In the Internet age, not only are you fighting junk mail in your mailbox, but you’ve also got exorbitant amounts of spam in your virtual inbox. In addition to being annoying, these e-mails can introduce viruses and spyware into your computer. While there are several different ways to combat spam, here’s a look at some of the best ways to do this.
Steps
1.
Look for warning signs. There are three simple ways to try to tell if an email program is spam.
Look at the ‘person’s’ name. When looking at your mail, look closely at the person or robot’s ‘name’. Most spam is named with a first name and a last name, i.e. Morgan Freeman, Taylor McJessie. Do you recognize the name? If not, it’s probably spam. Remember that most message users use nicknames.
Look at the time it was sent. Most spam is sent between midnight and 4:00am.
Look at the file size. Almost all spam will be 3KB. Most spam will contain a small sentence like “Hey, I’m Victoria, wanna date,” and include a link to a webpage. At the end of the link, will be a mix of random letters. Do not click the link.
If you’ve done the above three things and still aren’t sure, click on the message. Clicking on the message will not harm anything, but if there’s a link, do not click it!
2.
Stop posting your e-mail address on a public forum or website. It is estimated that 95% of all junk e-mail is caused by a person publicly disclosing his or her e-mail address. There are many robots and scripts that automatically scan websites for e-mail addresses. Also, sometimes humans actually grab e-mails off websites to use them for sign-up offers in order to get free stuff (iPods, Ringtones, Televisions, etc.).
If you must provide contact information, try writing it out in creative ways such as Me ~at~ yahoo ~dotcom~. There are alternative ways of displaying your email address while making it hard for spambots to harvest it. Such methods include using image picture of your email address or using Javascript to dynamic construct the display of your email.
3.
Avoid certain sites and software programs.These include the following:
Popular newsgroups. Robots often scour these lists for addresses.
Software like BonzaiBuddy or similar programs. If these companies don’t immediately sell your information to a spam company, they are subsidiaries of spam companies themselves and the software is spyware
Chat rooms like Yahoo Chat or IRC. Spammers or spambots are actively mining in popular chat rooms like AOL and Yahoo chats, where e-mail addresses can be correctly guessed just by adding the proper@whatever.com to the username of a chat room visitor.
4.
Use spam blocking tools. Most webmail providers offer them, or you can download one.
Use the “This is spam” button if your email provider has one. This submits the email to their spam-control people who can take care of business and improve their anti-spam filters.
If you have a Yahoo! account you can use their discardable addresses method.
Use Spam Gourmet, or others like it, with any email account
If you are using MS Outlook, try installing a spam filtering plugin, for example SpamAid or SpamReader
Use the ‘Block’ list and add the spammer’s domain name only. (However, this may not be that effective, since spammers normally use temporary addresses).
Limit incoming e-mails to those in your address book and have all others put into a “Junk” folder, which you can skim through quickly and clear regularly.
5.
Report spam. Before you delete your spam, forward your spam to: spam@uce.gov as this is the Spam box for FTC (Federal Trade Commission). Mail sent to this box is investigated. If it is indeed spam, the original sender can be charged $500 per email. The more mail they get from different users but same spammer, the more it’s likely to be investigated.
6.
Use disposable addresses to identify and shake off sources of spam. Have one main account.
Make a separate account for different purposes (one for friends, one for entertainment sites, one for your financial websites, etc.).
Set all those addresses to forward the mail to your main account so that you don’t have to check multiple accounts.
If you start receiving spam through one of your alternates, you can trace it to one of your disposable addresses and simply delete that account.
If you start receiving spam through one of your alternates, you can trace it to one of your disposable addresses and simply delete that account.
7.
Avoid clicking links within Wiki essays.
A current spam attack involves “essay spammers”, where spammers insert random links to sites related to essay-writing services. Another spam attack is spambots creating random pages related to subjects like UGG Boots. These pages also include random links to other subjects, whether or not they’re related to the subject or even placed in a grammatically coherent way.
Source: wikihow.com