Email Feedback Report Type Value : not-spam
draft-ietf-marf-not-spam-feedback-03

Abstract

This document defines a new Abuse Reporting Format (ARF) feedback report type value: "not-spam". It can be used to report an email message that was mistakenly marked as spam.

Status of this Memo

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This Internet-Draft will expire on March 25, 2012.

Copyright Notice

Copyright (c) 2011 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved.

This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document. Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described in the Simplified BSD License.

Table of Contents

• 1. Introduction
• 1.1. Discussion
• 2. Feedback Report Type: Not-Spam
• 3. Example
• 4. Security Considerations
• 5. IANA Considerations
• 6. Acknowledgements
• 7. References
• 7.1. Normative References
• 7.2. Informative References
• Authors' Addresses

1. Introduction

In RFC 5965 [RFC5965], an Abuse Reporting Format (ARF) is defined for reporting email abuse. Currently two feedback report types are defined that are related to the spam problem, and that can be used to report abusive or fraudulent email messages:

• abuse: indicates unsolicited email or some other kind of email abuse.
• fraud: indicates some kind of fraud or phishing activity.

This specification defines a new feedback report type: "not-spam". It can be used to report a message that was mistakenly marked as spam.

1.1. Discussion

In some cases, the email client receives an email message that was incorrectly tagged as spam, perhaps by the email system, or accidentally by the user. The email client accepts the end user's "not-spam" report instruction, retrieves information related to the message, and reports this email as not-spam to the email operator. When the email operator receives the report, it can determine what action is appropriate for the particular message and user. (The requirement for a not-spam report type is from the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA) Spam Report Requirement Document [OMA-SpamRep-RD].)

For example, in response to a "not-spam" report the email system can remove the spam tag or otherwise reclassify the message, possibly preventing future similar email for this user from being marked as spam. The report can be used to adjust the training of an automated classifier. After processing the report, the email operator might send a notification to the email client about the processing result (for example, by moving the message from one mailbox to another, such as from "Junk" to "Inbox").

In most cases, "not-spam" reports will probably not be taken on their own, but will be considered along with other information, analysis of the message, etc. Because different users have different needs and different views of what constitutes spam, reports from one user might or might not be applicable to others. And because users might sometimes press a "report not spam" button accidentally, immediate strong action, such as marking all similar messages as "good" based on a single report, is probably not the right approach. Recipients of "not-spam" reports need to consider what's right in their environments.

There are anti-spam systems that use (non-standard) "not spam" feedback today. All of them take the reports and mix them with other spam reports and other data, using their own algorithms, to determine appropriate action. In no case do the existing systems use a "not spam" report as an immediate, automatic override.

The feedback types "abuse" and "not-spam" can be taken as opposites. A mistaken "not-spam" report could be countermanded by a subsequent "abuse" report from the same user, and an operator could consider collected reports of "abuse" and "not-spam" in making future assessments.

2. Feedback Report Type: Not-Spam

This document only defines a new feedback report type, "not-spam", extending the Email Feedback Reports specification [RFC5965].

In the first MIME part of the feedback report message, the end user or the email client can add information to indicate why the message is not considered as spam -- for example, because the originator or its domain is well known.

3. Example

In the example, Joe, a pharmaceuticals sales representative, has received a message about discount pharmaceuticals. Because that is a frequent subject of spam email, the message has been marked as spam -- incorrectly, in this case. Joe has reported it as "not-spam", and this is an example of the report, shortened (the "[...etc...]" part) for presentation here.

Note that the message is DKIM-signed [RFC6376], a good security practice as suggested in RFC 5965 section 8.2 [RFC5965].

      
   DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; s=abuse; d=example.com;
     c=simple/simple; q=dns/txt; i=abusedesk@example.com;
     h=From:Date:Subject:To:Message-ID:MIME-Version:Content-Type;
     bh=iF4dMNYs/KepE0HuwfukJCDyjkduUzZFiaHqO9DMIPU=;
     b=e+BF8DCHFGqCp7/pExleNz7pVaLEoT+uWj/8H9DoZpxFI1vNnCTDu14w5v
       ze4mqJkldudVI0JspsYHTYeomhPklCV4F95GfwpM5W+ziUOv7AySTfygPW
       EerczqZwAK88//oaYCFXq3XV9T/z+zlLp3rrirKGmCMCPPcbdSGv/Eg=
   From: <abusedesk@example.com>
   Date: Thu, 8 Mar 2005 17:40:36 EDT
   Subject: FW: Discount on pharmaceuticals
   To: <abuse@example.net>
   Message-ID: <20030712040037.46341.5F8J@example.com>
   MIME-Version: 1.0
   Content-Type: multipart/report; report-type=feedback-report;
        boundary="part1_13d.2e68ed54_boundary"

   --part1_13d.2e68ed54_boundary
   Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
   Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

   This is an email abuse report for an email message received
   from IP 192.0.2.1 on Thu, 8 Mar 2005 14:00:00 EDT.
   For more information about this format please see
   http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5965
   Comment: I sell pharmaceuticals, so this is not spam for me.

   --part1_13d.2e68ed54_boundary
   Content-Type: message/feedback-report

   Feedback-Type: not-spam
   User-Agent: SomeGenerator/1.0
   Version: 1

   --part1_13d.2e68ed54_boundary
   Content-Type: message/rfc822
   Content-Disposition: inline

   Received: from mailserver.example.net
        (mailserver.example.net [192.0.2.1])
        by example.com with ESMTP id M63d4137594e46;
        Thu, 08 Mar 2005 14:00:00 -0400
   From: <someone@example.net>
   To: <Undisclosed Recipients>
   Subject: Discount on pharmaceuticals
   MIME-Version: 1.0
   Content-type: text/plain
   Message-ID: 8787KJKJ3K4J3K4J3K4J3.mail@example.net
   Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 12:31:03 -0500

   Hi, Joe.  I got a lead on a source for discounts on
   pharmaceuticals, and I thought you might be interested.
   [...etc...]
   --part1_13d.2e68ed54_boundary--
   
           Example 1: Not-spam report  
         
          

4. Security Considerations

All of the Security Considerations from the Email Feedback Reports specification [RFC5965] are inherited here. In addition, the Email Feedback Reports Applicability Statement [I-D.ietf-marf-as] contains important information about trust relationships and other security- and integrity-related aspects of accepting abuse feedback.

In particular, not-spam reports will likely be used in an attack on a filtering system, reporting true spam as "not-spam". Even in absence of malice, some not-spam reports might be made in error, or will only apply to the user sending the report. Operators need to be careful in trusting such reports, beyond their applicability to the specific user in question.

5. IANA Considerations

Registration is requested for the newly defined feedback type name: "not-spam", according to the instructions in section 7.3 of the base specification [RFC5965].

Please add the following to the "Feedback Report Type Values" registry:

Feedback Type Name:

not-spam

Description:

Indicates that the entity providing the report does not consider the message to be spam. This may be used to correct a message that was incorrectly tagged or categorized as spam.

Published in:

this document

Status:

current

6. Acknowledgements

The authors would like thank Murray S. Kucherawy and Bert Greevenbosch for their discussion and review, and J.D. Falk for suggesting some explanatory text.

7. References

7.1. Normative References

7.2. Informative References

Authors' Addresses