In some cases, the malicious programs systematically falsify the network addresses from which the data is sent.
When filters blocked mail from suspect network addresses, the spammers used botnets (networks of hijacked computers) instead.
It also sends the network addresses of all the infected machines to a designated location on the Internet, permitting those machines to be commandeered remotely.
Armed with a formal but vague go-ahead from one of its advisory panels, the Internet's international oversight body has begun writing a plan for new suffixes that would be added to ones like.com,.net and.org used in network addresses.
[C4.] Internet Agency Settles Dispute With VeriSign Icann, the Internet agency that oversees the assignment of network addresses, has settled a messy dispute with VeriSign, a security and services firm that controls the.com and.net network domains.
The program then searches for other machines on the victim's network and tries to commandeer those as well, sending the network addresses and passwords of each infected machine to a designated Internet location.
The growth in interest in "geolocation" services, which attempt to pinpoint Internet users' locations based on their network addresses, also signals the realisation that traditional marketing techniques, based on geography, can be applied online too.
An article in Business Day on Oct. 25 about the settlement between Icann, which oversees the assignment of network addresses, and VeriSign, which controls the.com and.net domains, misstated the plan for long-term control of Icann when it was started by the Clinton administration.
