As reported by the BBC, Lycos has created a screensaver that targets the Web sites of spammers, overloading them with requests for information. They hope to “make the monthly bandwidth bills of spammers soar by keeping their servers running flat out” and slow down their sites “under the weight of data requests. Early results show that response times of some sites have deteriorated by up to 85%.” The lists of spammer Web sites are pulled from real time black lists, which are built with addresses sent out to e-mails received by users from around the world. Even better, the method they are using, shouldn’t have a noticeable effect on the Net’s speed, unlike some other proposed solutions.
This is a great way to fight back, I really hope it works, even if it is only for a little while.