Spam blacklist Nixspam switched off

The spam blacklist Nixspam (ix.dnsbl.manitu.net) from iX magazine and the hoster manitu has been switched off. Since 16.01.2025, the DNS blacklist no longer contains any entries. All blacklist responses now only return "no spam" as the result of the check.

As the nixspam blacklist was used by many AntiSpam systems, it should now be checked whether nixspam is still in use. The list is still available for at least 6 months, but no longer delivers any hits. Therefore, this blacklist no longer provides any protection against SPAM. The following text can be found on the heise website regarding the background to the shutdown:

The non-profit project was a joint effort by manitu, iX and others, who took up the race against the spammers with expertise and commitment over more than two decades. Heise Medien appeared in the legal notice of the Nixspam website as the operator and acted as a contact and legal safeguard. The company withdrew as operator in 2024. The web host manitu looked into continuing to operate the website on its own responsibility, but it turned out to be uneconomical to protect against the expected legal risks due to the GDPR and NIS2, among other things, as manitu Managing Director Manuel Schmitt explains. explains in his blog.

Source: DNS blacklist Nixspam ceases operation

The following quote can be found in the linked blog article:

As long as Heise acted as the operator of the blacklist, it was a relatively safe bank, because presumably everyone would have thought twice about messing with them, e.g. if they ended up on the blacklist. If we were the operator, things would certainly be different: Just imagine if a market competitor was on it. Then many other §§ come into play - non-profit or not.

Lawyers and insurers have waved off this point: the cost risk is immense - with 0 "income".

Source: The era of ix.dnsbl.manitu.net comes to an end

I am now asking myself how other blacklist operators are doing, as there are other blacklist operators in the EU (e.g. NordSpam or Blocklist.de). Apparently it is difficult to operate a DNS backlist, which is usually configured voluntarily and queried by users, without having to fear legal consequences. In any case, it is a shame that a service like nixspam, which has worked very reliably for 20 years, is being shut down because of possible legal risks.

Spam blacklist Nixspam switched off
Source: https://www.nixspam.net/

I suspect that this is not how the laws were conceived. Perhaps a secure legal basis should be created here. If the operation of blacklists can no longer be guaranteed without risks, a simple and effective means of blocking spam and malware will no longer be available, and in my opinion this should be prevented at all costs.

3 thoughts on “Spam-Blacklist Nixspam abgeschaltet”

  1. Im Heise-Forum wurde Spamhaus empfohlen:
    „zen.spamhaus.org habe ich immer gerne genutzt, die sind stabil und die Listen sind gut gepflegt.“

    Reply
  2. Schade, diese Liste war ein treuer begleiter in meinen Firewalls….

    Leider hat Frankys Spamschutz zugeschlagen und ich kann meine verbleibenden Spamlisten nicht einfach so posten, daher versuche ich es über Pastebin: https://pastebin.com/Eyea5GfA

    Wie sieht das bei euch aus, was habt ihr noch drin?

    Reply

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