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Don't let Internet junk mail get the best of you. Samantha Amjadali explains what spam mail is and what you can do about it. Last year the debate over cookies highlighted privacy concerns on the Internet. In 1997 the focus has moved to 'spam' — bulk unsolicited junk e-mail which mostly intends to part you from your money. 'EARN $3000 A WEEK!' cries one e-mail as it lands in your inbox. 'MAKE MONEY WHILE YOU SLEEP!' trumpets another. (One of the hallmarks of spammers is that they love using Caps Lock). Spam, curiously named for the processed 'spiced ham' canned meat, can arrive in newsgroups or via direct e-mail. They are usually identical in their content but are delivered very differently. Newsgroup spams are messages posted to newsgroups where the spammer will flood one or more newsgroups with the same hyped-up promises. E-mail spams clog up your mailbox with junk e-mail which forces you to either read it or wade through each item individually and delete them one by one. The subject lines are sometimes shrewdly worded to arouse your attention.
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| How
do spammers get my e-mail address? Spam mail mavens obtain your e-mail address in the same way that traditional junk mail operators get your business or home address: you give it to them. Whenever you use a credit card, enter a competition, visit a trade show or even sign up for a magazine subscription, you are handing your postal details over to someone who may add you to a list. This list can then be offered for sale to companies who feel you may be interested in their wares. It's the same with spam mail, only worse. Any Web site or real-world situation where e-mail addresses are supplied is a potential target. 'List brokers' offer multi-megabtye lists or even entire CD-ROMs filled with e-mail addresses to anyone who will pay for them. Other organisations and even individuals will gladly send spammed messages to names on their private databases — for a fee, of course. There are many other devious methods for gathering e-mail addresses. Because all e-mail addresses conform to a common format of name@ domain.extension it's not difficult for specially-designed spam programs, of which Email Magnet is one of the most popular, to scan Web pages, newsgroups, chat channels and bulletin boards and extract any string of words matching the e-mail address format. Online directories such as Bigfoot (http://www.bigfoot.com) and Four11 (http://www.four11.com), which contain names and e-mail addresses, are another goldmine for address scanners. Spammers have been known to set up e-mail newsletters with tempting titles, to lure unsuspecting Internauts into submitting their address. There are even programs that can subscribe to mailing lists and then steal all the names and addresses sometimes exposed in the CC field of a message sent to the list.
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 Junk mail: Spam messages clutter newsgroups as well as e-mail Inboxes. Filters can help delete such messages based on key words in the subject line. |
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| Avoiding
spam Considering that anyone with Internet access is going to participate in newsgroups, mailing lists, interactive or personalised Web sites or some other activity mentioned above, this news is hardly encouraging. Here are our tips on staying one step ahead of the spam merchants.
Spam-stoppers contain additional characters to make the address invalid while providing real users with a clue of how to obtain your correct e-mail address. For example, if your e-mail address is polgara@wizard.com.au you could instruct your newsreader to show the address as polgara@wizard.com.au@remove-this-bit-for-my-real-address. Filtering software is unable to recognise the address, so any spam mail sent to this address is bounced back to the sender.
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 Face of the enemy: An entire industry has sprung up around the delivery of spam mail. This site offers specialised software, mailing lists and even Internet access to spammers. |
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| Fighting
back If you are already a harassed victim of spamming, the first step is asking to be removed from their mailing lists. In theory this should only require a simple "unsubscribe" in the subject field but in practice it either never happens or takes days to eventuate — assuming you can contact the spammer. Many spammers use a fake return address — or, in a fit of spite, the real address of someone totally unconnected. So if you add that address to a dozen other spam lists or send off one of those nefarious tools known as a 'mail bomb', it may only end up annoying an innocent fellow Net user. There's another good reason for not responding. Some spammers often use replies to their messages to verify that an account is active. Ignore this spam and it may go away. So, when you get unwanted junk e-mail, try one of the dozens of 'dob-in-a-spammer' type pages such as http://www.junkbusters.com and http://www.suburbia.com.au/spam/report.html You can also move a little further up the feeding chain, contacting the spammer's ISP and forwarding copies of any spams from that account. Provided they aren't sympathetic with their spamming customer, this is the best and often most effective course of action. Most ISPs actually prohibit customers from using their accounts for spamming through an 'Acceptable Useage Policy' which rogue spammers ignore to their peril. If an ISP receives enough complaints about a known spammer, their account will eventually be closed. Unfortunately, there are now plenty of spam-minded ISPs that market their services to spammers, with the guarantee that they won't get kicked off, regardless of how many complaints are received. So if spam mail arrives with an e-mail domain name such as makemoney.com or quickbucks.com, don't expect a civic-minded response! If you are getting a lot of spam mail you could try e-mailing your own ISP to see if they have any suggestions to resolve your difficulties. Common e-mail addresses for this purpose include abuse@yourISP.com or postmaster@ yourISP.com. If your ISP doesn't maintain such an e-mail address and the problem is severe enough, ask to have one set up. Nip spamming in the bud by including various warnings to
spammers on your Web page: the "No Junk Mail" logo (http://www.mcs.com/~jcr/junkemail.html)
cannot be missed. Also add a line or two to your homepage or e-mail signature file, to the
effect of "I do not want to receive any junk mail from your organisation and I pledge
never to purchase anything from a company that spams". Some hints on how to apply Eudora Pro 3.0's exceptionally capable filters in this way can be found at http://wso.williams.edu/~eudora/eudora-3-0-spam-filter.html
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 Spammers' paradise: It won't just be old friends and long lost family who can find your e-mail address through online directories.
Top 10 spammers *access800@industryone.net |
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Doing
business sans spam
Online resources for stopping spam
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