WTF is this?

[richard]

<a
href="http://www.dealadvisorswizards.info/320/35/79/229/389.12tt365678AAF1.html">
<!--
SHSQGQGYVH--TKUAEFPQAF--TWSQRVTBLS--IGADWGUFHQ--PBDKBHRRBT--YWRRNJPJMD--CXJDBILVOT--PGUSSWDKQG--EPDXKSJAEW--
EGUPLXYXUP--RMVOFQNKDE--QHWVIJQRLU--QRENIPMJPJ--YHVWYBNMOQ--TFAQEKCUDN--QVIUKSMYCD--IDMEALHPBV--IUEKNIVPFB--FXWPUJIIIK--
NQPAUPOFHP--DRMHDARBRX--CYVYPTJXCT--LPLBRITGNB--XRVKBYMTAE--TEERFVLQTP--LHFWJAHFIV--IHPERSFHOF--LILRDRNOIK--HVROSDOBIX--
YRHQXYJEIY--LUJXOMPDEA--PLWJCRNRUX--RVRYMQAYUJ--XIGJGUWXAD--BRQACSRPMP--PELIDBBEAV--PAEVLNSKNT--NOLEONAJFM--YVRMGUNHBP--
FQRLOEYION--CFEPJTGJDN--WELQQRNHYP--WGIRSAXTIO--JMTOEGKKRN--YQTKHKFVRG--NRNXLIXJCG--XMUUDABNKS--DLKWYTHERC--KFVAGHIESN--
-->

Found this code in an email message source.
Can anyone shed some light as to what the code is rerring to and how it
works?

 

[Jonathan N. Little]

<a
href="SPAM LINK REMOVE">
<!--
SHSQGQGYVH--TKUAEFPQAF--TWSQRVTBLS--IGADWGUFHQ--PBDKBHRRBT--YWRRNJPJMD--CXJDBILVOT--PGUSSWDKQG--EPDXKSJAEW--
EGUPLXYXUP--RMVOFQNKDE--QHWVIJQRLU--QRENIPMJPJ--YHVWYBNMOQ--TFAQEKCUDN--QVIUKSMYCD--IDMEALHPBV--IUEKNIVPFB--FXWPUJIIIK--
NQPAUPOFHP--DRMHDARBRX--CYVYPTJXCT--LPLBRITGNB--XRVKBYMTAE--TEERFVLQTP--LHFWJAHFIV--IHPERSFHOF--LILRDRNOIK--HVROSDOBIX--
YRHQXYJEIY--LUJXOMPDEA--PLWJCRNRUX--RVRYMQAYUJ--XIGJGUWXAD--BRQACSRPMP--PELIDBBEAV--PAEVLNSKNT--NOLEONAJFM--YVRMGUNHBP--
FQRLOEYION--CFEPJTGJDN--WELQQRNHYP--WGIRSAXTIO--JMTOEGKKRN--YQTKHKFVRG--NRNXLIXJCG--XMUUDABNKS--DLKWYTHERC--KFVAGHIESN--
-->

Found this code in an email message source.
Can anyone shed some light as to what the code is rerring to and how it
works?

SPAM

 

[JJ]

<a
href="crap">
<!--
SHSQGQGYVH--TKUAEFPQAF--TWSQRVTBLS--IGADWGUFHQ--PBDKBHRRBT--YWRRNJPJMD--CXJDBILVOT--PGUSSWDKQG--EPDXKSJAEW--
EGUPLXYXUP--RMVOFQNKDE--QHWVIJQRLU--QRENIPMJPJ--YHVWYBNMOQ--TFAQEKCUDN--QVIUKSMYCD--IDMEALHPBV--IUEKNIVPFB--FXWPUJIIIK--
NQPAUPOFHP--DRMHDARBRX--CYVYPTJXCT--LPLBRITGNB--XRVKBYMTAE--TEERFVLQTP--LHFWJAHFIV--IHPERSFHOF--LILRDRNOIK--HVROSDOBIX--
YRHQXYJEIY--LUJXOMPDEA--PLWJCRNRUX--RVRYMQAYUJ--XIGJGUWXAD--BRQACSRPMP--PELIDBBEAV--PAEVLNSKNT--NOLEONAJFM--YVRMGUNHBP--
FQRLOEYION--CFEPJTGJDN--WELQQRNHYP--WGIRSAXTIO--JMTOEGKKRN--YQTKHKFVRG--NRNXLIXJCG--XMUUDABNKS--DLKWYTHERC--KFVAGHIESN--
-->

Found this code in an email message source.
Can anyone shed some light as to what the code is rerring to and how it
works?

It's not in a form of common data encoding and it's too uniform. It's likely
garbage since it's near a spam link. Even if it's custom encoded, spam data
won't be any good for anything.

