Anyone who has had an e-mail account for more than twenty three and a quarter milliseconds has received Spam, so theres no need for a lengthy description of it. Basically, Spam is unsolicited advertising e-mail messages. It is also a really tasty meat product that goes great with pineapples and sliced jalapenos, but thats not the kind were dealing with here. My goal for this article is to give you a few pointers on how to reduce the amount of Spam you receive or possibly eliminate it, and some ways to deal with it when you do get it. Before we get started, you should understand that there are two kinds of e-mail advertising. Opt-in and Opt-outOpt-out is Spam. Opt-in is any sort of commercial mail, such as newsletters, catalogs and sales flyers that you have agreed to accept. Usually, you agree to accept these as a condition, reward or benefit of registering with an online service (remember PriceLine?). Be careful about the difference. If you get a message that you believe is Spam, think first about any agreements you may have made recently. It would be really poor form to report a legitimate, sweet, loving, angelic emailer as a putrid tool of the Devil, Spammer. With that in mind, to the ramparts! Attempt to EliminateI dont believe that you can
totally eliminate Spam, but this is as close as you can get:
While this method seems foolproof, I have heard anecdotal evidence that some Spam has slipped through, so I cant guarantee it. Also, remember that this will not protect you from any virus that an "approved" sender might mail you. You should also keep in mind that this will prevent you from receiving any mail you have requested, such as newsletters you sign up for, unless you can get their address into your address book first. This can be very annoying as when your Uncle Finsters lawyer sends you a message that the old boy is about to croak and youll not get a dime of the inheritance unless you show up at his bedside pronto. Anti-Spam Mail AccountsThis one usually incurs a fee, so move on if youre a cheapskate. There are mail systems out there
whose main claim to fame is the near total elimination of Spam,
as well as aggressively reporting Spammers. These services use
a combination of methods to prevent Spam. Ill give a quick
description of the most famous one, SpamCop (URL listed at end).
When you sign up with SpamCop, give them a list of approved sender
addresses. Mail from these senders will pass through unimpeded,
exactly as in the Hotmail example previously mentioned. If you do receive Spam, you report it to the mail service and theyll take care of reporting it. If a provider causes a lot of complaints from members, then that provider will be considered scum of the earth and placed on the bad list. You dont totally eliminate the Spam, but you do cut it way down and get the satisfaction that providers who generate a lot of Spam will be inconvenienced. Try to Fight BackAh, you valiant fool. Do not go quietly. . . Rage, Rage! Fighting back is OK as long as you understand that you will ultimately lose. At best, you may close down a few Spammers accounts, but they will just open new ones. At worst, your mail account may become unusable. But if you want to try...When you open a message that turns out to be Spam, there will almost certainly be a link at the bottom that you can click on to cancel further messages. This seems pretty easy, just click and end the torment. Right? Dont you believe it! What youre really doing is proving to the Spammer that your e-mail account is valid and that you read Spam. The vicious little insect will then sell your address to others of its species and you will be inundated. You could try reporting the Spammer. This may give you some personal satisfaction, but dont think for a minute that itll accomplish much. First off, youll need to set your e-mail system to "display full header information." What youre doing here is inserting all of the available routing history into the message when its displayed, rather than just who sent it to you and the date of transmission. This will, hopefully, give enough information to the Spammers provider that they can track down the weasel. The downside is that the full display
option takes up more space. Itll also insert a mountain
of text into your mail when you forward messages. You can delete
it, but its extra work to do so. Your email service providers Help should tell you where to report Spammers, but usually it will be "abuse@" followed by the providers name. For example, abuse@yahoo.com. You need to forward the Spam message
to the "abuse@" address, making sure that you have
the full header showing. Now the problem with that is that you
had to open the Spam to forward it. Guess what? The Spammer may
now know that you read the message and you will again be inundated. Now, you can use certain tools to
try and trace the Spammers yourself and report them. Another program from Net Services is Spam Hater (http://www.cix.co.uk/~net-services/spam/spam_ hater.htm). This program is supposed to help you trace and report Spammers as well. I havent tried either (Whois is freeware by the way), but they may be worth a look. Accept Fate, But Reduce the PainAs you may have noticed by now, Im a bit of a fatalist. Then too, I dont have time to go chasing Spammers and Ill bet you dont either. Of course, if youre truly committed to going after the vermin, I applaud you. If I were retired or even just single, I would certainly take a shot at them now and then. All I do is delete any and all messages that I do not recognize. Thats it. The whole Tamale. Spammers have a way to get notices that you opened their mail. Ill say it again, whenever you open a Spam message, the Spammer knows it. Now you have just verified that your address is valid. Your address will be sold. You will get more Spam. End of story. Whenever I forwarded Spam from Hotmail accounts to abuse@hotmail to report them, I got replies that there was nothing that could be done because the addresses in the message were fake. Within days, I was flooded with Spam from hotmail addresses. The same results from Yahoo and Netscape. On and on. When I started simply deleting the Spam, the volume slowly decreased. Well, on my Hotmail account there is one other thing I do; perhaps your account has a similar feature. In Options go to Inbox Protector under Mail Handling. In the Level of Protection, select Custom and then check only--Your address appears on the "To:" or "Cc" line and The senders address is in your Hotmail Address Book. This seems to have cut down on my Spam somewhat, but its not certain. Well, thats it. The sites listed next can give you much more information. If you really want to fight, check them out. More Info and HelpHere are links to some sites that will give you more information and help on fighting Spam
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Brian has worked in Tech Writing, Training, Quality Testing and Help Desk, as well as some Web Development. He is a regular at the Internet SIG. |