On my personal email server I use blacklists, whitelists, a Bayes filter, and RBL blocking. Some nasty stuff STILL gets through, though not much. My wife and kids like AOL (which implies Windows: can you say “worst case”?) which tends to bypass ALL local protections.

I filter my mail, as is my right. I will block inappropriate mail from my children’s mailboxes, and that is also my right. Where is it written that someone has a LEGAL RIGHT to send un-requested mail to my children or me? Utah and Michigan should not HAVE to pass local laws; this should be an issue of Federal (and perhaps international) law and technology. Blocked from sending outside their own domain (or perhaps at ALL) after only a short period of time without blocking valid mail, such laws will be enforceable. Right now we are only in the first round of legal attempts to protect society from the cyber criminals that belong to or depend upon the defense of the Free Speech Coalition and their like. The technological and legal problems are many, but ignoring the problem or letting the criminals win is NOT a solution. Doing nothing to suppress it only encourages criminal activity.

Having to pass a law to implement common sense and responsible behavior is silly. It is also, given human nature, unavoidable. I find these laws a bit scary myself. I find requiring every individual with an email address, including 5 through 17 year olds, to be far worse.

And here’s one you can protect yourself from, but if you don’t, you could be really nailed: spam re-mailer trojans. Current viruses are far less likely to format hard drives than they are to make computers function as “zombies” for nefarious purposes, most notably spam re-mailers. If that were to happen to your machine, you could be even now sending out porn spam to kids in Michigan and Utah with your IP address in the header if not your email address as well. The penalty for not keeping your virus protection up to date could now be a life sentence in prison, you evil child predator, you!