clewis@mnetor.UUCP (Chris Lewis) (11/21/85)
Over the last couple days we have received some 106 "newgroup" control messages from "root@wang (UNIX SYSTEM ADMIN Deb Bunting)". I didn't notice them until today, when the "newgroup"s finally got around to newsgroups that didn't exist: fa.bitgraph fa.anews-d fa.human-nets fa.energy fa.digest-p fa.info-vax fa.railroad fa.sf-lovers fa.telecom fa.teletext net.adm.site net.chess net.info-tenews net.mail.msggroup net.micro.432 net.micro.zx (To other SA's, you may need this list to recover) Here's a sample: >Relay-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site mnetor.UUCP >Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site wang.UUCP >Path: mnetor!utcs!utzoo!linus!decvax!wanginst!wang!root >From: root@wang.UUCP ( UNIX SYSTEM ADMIN Deb Bunting) >Newsgroups: fa.railroad.ctl >Subject: cmsg newgroup fa.railroad >Message-ID: <166@wang.UUCP> >Date: 16 Nov 85 16:35:19 GMT >Date-Received: 21 Nov 85 15:21:10 GMT >Control: newgroup fa.railroad >Organization: Wang Labs, Lowell MA >Lines: 0 > ><funny char> It very much looks like she was doing an install of 2.10.2 (notice the low Message-ID) with a really old "newsgroups" and goofed. This has happened before, but it is a real royal pain to recover from. Our downstreams shouldn't see these, I deleted 'em from the spool area before they were csendbatch'd. Anyways, this has gotten to be such a nuisance, I would really like to propose: 1) newgroup messages should be originated by only ONE person per "level of net". The logical person for this in the global "net.", "mod." is Spaf - the only person whose rmgroups/newgroups I trust without question. [ flames from "Fear and ..." or "net.dictator" types to /dev/null ] [ Our policy until now: Unless I've seen something in net.news.group, newgroups other than from Spaf are rmgroup'd immediately. In case of doubt, the group is rmgroup'd until Spaf's next checkgroups. We have remote rmgroups turned off.] 2) Modify inews to only accept newgroups from specific users; Spaf, the local SA(s), and subnet SA's. Has anybody implemented this before for 2.10.1 and upwards? It would be really nice if the "specific user list" was in a file in /usr/lib/news. 3) Make sure that everybody about to install a new news system is given a warning about this. In particular, don't use inews -C to create the initial active! -- Chris Lewis, UUCP: {allegra, linus, ihnp4}!utzoo!mnetor!clewis BELL: (416)-475-8980 ext. 321
adams@calma.UUCP (Robert Adams) (11/25/85)
> Over the last couple days we have received some 106 "newgroup" control > messages from "root@wang (UNIX SYSTEM ADMIN Deb Bunting)". I didn't > ... > It very much looks like she was doing an install of 2.10.2 (notice > the low Message-ID) with a really old "newsgroups" and goofed. > ... > Anyways, this has gotten to be such a nuisance, I would really like to > propose: > > 1) newgroup messages should be originated by only ONE person > per "level of net". The logical person for this in the global > "net.", "mod." is Spaf - the only person whose rmgroups/newgroups > I trust without question. [ flames from "Fear and ..." or > "net.dictator" types to /dev/null ] Actually, what we need is "mod.control" but that would require another release of news software. I hope that news software 2.10.3 has a script "newgroup" that is like "rmgroup" that just plays with the active file and creates directory so that messages can't go out onto the net. adams@calma.UUCP -- Robert Adams ...!ucbvax!calma!adams