Welcome to Spam Class

The University of Calgary is about to offer courses in spam software and virus writing.

No, they're not writing free antispam software. They are in fact writing software to send junk email messages and viruses. Spyware is also covered. Special attention is being paid to how spammers sneak past various anti-spam filtering mechanisms.

They are also banning external data storage devices from the computer labs and otherwise providing for electronic and physical security. If a student is found to not be compliant with policies - they will get an automatic failing grade.

However, with miniature USB keychain devices - one would imagine that viruses or junk email software could still be snuck out fairly easily.

The pretext is that its actual intent is to provide the context for students to understand how to write spamblocker software. To enforce this it's requiring students to sign an agreement that they will use their new found powers only for good, not evil.

I'm not sure if the way to inform student in the fine art of being a spamkiller is to teach them how to send bulk email and viruses. I fully believe that same information can be gathered more readily by examining various spam archives for patterns. There several large, publicly accessible databases of junk email that have been collected for research use.

It could be that the university is just out to get free press coverage by offering a controversial class.

SpamButcher is a Windows spam filter and has a free trial that can be downloaded from www.spambutcher.com.

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