Spam: How to Avoid Junkmail by Myrddin

Background Information

Spam is a very common problem on the Internet today... very few people are completely free of spam. Most spam is someone attempting to make money off of you, by selling you a product, or tricking you into giving them your credit card or bank information. They send out millions, BILLIONS of these emails, and only a teensy weensy fraction of people get tricked... but it costs so little to send the spam that they still make money.

There is no easy way to track down the spammers either, because most of them send spam through proxies and zombies... computers that got infected by special viruses designed to allow the spammer to send spam through them without the owner's knowledge or permission.

Once it is on a list, spammers trade and sell emails to each other, so even if you can get yourself off of ONE spammer's list, the rest have your message already... it is kind of depressing. And your email address can get on their lists in many ways, not all of which are under your control.

Some example ways to get on spam lists:

Cute websites with a box that lets you 'send this to a friend'.
Signup forms for websites.
They can guess your address if it is simple enough.
Emails forwarded and forwarded and forwarded with dozens of emails visible to everyone who gets it.

Spammers take pains to prevent you from easily blocking them... they randomly change the address they send from, put odd characters in the message and subject to foil filtering, and use thousands of different computers to send the spam from. As fast as ways are invented to block spam, spammers are inventing ways of getting around the blocks.

What You Can Do

There are many things you can do to both prevent getting on spam lists, or to avoid the spam once your address has been discovered.

To avoid getting on spam lists, be careful who you give your address to. It is common for people to maintain a 'junk email' and a real email. Junk emails are often setup with free email providers, like Hotmail, Yahoo, or Gmail. When you have to give your address to a website or a retailer, and you do not want them to get your real address, give them your junk email. This way, if a website is dishonest and sells your address, they will be selling your unimportant address. Only your friends, family, and business associates get your real email.

Another important part of not getting spam involves educating your friends and family in proper emailing behavior. Teach them to use BCC when sending emails to many people. It is polite Internet behavior. You can also tell them not to enter your email address in any website... some websites are scams, made specifically to collect addresses entered by well-meaning but misguided friends.

Spammers don't need to be told where you are either... sometimes they can just guess. Especially if your address is very short (less than 5 characters long before the @ sign) or is very common (like qbaker or jessicap) it can be guessed without you having to do anything. Dotnet rejects thousands of emails per day that are sent to addresses that don't exist, as spammers try to guess which emails work and which do not. Choosing an email address that is more complicated... like an uncommon nickname, or using added numbers, or just making it longer... can help prevent them from guessing your address.

Once they have your address, the problem gets harder. There are many ways to filter your email, but the spammers are also finding ever new ways of avoiding those filters. The fastest and quickest way to completely eliminate the spam you get is simply to change your email address. This obviously has drawbacks... you have to give all your friends and business acquaintances your new address, change your email settings, and possibly make up new business cards. And eventually the spammers will find you again.

You can download or purchase programs that filter junkmail from your inbox as it arrives. A popular program to do this is Mailwasher Get it Here, which lets you skim your mail before fetching it. Mailwasher is free to try, but after you try it you need to pay $37. Another way to clean your mail is to use a different email program. Office Outlook and Outlook Express both offer little to no protection from spam. A free email program that does is Mozilla Thunderbird Get it Here. Another way to prevent junkmail is to add junkmail filtering to your Dotnet service. Our filtering (provided by Postini) is quite good, reviews have shown it to be more accurate than any other filter. The downside is that it costs extra... spam filtering from Dotnet adds $2.99 to your monthly bill. However, if you signup for yearly unlimited dialup service, you can ask for the special and get spam and virus filtering for free. Residential wireless and DSL customers also get filtering for free. Call or email our billing department for details.

Spam: How to Avoid Junkmail by Myrddin

Background Information

What You Can Do

Other Questions