AntiSpam Resources & Information

Avoid, Shun, Thwart, Prevent, and then Filter Spam

Email is rapidly becoming the standard means of communication among businesses, associates, and even friends. While many people have now been using the internet and email for years, there are thousands of new users on the internet each day. With inexpensive web hosting, free email services, and the blog burst upon us, getting your own slice of the internet pie has never been easier.

Whether you're a seasoned professional looking for a refresher course, or you're new to the internet and email and want to start off right, here are some easy steps to follow to reduce the amount of spam you receive.

Don't choose an obvious email address. Spammers will generate lists of email addresses based on common names. A common list would be something like: nick@yahoo.com, nick1@yahoo.com, nick2@yahoo.com, etc. If you create an email account with less obvious combinations of your name plus some numbers, chances are better that you won't find your way onto one of these lists.

Treat your personal email address with care. Only give out your personal email address to close friends and family who you trust. Give your direct business email only to clients and other contacts you trust to only use your address for legitimate business purposes.

Use different accounts for different functions. Create different aliases with your business's domain name or create a few free accounts from free email servers like Hotmail, Yahoo!, Excite, etc. Use one account that you don't care about for posting to forums or discussion groups. Use another to subscribe to newsletters and newsgroups. When any of these addresses starts to get spammed too heavily, simply delete the account and switch to a different one.

Remove your email address from your website. Between blogs and cheap web space, it seems everyone has their own piece of cyberspace. Before you put a link to your email address on your site, remember that spammers have bots that harvest these addresses. They will even find addresses printed in plain text. Consider using a web-based form for communication from you website, or place your address as a gif or jpeg.

Do NOT open, respond to, or purchase from spam. Interacting with spam in any of these ways indicates to the spammer that not only is your address valid, it's also active. Do not respond with "unsubscribe" in the subject line, or click on any links to remove your name out of the database, as both of these are common ploys to confirm your email address. Remember, because sending email is so inexpensive, spamming can be profitable even if only a small percentage of people purchase what they're selling. Don't support what you're trying to stop.

Finally, Filter your incoming email using filtering software. Even if you guard your email address religiously, you'll likely still receive spam. Filtering software is usually inexpensive and effective, but there are some important features to consider with any filtering package:

Make sure you can control what comes to your inbox and what gets deleted. The best programs create a spam folder for you to review before permanently deleting emails.

The software should block images from incoming emails. Many jpegs in spam actually hide code that notifies the spammer when the email is viewed. Blocking images will not only keep offensive content off your screen but will also help prevent more spam in the future.

Choose software that provides you with updates - as new spamming techniques are created and proliferated, filtering software should keep up.

While eliminating spam from coming to your email address is nigh unto impossible, following these simple steps will mean you'll have to spend less time deleting spam from your inbox, giving you more time for the important things of life –- like reading this article.

Nick Smith is a client account specialist with 10x Marketing - More Visitors. More Buyers. More Revenue. Find more information about how to filter spam at ContentWatch, Inc.

Related AntiSpam Articles

Mosaic Technology Partners With Cisco Company IronPort -- Addition of Anti-spam, Anti-virus and Anti-spyware Appliances Boosts Security Offerings
Mosaic Technology expands security offerings with new partnership with leading security appliance vendor IronPort. Mosaic will market email security, web security, and security management appliances to SMB and Enterprise customers.

How SPAM Sells Sex, Greed, and Survival
The unsolicited email people react to most is what yells for money through our base needs involving sex, greed and survival.Selfish SPAMMER messages are more clear to understand than all the subtle appearances of simple unsolicited email such as misdirected messages with incorrect email addresses.

I Must Be The Luckiest Person Alive! Spam
I must be the luckiest person alive! My inbox is just crammed with good news, great advice, and millions in accounts just needing the ok from me. Right now, I've two million euros just waiting to be claimed.

Spam-Free, Virus-Free Woomail is Not Your Grandfather's Email
Internet users the world over are dumping traditional email in favor of Woomail - the world's safest email - because it is spam free, virus free and offers present-day benefits that old timer web mail providers such as hotmail and yahoo cannot - shelter from spammers and tools to protect information from identity theft.

How To Be More Specific In Blocking Spam
Spam is oftenly thought to be such a difficult subject. But actually, it is not as difficult to comprehend as much as you think it is. But to correct any wrong perceptions regarding spam, spam is any form of junk mail that contains nothing else but advertisements. These advertisements are not ones that you asked for. They are ones that advertise products that you do not even know were invented. See just how bad and evil spam is?

AOL Spam Filtering Technology
American Online (AOL) is one of the major mail administrators in the internet industry. AOL like other mail administrators provides a quality service in terms of its mailing procedures and formats. Optimizations of emails as well as spam filtering are also part of AOL?s service. Indeed AOL makes a clear runway for their users emails.

Managing Spam in 2005
In 1998, nearly 10% of all email traffic on the internet was SPAM. By 2003 that number had climbed to 50%, and the problem had gotten so bad that Congress passed the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 (Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act)The specific requirements and penalties of that law, (which took effect in 2004) have done little to stem the tide of junk email we all receive.

KnujOn Records 50,000th Spam Website Suspension
The fight against spam and Internet crime is moving a different direction as Project KnujOn expands operations and broadens its reach.

The Importance of Protecting Your PC from Viruses and Spam
Today the internet is a mine field of malicious code looking to harm your computer. Hackers want to have access to your PC for both fun and profit.

Commtouch Opens Email Security Blog to the Public to Share Insights and Early Warnings: Celebrates a Year of Blogging with Anti-Spam Cartoon
Commtouch (NASDAQ:CTCHD) today announced that it is opening up its email security blog, the Commtouch Cafe, to the general public.

Finding The Right Anti Spam Software
Annoyed of going through junk emails each time you access your inbox? I sure was. I felt as I would never complete checking my mail since half of them were spam. To make matters worse, some of the junk was even offensive. I was doubtful that my daughter would open the family email in my presence and in turn get propositioned in our own home! Antispam has come to my rescue. No longer do I worry about spam. The anitspam software is even easy to install.

New Improvements Mean Leading Anti-spam Programme Now Protects Microsoft Exchange Better than Ever
Businesses worldwide using Microsoft Exchange are protected by the SPAMfighter Exchange Module from both spam and viruses.

SpamButcher Announces 'Spam Cats' Photo Contest
SpamButcher is asking users to send them photos of their cats being featured in, or pretending to send, spam e-mail.

Anti Trackback and Comment Spam Methods
What is spam ? Spam is text or URL, in one or several exemplars, neither being waited nor wished, not having, neither directly nor from its shipper, no relationship neither with the recipient nor with a possible resource related to the recipient. How does spam appears in blogs ? Through the comments' body and commentator's URL.

Search Engine Spam
Running an online business relies to a greater or lesser extent on search engine traffic. Be this free search engine traffic or pay per click traffic your business still relies on the search engines to profit and survive.