Challenge response for bitlbee created

Sigh. Every useful medium for communication eventually gets ran over by spammers. In my case I’m now getting several Yahoo “spims” a day. Since my role at Yahoo is coming to a close, I’ve got little need to keep an official Y! client running. I do use Y! instant messenger for communicating with family members, and I do want to keep in touch with Yahoos.

My ultimate solution to the problem, is to use bitlbee, a multiprotocol messenging gateway that interfaces with IRC clients. On top of this, I’ve added a challenge/response system so that if someone messages me that is not in my contact list, they get an automatic response back, saying what they need to do to contact me. This can either be a keyword in the message, or alternately my email contact info is provided.

You are welcome to use my bitlbee challenge/response patch; please drop me a note (jfesler@gigo.com) if you found it useful!