On Wed, 9 Jul 2003, Pete Weiss wrote:

>At 13:10 07/09/2003 Wednesday, Ahern, Shannon wrote:
> >I found subscriptions as well. What is this person doing exactly?
>
>Subscribing (w/ LISTSERV confirmation) to many many unrelated lists (some
>professional w/ limited applicable audiences) in a very short period of
>time with no apparent rhyme or reason OTHER THAN to collect email
>addresses or making unauthorized archives of postings
>

I have a cron job that runs several times a day that gathers all
email addresses on all lists, sorts them, and counts the number
of lists each address is subscribed to. It then emails me the top 15
subscribers. This address wasn't in the top 15 because it was only
subscribed to 5 lists.

The next strategy I am contemplating is setting up a dummy list, like
CATSCRATCH-L, or something stupid like that. Then, anyone who subscribes,
I will check the other lists for that address and treat it as a possible
email address harvester.

Darren Evans-Young,
The University of Alabama