for anyone who’s ever felt picked-on for making a stupid user mistake — relax, the professionals make even better mistakes!

Date: Mon, 09 Jan 2006 07:21:08 -0500
To: abuse@$MY_EMPLOYER.edu, postmaster@$MY_EMPLOYER.edu
From: $ISP Support Role Account
Subject: please fix this before you are blacklisted

——- Forwarded Message

[buncha headers snipped]
Date: Fri, 06 Jan 2006 13:45:50 -0500
From: A GSB Alumna To: $ISP Support Role Account
Subject: Re: blah blah

Can you please remove the email forward of (her address this ISP hosts) to (her GSB address)?

My account name is (foo)
Email address is (bar)
Thanks so much,
(Her name), (Her company)

—– Original Message —–

[Much quoted previous material, including a response from the support guy in which he chided her for a long paragraph for using HTML email because “there are too many possible security issues with HTML,” and not sending her “account name/email address/whatever needs to be changed” because “[w]e’re a very small ISP, but I cannot keep all account/email address info in my head,” and finally adds that he completed her original request, which was to set up the forwarding from her hosted address to her GSB address.)

did you notice the part where he left out any explanation about what he was claiming, via the subject line, was going to get us blacklisted?

so we get this email and then kinda stare at it, gossipping about it in irc, warming our hands over the shared fire-barrel of “what the hell is he talking about?”

Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 12:04:51 -0600 (CST)
From: sabrina downard
To: $ISP Support Role Account
Cc: abuse@$MY_EMPLOYER.edu, postmaster@$MY_EMPLOYER.edu
Subject: Re: please fix this before you are blacklisted

Please fix what, precisely, before we are blacklisted? So far as I can
tell, you’re upset about a client asking to have a forwarding address
terminated. Or possibly because she’s top-posting.

–sabrina
(for postmaster@$MY_EMPLOYER.edu)

a few minutes pass, during which time i clean up the HTML further so the entire message is legible (amazing what “%s/\&/\&/g” and friends can do for you), and realize something else is badly amiss. specifically, that the quoted material — which is a whole long thread — contains the user’s account name, pop server hostname, and the password that he assigned her. then we receive:

Date: Mon, 09 Jan 2006 13:56:58 -0500
To: abuse@$MY_EMPLOYER.edu, postmaster@$MY_EMPLOYER.edu
From: $ISP Support Role Account
Subject: Re: please fix this before you are blacklisted

I’m very sorry, my mistake, I got the wrong email!

the epilogue — after a soul-searching internal debate about whether or not it’s just being mean to rub the salt in the wounds of embarassment further, versus letting him be blindsided when the user inevitably contacts him:

Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 13:25:16 -0600 (CST)
To: $ISP Support Role Account
From: sabrina downard &;t;sld@$MY_EMPLOYER.edu>
Subject: Re: please fix this before you are blacklisted

: I’m very sorry, my mistake, I got the wrong email!

No worries.

BTW, your email to us contained the client’s login information, including
her password, for your pop server, as the thread included the original
email where you set her account up.

We have a very strict security policy at our site, so I emailed the
client and asked her to change her password as soon as possible. Just
letting you know in case you hear from her.

–sabrina
(for postmaster@$MY_EMPLOYER.edu)

i felt kinda bad for that last one. but, c’mon. seriously, he chastises the user like a child for sending HTML email because of its security implications, and then he forwards her login information to completely unknown third parties via insecure email? gimme a break.

asking where the “any” key is ain’t got nothing on us.