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 Which script should I use?
Author: C.Combs   (15 Jan 05 2:55am)
I am an attorney here in California and I am litigating two spam suits (which has given me great satisfaction). I would really like to install project honyepot to help me put more spammers out of business. And, although I am knowledgeable enough to hand code my own Web site, I got lost when trying to install the Project Honeypot Scripts.

I have my domain (www.combslaw.cc) hosted with a third party. The server is running Unix, but I have no idea what flavor. Should I use PHP or Moveable type or what? What would be the easiest? I would pay somebody to help me if it was not too expensive ...

CC
 
 Re: Which script should I use?
Author: M.Prince   (15 Jan 05 4:33am)
Thanks for your interest in the Project. Maybe we could work out some sort of trade where you help us with some California cases against harvesters and we'll help you with the getting a honey pot installed! ;-)

Seriously, great that you want to install a script. It shouldn't be too difficult to do once we figure out exactly what's running on your server. Your choice is really between PHP and Perl. The Movable Type version is really just the Perl version with some hooks for people who run a particular type of blogging software (Movable Type).

PHP and Perl are both scripting languages. Either one will work on your server so long as the underlying scripting language is installed. It looks like you're getting hosting through Affinity/ValueWeb. I checked out their home page and it looks for sure like they have Perl support, so let's go with that....

First, login to your Project Honey Pot account and go to:

http://www.projecthoneypot.org/manage_honey_pots.php

Enter the full domain of the site where you want to install your honey pot. Assuming it's the same as the domain you listed above enter:

www.combslaw.cc

Somewhat unlike donating MX entires, you want what you enter there to be exactly the same as how someone would type to visit your page. After that select that you want the Perl version. Since you donated an MX entry you can choose whether you want to include any MX record in the spamtrap addresses issued from your honey pot, or only those created with the MX(s) you donated. You can also choose whether your honey pots stats will be public or private. You can just leave these as the default (public) setting. You can always change them later. It's easiest to also just allow us to randomly choose a name for your honey pot for you.

After you submit that information our system will take you to a page where you can download a copy of your customized honey pot script. The file you download is compressed with the ZIP program. You can use unzip the package using Winzip or any other program that will handle zipped archives. It will open to a folder containing a number of items.

The first thing to do is find the README file and give it a quick read. The honey pot script itself is the file that ends with the extension .cgi. It will be something like:

immovableobject.cgi

Obviously, for you the name will almost certainly be something different.

You'll need to upload that file to your webserver. The harder question is where you need to put it. Some hosts require that the file go into a CGI directory. Often that's named something like: "cgi-bin" or "cgi". Look around and see if there's such a directory on your webserver. Another good guess is to put it anywhere you find other files that end with .cgi or .pl as these are likely other Perl scripts.

Once you've copied the honey pot script to your server you'll need to login and change the script's permissions. The script is just a text file with instructions, and it will behave as any other document until you set it as being "executable." To do this, navigate to your script from the command line, and then type:

chmod 775 immovableobject.cgi

(Replace "immovableobject.cgi" with the name of your own honey pot script.)

You're 95% of the way finished now. The key at this point is accessing your honey pot script through a web browser. Most likely, you will do this by typing in a URL like:

http://www.combslaw.cc/cgi-bin/immovableobject.cgi

Again, replace "immovableobject.cgi" with your own honey pot script's name. Also, if your CGI folder is not named "cgi-bin" then you'll need to replace that part of the URL with whatever your folder's name is.

Assuming you installed the script in the right place and set the permissions correctly you should see a page with instructions and a link to "ACTIVATE" the script. Click that link and your honey pot will be active. The last step is to add at least one link from your existing pages to the honey pot page, and instructions on how to do that will be presented to you as soon as you activate.

The tricky part is that every host has a slightly different setup. If you have questions, go to your provider's site and search for "CGI" and/or "Perl" in the FAQ. Most likely you'll be able to find the specific instructions you need there.

Good luck. Don't hesitate to post here, or use the contact us form, if you have any more questions and we'll do what we can to help. And we'll definitely be giving you a call when we need to serve a subpoena in California!

Welcome to the Project!
 
 Thank you - HoneyPot Activated!
Author: C.Combs   (16 Jan 05 2:33am)
Thank you so much for taking the time to walk me through the steps. I had actually done all that you suggested above (I promise I read the directions before posting here) but I was using PHP. Perl worked like a charm. I will now create the HTML links as suggested.

Question .... I am running other domains, I assume that posting the links to the honeypot on these other domains will will help direct harvesters on this domain?

I do so look forward to catching some spammers and suing them. This is great.
 
 Re: Which script should I use?
Author: M.Prince   (16 Jan 05 2:40am)
You can include a link from any of your sites to your central honey pot, or you can install multiple honey pots and link to each of them individually. The advantage of the former is that it's easier, the advantage of the later is that you can track the stats for each domain individually. We don't care one way or another, so you should do whatever works best for your situation.

Glad the installation went ok. Thanks for your interest in and help with the Project!

Matthew.



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