csg@pyramid.pyramid.com (Carl S. Gutekunst) (05/11/88)
A 2300-line message was posted to misc.test (and cross posted to talk.bizarre) by 22116@pyr1.acs.udel.EDU that refers to itself as the "misc.test digest." It contains the complete text of all the misc.test messages posted within the past month or so, a total of 107 articles. This awesomely stupid menuever was topped by pst@comdesign.UUCP reposting the same message to alt.test. The posting of two 68 Kbyte messages to test groups is trivial compared to the effect of all the echo reflectors out there. Every one is forwarding the damn postings back to the sender. Worse, at least one standard reflector script, Erik Fair's, echos mail to *EVERY* "Path:" line in the test article. Since the article contains 109 Path lines, we mailed the 68K posting to all 109 of them! We have broken the UUCP link to comdesign, and are trashing every copy of the test message that we can find. Unfortunately, nearly all of them already went out during the night, and we apologize to all of you who found this monster in your inbox this morning. Other sites, especially those running echo reflec- tors, should survey their own spool partitions and squash as many of these as they can. <csg>
chuq@plaid.Sun.COM (Chuq Von Rospach) (05/11/88)
>The posting of two 68 Kbyte messages to test groups is trivial compared to the >effect of all the echo reflectors out there. Every one is forwarding the damn >postings back to the sender. Worse, at least one standard reflector script, >Erik Fair's, echos mail to *EVERY* "Path:" line in the test article. Since the >article contains 109 Path lines, we mailed the 68K posting to all 109 of them! Another thing that's happened recently is that some folks have recently posted messages cross posted to misc.test. I responded to one without noticing which groups it was going to, and have been inundated with the automatic "ack" messages from around the country ever since. That's a guaranteed way to irritate someone. Which, considering the source, was exactly the point, I believe. Chuq Von Rospach chuq@sun.COM Delphi: CHUQ I come to preach to a religion that doesn't exist. It has no members. It has no clergy. It has no doctrine. It has no collection plate.
fair@ucbarpa.Berkeley.EDU (Erik E. Fair) (05/11/88)
Frankly, I am amazed that awk didn't blow up on this. If I recall correctly, the entire "To:" field is done by one printf, on the (obviously erroneous) assumption that there wouldn't be too many addresses... What's really fun is that I'm getting all these bounces from addresses that the awk script didn't guess too well on (the same ones that I got from the previous month's tests). Needless to say, this does not make me happy. Fortunately, I just converted to using mh, and I can (and do) pick these gems out of the inbox and file them in another folder before dealing with my regular mail... So, can anyone think of a suitable punishment for these two ignoramuses? Erik E. Fair ucbvax!fair fair@ucbarpa.berkeley.edu
msmith@topaz.rutgers.edu (Mark Robert Smith) (05/11/88)
Being one of the recipients, I suggest that we coerce the sysadmins to
remove these user's accounts, and if they refuse, pull up all links to
their machines.
I show that udccpyr1 is not at a backbone site, and I don't even have
a map entry for comdesign, so I don't know what their situation.
For their little "trick" I think this punishment is fitting.
Mark
--
Mark Smith (alias Smitty) "Be careful when looking into the distance,
61 Tenafly Road that you do not miss what is right under your nose."
Tenafly, NJ 07670 {backbone}!rutgers!topaz.rutgers.edu!msmith
msmith@topaz.rutgers.edu Bill and Opus in '88!!!
--
Mark Smith (alias Smitty) "Be careful when looking into the distance,
61 Tenafly Road that you do not miss what is right under your nose."
Tenafly, NJ 07670 {backbone}!rutgers!topaz.rutgers.edu!msmith
msmith@topaz.rutgers.edu Bill and Opus in '88!!!grr@cbmvax.UUCP (George Robbins) (05/11/88)
In article <May.10.22.44.49.1988.7262@topaz.rutgers.edu> msmith@topaz.rutgers.edu (Mark Robert Smith) writes: > Being one of the recipients, I suggest that we coerce the sysadmins to > remove these user's accounts, and if they refuse, pull up all links to > their machines. > I show that udccpyr1 is not at a backbone site, and I don't even have > a map entry for comdesign, so I don't know what their situation. > For their little "trick" I think this punishment is fitting. Perhaps you should wait for some reasonable summary of the facts before passing sentence. Are you sure these agents of chaos deliberatly set out to create a net.catastrophe? I'd assume the people at Delaware and this comdesign place can take care of any neccessary wrist slapping without a bunch of threats... -- George Robbins - now working for, uucp: {uunet|ihnp4|rutgers}!cbmvax!grr but no way officially representing arpa: cbmvax!grr@uunet.uu.net Commodore, Engineering Department fone: 215-431-9255 (only by moonlite)
chiefdan@vax1.acs.udel.EDU (Daniel Paul Roth) (05/11/88)
In article <3757@cbmvax.UUCP> grr@cbmvax.UUCP (George Robbins) writes: >In article <May.10.22.44.49.1988.7262@topaz.rutgers.edu> msmith@topaz.rutgers.edu (Mark Robert Smith) writes: >> Being one of the recipients, I suggest that we coerce the sysadmins to >> remove these user's accounts, and if they refuse, pull up all links to >> their machines. >> I show that udccpyr1 is not at a backbone site, and I don't even have >> a map entry for comdesign, so I don't know what their situation. >> For their little "trick" I think this punishment is fitting. >Perhaps you should wait for some reasonable summary of the facts before >passing sentence. Are you sure these agents of chaos deliberatly set >out to create a net.catastrophe? I'd assume the people at Delaware and >this comdesign place can take care of any neccessary wrist slapping >without a bunch of threats... Hello! This is the moron who created the "MISC.TEST DIGEST". (From a different account which I now find myself unable to log into.) My apologies to all those who this cause trouble for. I was not in any way trying to cause any havoc! I did not realize what trouble this message would cause. Please... 1) Realize our administrators had nothing to do with it! 2) Know that I didn't know about all these programs which mail replies back. 3) Accept the above apology. There's no need to suggest "punishing" our site. It was purely my ignorance regarding the net which led to this problem -- nothing malicious on my part and certainly nothing for which anyone besides myself is responsible. As soon as I was informed by the first piece of e-mail I received of my netiquette violation, I did what I could to repair the situation (which was obviously an exercise in futility) and issued a kill statement. Once again my apologies, and I believe I'd best send mail with our administrators, who I believe may wish to speak with me.
