Okay, suppose I write code, so that when file X on a web server contains the word "BLAH", the program starts sending my BROTHER an e-mail ever 10 seconds for 2 hours.
Now suppose that I combine this code with my program, and then distribute the program to a lot of people (100's)
I have oversimplified things until now, please note that I will take care of the technical details so that:
- This code keeps running even when the program "closes"
- The code doesn't make the program crash
- Normal people (non geeks) don't know about anything that's happening
- Etc...
Now, when I edit the file to "BLAH", and hundreds of my programs copies all start continuously sending e-mails to my brother, his hotmail inbox will be full in under an hour! Muhahahahaahaha...
But can and might hotmail sue me doing for this? Is this illegal? What law says it is?
Oh, and I'm SURE my brother won't report me to the police or take any legal action against me... Plus, I'm under 18
I had the program ready and was about to try this when I realized that this might get me into some trouble...
where, oh where to begin...
first. If a file is on a web server it'll kick your intended bot net into life.
first, that's really dumb. because when they "the authorities" do have a problem with this they'll get a copy of the program dissect it and see where it phones home. to your web space.
second, don't say it's for your brother, mother father whatever, it could be your best mate or your worst enemy, or a company a bank etc... we don't know, your simple assurance isn't assuring anyone!
you got the next bit right though, if you have 100 people sending a message every ten seconds, that'll be a lot of traffic, but why stop every ten seconds, why not ten every second? that'll make the effect 100 times worse!
anyway, as for the next bit...
will hot mail sue you...
that rather depends on how much damage you do.
sending unsolicited email is a crime. taking out out one of hot mails servers won't make them happy.
your sure that your brother won't report you? why? cause he's your brother.
well why do you need 100 machines and a bot net, why not do it all from one machine? sending from 1 machine will be annoying, sending from 100 machines at one every ten seconds, (so 600 per minute) in a never ending unstoppable loop, will be downright frustrating. and you;ll have little to no control over it once it starts, especially if you've made a mistake.
just cause you're under 18 doesn't mean a thing. you'd still get arrested, and tried as a minor.
I was actually planning on using G-mail to send the messages because I know their SMTP port, and I have an account set up specifically for this purpose... Would that not be okay with them? I'm talking about around 600 - 3000 messages per minute here (from the same account)
And no, I was going to "hide" the code in something I made like an advanced calculator or alarm clock or something... I'll upload it (my program) and share the download link via sites like YouTube and Facebook. The people will have a choice to install it, but they won't know about the e-mails which it will send.
yeah, cause if hotmail won't sue you for buggering up their servers, then why not try abusing googles servers instead.
why do you even need to relay this through googles servers?
why can't the program just establish a connection on port 25 and send the email direct to hotmails servers?
I also imagine that Google won't really want you relaying through their servers, and probably have something to stop spammers relaying stuff through their servers.
as for hiding your stuff in another program, we'll just use the proper term and call it a trojan?
all in all, it's a bad idea.
your brother won't like you if you fill his email box with 100 emails.
hotmail won't like you if you take out one of their mail servers by flooding one with 600 emails a minute.
google won't like you for relaying 600 emails a minute through their servers.
you don't even know how many will download your program, (one person, ten people, a hundred, a million?). so you have little to no control over how many people will be sending the emails,
if 1 person downloads it'll be 6 emails a minute.
if a million run your program it'll be six hundred thousand emails a minute.
and yes, you will get into trouble for that.
