Hello
Over the last few days one of my subscribed newsgroups, microsoft.public.vb.general.discussion, has started downloading
messages with a subject similar to
??????????????? pg slot game ?????????
The text could be other than this,eg pantip, usabet etc in different plaqce in the subject string.
Filtering on sender does not work bacauise it changes.
Can anyone suggest a filter to get rid of them ?
I use Agent 2 on Windows 10 so the Agent Help does not work.
Any advice gratefully received.
TIA

--
remove fred before emailing

On Sun, 07 Jan 2024 11:52:43 +0000, scbs29 <scbs29@fred.talktalk.net>
wrote:

>Hello
>Over the last few days one of my subscribed newsgroups, microsoft.public.vb.general.discussion, has started downloading
>messages with a subject similar to
>??????????????? pg slot game ?????????
>The text could be other than this,eg pantip, usabet etc in different plaqce in the subject string.
>Filtering on sender does not work bacauise it changes.
>Can anyone suggest a filter to get rid of them ?
>I use Agent 2 on Windows 10 so the Agent Help does not work.
>Any advice gratefully received.
>TIA

A few weeks ago, I had the similar problem and my solution
before I asked here used the wrong direction of / .

{/?/?/?/?} catches any subject with four ?'s .
Probably Indonesian.

BTW -
Additional spam started arriving after a few weeks, with
text in English. Every one of them includes some link, and
almost all the Subject lines include the word Download.

{Download} catches them. I mark them as Read, so that
I can change my View and see if they keep coming. I assume
that they will end when Google stops hosting posting in February.

--
Rich Ulrich

On Sun, 07 Jan 2024 11:52:43 +0000, scbs29 wrote:

> Hello
> Over the last few days one of my subscribed newsgroups, microsoft.public.vb.general.discussion, has started downloading
> messages with a subject similar to
> ??????????????? pg slot game ?????????
> The text could be other than this,eg pantip, usabet etc in different plaqce in the subject string.
> Filtering on sender does not work bacauise it changes.
> Can anyone suggest a filter to get rid of them ?
> I use Agent 2 on Windows 10 so the Agent Help does not work.
> Any advice gratefully received.
> TIA

Those subjects look like the spam flood originating from Google Groups.

1. The spam flood from Google Groups should stop on 24 February 2024
when Google Groups stops supporting new Usenet content.
<URL:https://support.google.com/groups/answer/11036538>

2. Meanwhile, for Agent 2.0, see the post "Filter for Google Groups
Robo Spam" by Joe Gwinn:

<URL:news:a4umni9lnknee5bmk2f2u5h4rt55akaj9d@4ax.com>
<URL:https://groups.google.com/g/alt.usenet.offline-reader.forte-agent/c/ahYi_MNXQT8>
<URL:https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=4711&group=alt.usenet.offline-reader.forte-agent#4711>

Use the filtering for specific words in the subject. The
message-id filter, “ message-id: googlegroups.com ”, will not
work in Agent 2.0 so do not use that. Message-ID filters require
Agent 5.0 or later.

If those are not good enough...

3. If you were to update to Agent 5.0 or later then you could filter
all the Google Groups spam with a simple filter on the message-id
header -- like this:

message-id: googlegroups.com

4. If you cannot upgrade, then use a local use a local proxy to
do filtering on the message-id header.

There is an add-on NFilter which can add filtering to any
newsreader, including filtering on Message-ID.
<URL:http://web.archive.org/web/20080514193524/http://www.nfilter.org/>

[Diagram best viewed in a fixed-pitch font]

                                    (          )
     +----------+     +---------+   ( Internet )   +----------+
     ¦   NEWS   ¦     ¦         ¦   (          )   ¦   NEWS   ¦
     ¦  READER  ¦---->¦ NFilter ¦----------------->¦  SERVER  ¦
     ¦          ¦     ¦         ¦   (          )   ¦          ¦
     +----------+     +---------+   (          )   +----------+
                                    (          )

> I use Agent 2 on Windows 10 so the Agent Help does not work.

You can use a copy of WinHlp32.exe from Windows XP to open the
Agent 2.0 help file. It just doesn't open from within Agent 2.0.

--
Kind regards
Ralph Fox
🦊

All are not friends, that speak us fair.

Thanks, the filter worked fine

On Sun, 07 Jan 2024 16:22:30 -0500, Rich Ulrich <rich.ulrich@comcast.net> wrote:

>On Sun, 07 Jan 2024 11:52:43 +0000, scbs29 <scbs29@fred.talktalk.net>
>wrote:
>
>>Hello
>>Over the last few days one of my subscribed newsgroups, microsoft.public.vb.general.discussion, has started downloading
>>messages with a subject similar to
>>??????????????? pg slot game ?????????
>
>{/?/?/?/?} catches any subject with four ?'s .

--
remove fred before emailing

On Sun, 07 Jan 2024 16:22:30 -0500, Rich Ulrich wrote:
> On Sun, 07 Jan 2024 11:52:43 +0000, scbs29 <scbs29@fred.talktalk.net>
> wrote:
>
>> Hello
>> Over the last few days one of my subscribed newsgroups, microsoft.public.vb.general.discussion, has started downloading
>> messages with a subject similar to
>> ??????????????? pg slot game ?????????
>
> {/?/?/?/?} catches any subject with four ?'s .

*** WARNING *** *** WARNING *** *** WARNING ***

{/?/?/?/?} will catch _all_ posts, whether or not the subject has question marks.

To catch any subject with four ?'s but not all posts, you need to use \ not / here.
That is, use this instead:
{\?\?\?\?}

A REMINDER

Please test your filter expressions using Find Global to make sure they
do not catch other posts you do not want caught.

--
Kind regards
Ralph Fox
🦊

Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.

On Tue, 16 Jan 2024 12:30:51 +1300, Ralph Fox <-rf-nz-@-.invalid>
wrote:

>On Sun, 07 Jan 2024 16:22:30 -0500, Rich Ulrich wrote:
>> On Sun, 07 Jan 2024 11:52:43 +0000, scbs29 <scbs29@fred.talktalk.net>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Hello
>>> Over the last few days one of my subscribed newsgroups, microsoft.public.vb.general.discussion, has started downloading
>>> messages with a subject similar to
>>> ??????????????? pg slot game ?????????
>>
>> {/?/?/?/?} catches any subject with four ?'s .
>
>
> *** WARNING *** *** WARNING *** *** WARNING ***
>
>{/?/?/?/?} will catch _all_ posts, whether or not the subject has question marks.
>
>To catch any subject with four ?'s but not all posts, you need to use \ not / here.
>That is, use this instead:
> {\?\?\?\?}
>

Damn! I made that mistake the first time, and you corrected
me -- and I fixed my filter to be correct. I did test it, too.
Then I posted it wrong.

Thanks, again.

>
>A REMINDER
>
>Please test your filter expressions using Find Global to make sure they
>do not catch other posts you do not want caught.

--
Rich Ulrich