 

[Lewis]

<!--
SHSQGQGYVH--TKUAEFPQAF--TWSQRVTBLS--IGADWGUFHQ--PBDKBHRRBT--YWRRNJPJMD--CXJDBILVOT--PGUSSWDKQG--EPDXKSJAEW--
EGUPLXYXUP--RMVOFQNKDE--QHWVIJQRLU--QRENIPMJPJ--YHVWYBNMOQ--TFAQEKCUDN--QVIUKSMYCD--IDMEALHPBV--IUEKNIVPFB--FXWPUJIIIK--
NQPAUPOFHP--DRMHDARBRX--CYVYPTJXCT--LPLBRITGNB--XRVKBYMTAE--TEERFVLQTP--LHFWJAHFIV--IHPERSFHOF--LILRDRNOIK--HVROSDOBIX--
YRHQXYJEIY--LUJXOMPDEA--PLWJCRNRUX--RVRYMQAYUJ--XIGJGUWXAD--BRQACSRPMP--PELIDBBEAV--PAEVLNSKNT--NOLEONAJFM--YVRMGUNHBP--
FQRLOEYION--CFEPJTGJDN--WELQQRNHYP--WGIRSAXTIO--JMTOEGKKRN--YQTKHKFVRG--NRNXLIXJCG--XMUUDABNKS--DLKWYTHERC--KFVAGHIESN--
-->

Found this code in an email message source. Can anyone shed some light
as to what the code is rerring to

That is a comment block.

and how it works?

It doesn't 'work'. It's just a comment block.

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

<!--
SHSQGQGYVH--TKUAEFPQAF--TWSQRVTBLS--IGADWGUFHQ--PBDKBHRRBT--YWRRNJPJMD--CXJDBILVOT--PGUSSWDKQG--EPDXKSJAEW--
EGUPLXYXUP--RMVOFQNKDE--QHWVIJQRLU--QRENIPMJPJ--YHVWYBNMOQ--TFAQEKCUDN--QVIUKSMYCD--IDMEALHPBV--IUEKNIVPFB--FXWPUJIIIK--
NQPAUPOFHP--DRMHDARBRX--CYVYPTJXCT--LPLBRITGNB--XRVKBYMTAE--TEERFVLQTP--LHFWJAHFIV--IHPERSFHOF--LILRDRNOIK--HVROSDOBIX--
YRHQXYJEIY--LUJXOMPDEA--PLWJCRNRUX--RVRYMQAYUJ--XIGJGUWXAD--BRQACSRPMP--PELIDBBEAV--PAEVLNSKNT--NOLEONAJFM--YVRMGUNHBP--
FQRLOEYION--CFEPJTGJDN--WELQQRNHYP--WGIRSAXTIO--JMTOEGKKRN--YQTKHKFVRG--NRNXLIXJCG--XMUUDABNKS--DLKWYTHERC--KFVAGHIESN--
-->

[...]
That is a comment block.

It looks like a comment declaration ("comment block"), but it isn't.
Trying to validate a document with that foolishness causes an error
message like

invalid comment declaration: found name start character outside comment
but inside comment declaration.

It doesn't 'work'. It's just a comment block.

There are no requirements on what browsers should do with a document
containing such a malformed construct. In practice, they may use broken
comment declaration parsing and really treat it as a comment declaration.

The question was nonsensical, but there's a lesson to be learned from
the answer: don't use a pair of hyphens "--" inside a comment declaration.

 

[Tim Streater]

Spam right? It's an attempt to get around Bayesian filters.

You can't get round bayesian filters this way. The above (assuming you
tokenise on the '--') will give a series of tokens with a count of 1 in
the tokens database. They won't be used when assessing the spamminess of
the mail.

 

[Lewis]

2013-04-02 12:56, Lewis wrote:

[...]
That is a comment block.

It looks like a comment declaration ("comment block"), but it isn't.
Trying to validate a document with that foolishness causes an error
message like

This is because there are double dashes '--' in the block. If you
eliminate a single - from it, it will validate, sort of. At least BBEdit
then sees it as a comment (though it will give an error).

I admit, I have no idea why this is. Removing anyother -- doesn't fix
it, but removing any group of characters AN the following/preceding --
fixes it also.

Very odd.

The question was nonsensical, but there's a lesson to be learned from
the answer: don't use a pair of hyphens "--" inside a comment declaration.

At least in HTML4/HTML5, the string "--" in comments is completely
forbidden.

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

This is because there are double dashes '--' in the block.

Technically, no. It is not the second "--" that triggers a validator
error message but the letter after it, in the construct that starts with

<!--
SHSQGQGYVH--TKUAEFPQAF

Very odd.

It's explained well at
http://www.htmlhelp.com/reference/wilbur/misc/comment.html

At least in HTML4/HTML5, the string "--" in comments is completely
forbidden.

In HTML 4, that is formally true, but just because "comment" means
something else than you (or most people) think. The string "--" is not
allowed within a comment, but it is allowed within a comment
declaration, under certain rules. The following is syntactically correct
(though not advisable) in HTML 4:

<!-- Hello -- -- Hello-->

HTML5 simplifies things: it has just a "comment" concept, which
corresponds to a simplified form of SGML comment declaration, and indeed
forbids any "--" inside a comment.

So here's yet another reason why it is incorrect to say that any HTML
1.0 Strict document is valid HTML5.

