etc, but that could have given clues to spammers).

· We also use RBL lists from providers like SpamHaus to proactively stop spam. In a month we process and remove over 2M spam messages both inbound and outbound in our 2nd tier. The first tier which uses RBL lists to stop spam messages would have removed millions more. In addition our network and systems logic makes it very difficult for any outbound spam from our networks.

· When we receive any information of any illegal or disreputable activity that takes place via a domain name we have quick processes that ensure follow-up action. My colleagues who work in abuse investigation process between 150-200 requests a week.

Don’t forget that Network Solutions is a member of Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG) and actively participates in its efforts to develop industry best practices. We also leverage our APWG membership to maintain communication channels with leading anti-spam and anti-malware experts. Likewise, we joined the Registry Internet Safety Group to share information about domains being used to do bad things, and are actively involved in the RISG’s efforts to develop data sharing frameworks and industry best practices. We also monitor specialized mailing lists like RegOps and NXDomains and respond to allegations by these industry experts of misdeeds by domain under our management.

Also, we were ranked the 2nd most responsive registrar in MarkMonitor’s Autumn 2007 Brandjacking Index report
Brian Krebs highlighted this finding in his December 11, 2007 blog post I haven’t seen any follow-up analyses in MarkMonitor’s subsequent Brandjacking Index reports.

Bottom line Network Solutions and especially its dedicated employees that monitor Abuse issues proactively fight spam on a daily basis and also actively cooperate with law enforcement in shutting down illegal sites.

Follow-up:

· From the details that Knujon provided us yesterday we notified registrants of the domain names and most have taken action immediately. One in particular was an innocent victim and was not aware that their domain was being used to spread malware. This is an example where reaching out and following up with the domain owners is better than taking an arbitrary decision to shut down the domain.

· We have asked for specific details on a few domains that Gath Breun has sent us.

This list should not be construed as any judgment of our efforts to fight spam and anti-virus. Of all the spam domains that Kunjon tracked merely 11,000 domains that sent spam could have been Network Solutions domains. The report does not state how quickly any or all of these were acted upon by us if we received proof and abuse notification.

Are there any lessons learned for us from the Knujon Report:

- In this age all companies have to learn and adapt to fast changing technology landscapes and also the methodology nefarious elements employ. Sharing information is the best way to make progress.

- We hope to continue to get feedback and notifications from Knujon and other organizations about spam and abuse and investigate them.

- A report like this that takes only the data reported to Knujon alone may not be sufficient to list organizations that are not taking action against spammers. My suggestion is that this data should be universally collected and analyzed with other organizations to be a accurate reflection. Knujon published a few months ago a report on websites selling illegal steroids http://www.knujon.com/schedule3/dir.html which makes an interesting read.

If you want to learn more about Spam Symantec has a extensive report on Spam