Spam email and Virus, think it again!

Posted by arlene

What Is E-mail Abuse?

E-mail abuse is characterized as the use of electronic mail to harass, annoy, or cause harm to the e-mail recipient. Abuse can take the form of threatening e-mail, or bulk mail with the intent to slow productivity or cause damage to the recipient’s system. This is a worldwide problem; anyone with e-mail is at risk.

Many people link the term spam to this abuse. While spamming is quite annoying, not all spam mail is linked to criminal activity.

A Word about Spam

According to spamabuse.org, “the term Spam is to flood the Internet with many copies of the same message in an attempt to force the message on people who would not otherwise choose to receive it. Most spam is commercial advertising, often for dubious products: get-rich-quick schemes or quasi-legal services. Spam costs the senders very little—most of the costs are paid by the recipient or the carriers rather than the sender.”

Spam with a Criminal Twist

Regardless of the ethics of spam mail, the criminal aspect arises when a spammer’s sole purpose is to go information fishing. One of the first things my cyberguru John Flowers warned me about was the fraudulent side of spamming. There are deviants who set up a spamming business for the purpose of snagging valid e-mail addresses to gain access to your personal profile. After accumulating your personal information, these trollers then sell all the information to anyone who will pay for it—potentially including pedophiles, stalkers, or identity thieves.

Investigate Yourself

To find out what kind of personal information is already out there about you, search the Web yourself. Go to sites like switchboard.com or dogpile.com. They offer various types of searches on people for a fee, depending how in-depth you want to get.

Whatever You Do . . . Don’t Click the Box

Most spam mail that you receive will have a “take me off your list” box for you to check. What is disguised as a courteous service is really a trap. One click in the box tells them you are a valid e-mail address and you’ll get even more junk mail. According to Kaitlin Duck Sherwood, author of the Overcome E-Mail Overload series of guides, “If you have an ISP with millions of users, like America Online, and you have a user name made up of English words or a common name, spammers will guess it.” So remember, don’t click the box—hit DELETE instead.

Use a Filter to Sift through the Problem

An easy way to cut down on unwanted e-mails or unwanted solicitations is to set filters that come with your e-mail software. Refer to an anti-spam Web site to learn how to recognize characteristics that most spam mail contains, and set your filters accordingly. If you really want to get serious, there are more aggressive anti-spam products that you can buy. Programs like SpamEater or SpamBuster use artificial intelligence to figure out what’s spam and what’s not.

to be continued

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