ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area SPAM SPAM SPAM!! SHOOT THE MFER!

I am about to travel into cyber space to strangle this SOB! I get about 500 spam messages per week, and I have lost all patience!

Any suggestions? I do use spaminator ...

If you frequent any USENet newsgroups, disguise your email address.

Something like (e.g.) what I just did to my email address here:

svennopants@gordsven.com

At the end of your post, put the following in: remove "nopants" to mail me. That cuts down on the automated spam harvesters. Seen a lot of people on the rec.antiques.radio+phono newsgroup do that.

Avoid the "nospam" since I hear now they've developed programs that actually do pick out the nospam and you're back to where you started. That's why I picked out the wacky "nopants" thing.

Also get a bunko free-bee email address from yahoo or MSN or whatever and use that as much as possible for public postings....most of the spam gets deflected there and when it gets full...dump it and get another account.

Hope this helps.

Hey Joe,

you should see my inbox at the office !!!

boy you think you get a few, its all a load of Bull%&@#.

Been gettin em for ages, but some of the other types of mail i get is porn, now that is something i dont mind gettin as long its the missus whos sendin it to me!!

I have over the past year or to got a load of really dodgy stuff that goes direct to our local law enforment offices. !!

As SvenNYC says, it works wonders but be aware these creatures are very good at what they do.


Have fun !!

John H

Joe;
go here to Spam the Spammers

possibly with this.....

Hehe... Like the new words!

Joe,
I don't know what to say. I only seem to get two or three pieces of this garbage a day at the moment.

The Nigerian "We have $35 million..." messages arrive fairly regularly, but I have a horrible feeling I'm going to start getting more junk very soon, as the last week I've started receiving a lot more of the sleaze-merchants' garbage in my mailbox.

E-Mail Options:
<R>eply to message
<D>elete message
<C>onnect sender across 480 volts

I'm constantly adding senders to the spam list. I got one of the farily common "congo republic needs help" messages, but best thing, yesterday and today somebody sent me a US-only offer for cheap cigarettes. I don't smoke. Oh yes, and the advertisement for quality US-flags was very useful for someone from Austria!

And don't you love the ones that open a browser window before you can hit the delete button!

Ed

I wish I had an answer to this.
I get several Hundred per day that I have to wade through. Sometimes 50 or more of the same thing. It does waste a lot of time. I don't want to use filters if I can avoid it because I might miss something important.

My patience with some of these is definately wearing thin!

On the upside though, I've been approved for a $25,000,000 loan that I won't have to pay back!


Bill

has anyone tried this?

[This message has been edited by sparky (edited 12-14-2002).]

Hi.

I have yet to meet anybody who enjoys receiving those "one time mailings", the "courtesy calls", etc.

Also, be aware that many web sites have "privacy policies" and that your e-mail address may be "shared." That means it can be put on a list so you receive e-mail from vendors that offer "similar products and/or services."

Pauluk, I like the options you listed. However, I think the <C>onnect option is difficult for a number of reasons, though it would probably be quite effective.

The <D>elete option is most likely the best, as frustrating as it is knowing that somebody dumps in your inbox and leaves the mess for you to clean up. As to

<R>eply...that's one I definitely wouldn't use. That can get you twice as much spam.

I have come up with my own little practices and "general rules" for dealing with spam when so much of it is coming in that deleting it is so time consuming:

<Fade in with Monty Python's "SPAM" song.>

...N-E-V-E-R reply to the "if you wish to be removed from this list..." type of bait. They're either going to bounce as undeliverable, or worse, you will be confirming that you are a "live" address. At that point, get ready for more of a deluge. (That, of course, does not apply to legitimate e-mail lists that one has subscribed to. I'm talking about the junk e-mail only.)

...Though this can get to be a real pain, where possible/practical, try to use more than one e-mail address.

Then, if your e-mail program provides the feature, filter your received mail into "folders" so that your messages are separate.

For example, one for your closest correspondents, one for your website (or better yet, use a form that lists no e-mail address), one for mailing lists to which you subscribe, etc. This way, if one of the addresses becomes unbearable due to spam, you can delete the address and replace it with something else. Very much annoying, especially having to go through correspondence to notify people of the new address. However, it should bring down the spam level a bit...until the next time.

...Note that there are "crawler" programs that go through web pages looking for e-mail addresses. If your address is on your web page, chances are you are going to get spam. Thus if you use a form rather than an e-mail address, it should help.

...If you have a domain name, the e-mail address that is registered with your domain will most likely get spam. The spammers crawl the domain registration listings as well. That, however, is a listing that must be a valid e-mail address so the domain registrar can reach you via e-mail.

<Cut to Monty Python's "SPAM" song, then fade out.>