Who the hell are Aphrodite Marketing? My Yahoo account has been relatively quiet spam-wise lately (with most offenders being sent straight to the Bulk Mail folder) but these jerks have suddenly exploded into my Inbox in a big way. They seem to specialize in HTML emails where the actual spam pitch is contained in a big image, while the text of the email looks like a message from a friend. I keep reporting it as spam but the torrent isn’t slowing. Bastards.
18 responses
Found this via Google for you:
–www.cloudmark.com/support/spamnet/forum/read.php?f=10&i=1390&t=1390–
Seems to be a new thing…. good luck!!
Thanks Weeb. I found that one too. The idiots are hitting me with, like, ten messages a day. I hope Yahoo figures out how to block them.
I know it doesn’t really apply to this specific problem but….
My handy hint it to use different email account names if possible for anything you register on. Most web hosts allow this, eg siteimreggingon@mydomain.etc
If they then start pumping out spam to you then you can just do a filter on siteimreggingon and delete the emails.
I’m sure so much spam could be avoided if everyone kept their own personal address private and never used it on sites when they join places.
Yeah, I used to do that all the time with w-g. It became a bit of a problem last month when MyDoom hit. Since I had my mailserver set up to accept mail to any web-goddess.org address, I was getting hundreds of messages sent to random spoofed addresses. I ended up having to shut it off for the time being.
But anyway, the Aphrodite thing is really only hitting my Yahoo account now. I’ve had that one since college and it’s sorta my default throwaway address (though a few old friends still use it to contact me). It gets tons of spam but Yahoo catches most of it. It’s just these bastards that have figured a way around it. 🙁
Me too. Within the last month I am getting pelted by these bastards just like you are. And they are coming straight to my Inbox. I finally clicked the “unsubscribe” link at the bottom. (That was probably a BIG mistake but I figured what the hell. I’m already getting killed by them.)
Argh, Yahoo had been getting better spam-wise until recently. I put a filter on Aphrodite, but now I’m getting a dozen or so messages per day from “xxxx@xxxx.something.com” where x is a digit. Too bad you can’t create a regular expression mail filter 🙁
Ooh, I’ve been tempted to do that, Josh. Please keep me updated on whether it has any effect!
Yeah, those are the same addresses I’m getting, psorr. I think they hide the Aphrodite bit in an image. What gets me is that some of the firms advertising look legitimate. I mean, I keep getting ones with Blockbuster logos all over them. Should we try complaining to *them*?
I came upon your postings looking for information to remove the Aphrodite spam from my inbox. I think they are using most of their information using stationary and placing their spam on top. Like you I recieve 10+ to my inbox each day all on yahoo…….will keep searching and post any solutions.
I too have received a flood of marketing cr@p from these idiots! They oughta be caught and strung up!
SOLUTIONS? Not sure, but I HAD been catching nearly everything by filtering (at Yahoo) on terms like “unsubscribe” and “click here” (my friends don’t put THAT in e-mails! I opened source code in the Aphrodite message, and I am now searching for any e-mail that contains “java” in the body (they use java scripting in the source for Aphrodite. Not sure if Yahoo’s filter will find this in the source code, or if they only search in the actual text. It would certainly be able to trap specific code or source code info!
FUCK APHRODITE MARKETING! I HOPE THEY ALL ROT IN HELL AFTER A LONG MISERABLE LIFE OF ENDLESS PARKING TICKETS, HEMRROIDS THE SIZE OF GRAPEFRUIT, CONSTANT TOOTHACHES, AND A PEBBLE FOREVER AT THE BOTTOM OF THEIR BOOTS!
I’d delete you for shouting profanity but alas, I agree with the sentiment. 🙂
Yahoo…..or complaints may have stopped the Aphrodite Marketing scheme, but they have changed the name to “Brilliant Marketing” in their new spam wave. As much crap in the inbox and nothing to do about it?
SPAM from Brilliant Marketing has a tag at the bottom unique to your email address. Every SPAM you get from them will have the same tag. It should look similar to this:
Y3liZXJzYXVyUCEiY2dsb2JhbC5uZXQ=
You can filter based on finding that tag in the body of the email!
Also, I strongly suggest you forward all your Brilliant Marketing SPAM to uce@ftc.gov.
Aphrodite are the scum of the earth and must be stopped almost makes mail not looking at
You people are sort of retarded. Mailing ftc.gov won’t do any good since Aphrodite Marketing is a legal company that is following all of the CAN-SPAM laws. There’s a remove link, a snail mail link and a phone number.
I called these guys and they called me back, they also removed my Email from there list.
I was pissed off like the rest of you, but when i call they made me look like a fool when they told me where I ‘opted-in’ to a free give-away site.
My advice to you all, Call the 877 number and asked to be removed, Don’t sign up for anything unless you have a sperate email for it and have read the Terms of service or what ever the site uses
Wow, I think we had a visit from an Aphrodite shill! Sorry, John, I didn’t sign up for anything. I don’t do “free give-away sites.” I’m not an idiot. Also, I’m located in Australia. Why am I going to make an expensive international phone call to remove myself from a list I never signed up for? Also, regardless of whether they’re following the letter of the CAN-SPAM laws, they’re certainly abusing the spirit of the legislation with their stupid ploy of hiding the spam in an image and disguising the e-mail as a message from a friend. That’d indefensible.
I’m not too bothered anymore, though. Yahoo seems to have finally figured out a way to block them.
Hey Kris,
Optin networks are no always free give aways, ISP’s, Large free mail servers(hotmail,yahoo, etc), newletters, etc sell data to e- marketers (aka spammers), US spammers need to buy more that an email address to use for spamming too, they usually have full names, addresses, phone numbers, the ip they where using , time stamp and the site they signed up at.
EX: http://www.vissor.com says they hate spam and whatever else, but they sell there members information to other companies… it’s an endless, just have two email addy’s one for personal and one for everthing else.
reading this thread, it seems that i have to say this; we have to fight this ourselves. accept the spam, and forward it on to the ftc or another anti-spam related resource. then report it to your email provider. then delete it if you want to.
fighting spam is hard. fighting back is harder. which path do you believe is going to be more productive?