[SpamCop-List] Re: Reporting blank spam emails?

[Mike Easter]

Frog Prince wrote:

> when SC receives a blank spam report it will not process the
> submission unless the user submits via the web site interface and
> adds text to the effect 'text added'.

The 'trick' of adding 'text added' to empty spams is a commonplace
maneuver to report blank spams which is much discussed and sanctioned by
at least one deputy and thus 'approved' in forum discussions.  However,
it does not actually appear in the 'real' web based faq which has some
approvals or 'blessings' for making changes in a spam prior to
submission.  And, it does result in SC making a report and counting a
source which it would not by design have done -- which would seem to fly
in the face of what is and isn't permitted under the Material changes
rule http://www.spamcop.net/fom-serve/cache/283.html  "Do not make any
material changes to spam before submitting or parsing which may cause
SpamCop to find a link, address or URL it normally would not, by design,
find."

That faq names specific 'releases' from its overall theme, but adding
'text added' or similar such is not named.

> Instead of doing the deed then posting a notice to the effect no
> report as the email is blank why isn't the addition of the tag 'text
> added' an automatic function?

IMO, the parser is so designed because the 'appearance' that a spam is
empty is often associated with some kind of error in the submission
method.  The algorithm 'assumes' that an error has been made by the
submitting reporter, not that the item is an empty spam.  Perhaps from
the algorithm writer's perspective, empty spams should not be reported,
since it isn't mentioned in the faq.

-- 
Mike Easter
kibitzer, not SC admin