 

[Lewis]

2013-04-03 3:31, Lewis wrote:

Technically, no. It is not the second "--" that triggers a validator
error message but the letter after it, in the construct that starts with

That is because the '--' is only allowed as part of the closing tag, '-->' when the > is not there, the error occurs.

In HTML 4, that is formally true, but just because "comment" means
something else than you (or most people) think. The string "--" is not
allowed within a comment, but it is allowed within a comment
declaration, under certain rules. The following is syntactically correct
(though not advisable) in HTML 4:

<!-- Hello -- -- Hello-->

It throws errors here, but I did not check it agains the w3 validator.

I tested:

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd">
<html lang="en">
<head>
</head>
<body>
<!-- -- Test -->
<h1>This is a header</h1>
</body>
</html>

And BBEdit not only errors, but it doesn't see the comment block as
closed, so the rest of the document shows up in syntax coloring as a
comment. It does display the file "correctly".

And throws the error:

"untitled text 5:15: Unexpected EOF; document ended in the middle of an
SGML Comment."

HTML5 simplifies things: it has just a "comment" concept, which
corresponds to a simplified form of SGML comment declaration, and indeed
forbids any "--" inside a comment.

So here's yet another reason why it is incorrect to say that any HTML
1.0 Strict document is valid HTML5.

HTML 1.0?

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

2013-04-03 19:13, Lewis ?rote:

That is because the '--' is only allowed as part of the closing tag,
'-->' when the > is not there, the error occurs.

Not correct. There is no tag involved; it's a comment declaration in
SGML, comment in XML. In SGML, '>' terminates it, and '--' is a comment
delimiter. In XML, '-->' is a comment terminator, but not a "closing tag".

It throws errors here, but I did not check it agains the w3
validator.

In HTML 4.01, it is valid and contains two comments.

I tested:

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd"> <html lang="en"> <head>
</head> <body> <!-- -- Test --> <h1>This is a header</h1> </body>
</html>

That's something completely different. Here you have something that
starts like a comment declaration that contains first the comment
'-- --' and then 'Test', which makes it invalid.

HTML 1.0?

Sorry, HTML 4.01.

 

[jfaerber172]

SHSQGQGYVH--TKUAEFPQAF--TWSQRVTBLS--IGADWGUFHQ--PBDKBHRRBT--YWRRNJPJMD--CXJDBILVOT--PGUSSWDKQG--EPDXKSJAEW--

EGUPLXYXUP--RMVOFQNKDE--QHWVIJQRLU--QRENIPMJPJ--YHVWYBNMOQ--TFAQEKCUDN--QVIUKSMYCD--IDMEALHPBV--IUEKNIVPFB--FXWPUJIIIK--

NQPAUPOFHP--DRMHDARBRX--CYVYPTJXCT--LPLBRITGNB--XRVKBYMTAE--TEERFVLQTP--LHFWJAHFIV--IHPERSFHOF--LILRDRNOIK--HVROSDOBIX--

YRHQXYJEIY--LUJXOMPDEA--PLWJCRNRUX--RVRYMQAYUJ--XIGJGUWXAD--BRQACSRPMP--PELIDBBEAV--PAEVLNSKNT--NOLEONAJFM--YVRMGUNHBP--

FQRLOEYION--CFEPJTGJDN--WELQQRNHYP--WGIRSAXTIO--JMTOEGKKRN--YQTKHKFVRG--NRNXLIXJCG--XMUUDABNKS--DLKWYTHERC--KFVAGHIESN--

Can anyone shed some light as to what the code is rerring to and how it

works?

http://www.ngenerator.com/

Input Data:
Total passwords to generate: 49
Length of each password: 10
Check only "Character Set (A..Z):"

Output Formatting:
Separator: --

Here you are e.g.:

DRVWZLCTSE--AFGHZOQGTP--YDNWVZLESC--ABQEZIVPYE--KWDXVGPEOR--RVUBWDYISM--FPLNNWBMTE--BTDCQQFBCI--PLYRNUIXTY--QYTNLNOFTL--XAZDMUJJMP--ZBXTFOYHAW--EQBFQCNAIV--ZQBBKCMCRD--JNGIOKCYFQ--QYSZJJXLHU--WAEZWZAHEW--NAHBRWOOQF--ZHEBDPFLRF--TLZTHBRUKM--VGEIHSUHQJ--LMOBAWJQQN--KOQDQPWZIH--GQMKUCFFIL--KHIJVUEUYJ--HDRMICHYTW--QNTDVLVURB--FDCSZPXSOJ--EXQHWEDCDE--ZWNVGHFVGM--KLKIBNDKZH--ENUBLMBACP--LLLAYDUMUN--VKYHZMKBMJ--RWEJMKZOOX--AQKBIKPTPX--WWPZXKFLYG--EIHXDBZCWF--XAQKFXUJBK--PRWRIMOIAF--MNMJXXKDQK--HDVFNZXBMT--BMCHTGXLLO--DJTTMKNFER--IFKXZCGPIV--LXUSAOMHSO--VZPAZFMYSG--EPXTEXQNVZ--TGZIDKIBHV--

(& Finally comment it out.)