matt@oddjob.UChicago.EDU (Java Man) (05/12/88)
grr@cbmvax.UUCP (George Robbins) writes:
) Are you sure these agents of chaos deliberatly set
) out to create a net.catastrophe?
Suppose there had been no automatic responding programs at all.
Would it then have been a *good* idea to repost and re-repost all the
articles from a "test" newsgroup?
Matt Crawfordnic@dworld.UUCP (Nic Bernstein) (05/12/88)
In article <3266@pasteur.Berkeley.Edu> fair@ucbarpa.Berkeley.EDU (Erik E. Fair) writes: >So, can anyone think of a suitable punishment for these two >ignoramuses? After getting three of these replies (so far) at 68K each, and growing with each new header, I spent a fair amount of time trying to figure out why. (I don't read the test groups, or talk.bizarre, so I didn't see the original postings). Needless to say, some examination of the headers revealed the reason. By this time, I have had five copies of this beast on my machine; three in my mail box, one in misc. test, and one in alt.test. 5 x 68,000 = 340,000 of space eaten up on my already overburdened 3B1, it also equals 47.2 minutes of connect time at 1200 baud with my neighbor, 340,000 of space on each system down the line, etc. My first inclination was to flame the idiots that started this, but that would only waste more space/time/money. So, instead I suggest that perhaps the best punishment would be to make these people PAY FOR IT!! Now I know that this is not a realistic suggestion, but the thought of an unknown number of servant repliers sending two replies to each of 109 people throughout the net boggles the imagination. What these foolish posters have done, stupid as it was, is to show us a very effective form of usenet virus. Much scarier than the cost of their stupidity is the prospect of someone else doing this maliciously. I can only hope that enough sysadmins are aware of this, and doing what they can to fix their auto ACK systems to prevent something like this bringing usenet to it's knees. >> All in all, I've boo boo'ed big-time. I'd say!!!!! >> Paul S. Traina arpa: @pyramid.com:pst@comdesign.uucp -- "You can't spend your history!" Nic Bernstein Melinda Briggerty Discovery World Museum "... but you can sell it!" 818 W. Wisconsin av. Me Milwaukee, WI 53233 ____________________________________________________________________________ {uunet|uwmcsd1|gryphon}!marque{!introl}!dworld!nic ____________________________________________________________________________
tom@vax1.acs.udel.EDU (Thomas Uffner) (05/12/88)
On the positive side though, this did bring to light a potential flaw
in some of the auto-ack and reflector scripts. correcting this now
might prevent a worse disaster later.
tom
--
Arpa: tom@vax1.acs.udel.edu
Uucp: ...{ihnp4,unidot,uunet}!cfg!udel!udccvax1!tom
"Themes were useless; Destiny was here and the foot pedals were bleeding."gore@eecs.nwu.edu (Jacob Gore) (05/12/88)
I think this thing belongs in the list of accidental "computer" screwups that
may even be considered amusing (if one's in the right state of mind and isn't
beaten up by them too badly; we've seen 3 copies of that monster at this site,
and are expecting 2 more...). Kind of like those two vacation programs that
formed a positive feedback loop.
I'll be very surprised if it turns out that that stupid posting was made just
to cause problems. We shouldn't assume malice where plain ignorance (or,
sometimes, stupidity) will do.
So, rather than go tar and feather the posters, how about just doing whatever
damage control we can, fixing up whatever reflector scripts we have to avoid
such problems in the future, and explaining to the nuts that posted it to:
1. avoid such costly jokes if they can, and if not:
2.a. post them to humor groups only,
2.b. edit away the headers,
2.c. limit the distribution to the smallest region that their egos (or
software) will permit?
Jacob Gore Gore@EECS.NWU.Edu
Northwestern Univ., EECS Dept. {oddjob,gargoyle,ihnp4}!nucsrl!goreIlan@cup.portal.com (05/12/88)
Erik,
Would you consider the following "suitable punishment" ?
Send a 2000 volt electric current to their modem via the net
and blow their server to bits. <hehe>
- Ilan Rabinowitz -
Ilan@cup.portal.comrichard@gryphon.CTS.COM (Richard Sexton) (05/12/88)
Gosh folks, I dont know much about this stuff, and I dont know about
all them fancy UNIX tools, but it seems to me that there should
be some way for the automagic response system figure out if the
test message is longer than the first six volumes of the
encyclopaedia brittanica and take appropriate action.
Like do nothing. Or maybe only have backbone sites respond to it. Or maybe
only sites with a 'J' as the third letter of the sitename.
Just a crazy idea.
--
noalias went. it really wasn't negotiable
richard@gryphon.CTS.COM rutgers!marque!gryphon!richard