The most common method used to authenticate a user is through
verifying the username and password.
If your password is compromised, anybody can pose as you and
send out junk.
Just like unsecured wireless networks lead to someone posting a
bomb hoax and resulting in the owner getting arrested, you risk
getting your identity stolen. The only thing you stand to gain is a
rise in the number of enemies.
xmy, the problem is not a compromised password. The spammers are
using a new technique and that is, send out mails to non-existing
addresses so that the mail bounch back to the person's email
address.
For example, I send out an email to
[email protected] and I send it out as from
[email protected] and singnet server will send a no such address
reply to [email protected]
The spam filters will not filter out emails from singet servers
because, hey, how can singnet be spamming???!!!
So now imagine I send out a million different spam messages to
many different email servers (can be done easily by computer
programming) then [email protected] will receive a million replys
from email servers and they are not filtered out by the spam
filters.
Inside the replys from the email servers are usually attached
the original (spam) message and hey, the spammers have achieved
their aim and that is, to send you their spam message without being
filtered out!
As an IT consultant, I solve this problem regularly for my
clients.