Subject: Re: [marf] New Version Notification for draft-li-marf-not-spam-feedback-00.txt

From: Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 13 May 2011 13:57:06 -0400

Kepeng Li and I have just submitted a draft for consideration by the
MARF working group:

> Filename:        draft-li-marf-not-spam-feedback
> Revision:        00
> Title:           Email Feedback Report Type Value : not-spam
> Creation date:   2011-05-13
> WG ID:           Individual Submission
> Number of pages: 7
>
> Abstract:
>   This document defines a new Abuse Reporting Format (ARF) feedback
>   report type value: "not-spam".  It can be used to indicate that a
>   message that was tagged or categorized as spam (such as by an ISP) in
>   fact is not spam.

http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-li-marf-not-spam-feedback

As noted in the draft the requirement for this comes from the OMA
SpamRep folks, and also seems like a reasonable need in general.  We'd
like the MARF working group to review this, and to consider adopting
it.  It seems like an easy ride, I think.

Murray will handle all chair responsibilities for this if it's
adopted, since I'm a co-author.

Barry, as participant

---

From: "Murray S. Kucherawy" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 13 May 2011 10:59:43 -0700

> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of Barry Leiba
> Sent: Friday, May 13, 2011 10:57 AM
> To: Message Abuse Report Format working group
> Subject: Re: [marf] New Version Notification for draft-li-marf-not-spam-feedback-00.txt
> 
> [...]

Seems appropriate given our chartered task remain in line with SpamRep and seek consolidation.  I think it's appropriate to bring it into the WG.

-MSK [as participant]

---

From: Steve Atkins <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 13 May 2011 11:05:20 -0700

> it.  It seems like an easy ride, I think.

Probably. Seems harmless.

Is this intended for communication between MUA and message store (doing
much the same thing as an IMAP move from spamfolder to inbox folder)
or is it something that's intended for broader use across administrative
boundaries (like, say, ISP pushback to Postini)?

Cheers,
  Steve

---

From: Alessandro Vesely <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 14 May 2011 13:15:27 +0200

On 13/May/11 20:05, Steve Atkins wrote:
>> it.

+1 for adoption.

>> It seems like an easy ride, I think.
> 

A possible harm is inappropriate usage.  IRC, "non-spam" used to be in
ARF and was removed for this reason.  I suggest to change the label to
something more specific, such as "ham" (to highlight Bayesian training
purposes), "reconsideration-request", or such.

> boundaries (like, say, ISP pushback to Postini)?

I hope so, because trusted authors deserve to come to know if their
messages are misclassified, and have a chance to appeal.  In this
respect, the example in section 3 is described deceptively.  Does it
mean "Joe has _authored_ a message..."?

The human readable part of the example does not say /why/ it is not
spam.  (Shouldn't it mention RFC 5965 rather than mipassoc's URL?)

---

From: "J.D. Falk" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 15 May 2011 13:14:16 -0500

> http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-li-marf-not-spam-feedback

I agree that this fits nicely into the MARF WG.

The main comment I have on the document is that I think it needs a minor shift in attitude.  Statements like "It can be used to report a message that was mistakenly marked as spam" sound very certain, and that carries with it an expectation that the report will be acted upon.

I'm aware of four anti-spam systems which use "not spam" feedback today: Yahoo! Mail, Vipul's Razor, Cloudmark, and GMail.  (I worked on the first from 2004-2007.)  All of them take the "not spam" reports, and mix them with spam reports and other data using a proprietary algorithm.  In no case is a "not spam" report an immediate, automatic override.

(This differs from the "not spam" button in some MUAs, where it /can/ be an override -- but only for that individual user.  For example, the Yahoo! Mail MUA does this.)

The document does acknowledge that anti-spam systems can and should make their own decision (in sections 1.1 and 4), but I think that needs to be spelled out more clearly to avoid creating inappropriate expectations.

This proposal also brings up the more general question of feedback from an MUA to the user's mailbox provider, which I think would be a wonderful topic for an Applicability Statement.  But first, someone needs to actually implement it and try it out.

--
J.D. Falk
the leading purveyor of industry counter-rhetoric solutions

---

From: "McDowell, Brett" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 25 May 2011 15:06:13 -0600

I haven't been particularly active for a long time, but I just wanted to convey support for adopting this draft and supporting the harmonization/convergence of ARF and SpamRep.

Barry, how would you feel about updating the example to show a message that was compliant with one of the Security Considerations recommendations... like maybe a DKIM signature on the message?

-- Brett

On May 13, 2011, at 1:57 PM, Barry Leiba wrote:

> _______________________________________________
> marf mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/marf

---

From: Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 29 May 2011 01:33:28 +0000

Thanks, folks, for the comments.

Steve: It is intended for use across boundaries, and can certainly be
used internally as well.  It's intended for exactly the same use that
the base MARF report types are.

Alessandro and JD: Yes, there's certainly the case that "not-spam"
reports can't be just taken at face value if that would cause them to
affect the filtering for other users.  We'll put some more into the
next version of the draft to make that more explicit.  I don't think
we want to change the name of the report, though -- just the
documentation.

Brett: Yes, I'm always happy to change or add examples, and I
generally believe that more examples improve most documents.  I'll
change the example, or add a new one (or ones), as you suggest.

I'll have a chair chat with Murray, and then post a new version at his
direction.

Barry