Users are now doubting whether email communication is worth it or not. When President Bush signed the ‘Can Spam’ bill in December 2003, it was the first national standard and decisive step against bulk unsolicited commercial email. The bill which was approved and voted by the Senate by 97 to 0 address the issue of stopping senders from sending out bulk commercial unsolicited emails by spoofing or providing invalid return addresses and taking the help of dictionaries to create the mailers. More over, these emails can not carry a subject line which is deceptive and must have an opt out provision. The legislation also prohibits senders from harvesting addresses off Web sites so violations constitute a misdemeanor crime subject to up to one year in jail.
One point of consideration is that now spam is generated in other countries as well. Since such emails originate from other countries, it is nearly impossible to control them. These problems are difficult to handle, though the laws may sound good since the internet knows no country barriers. So what is the solution? Here are 5 most effective spam protecting rules:
Number 1: Never put your email address on the internet. There are products called ‘spam spiders’ that search the Internet for email addresses to send email to. If you are keen to know more about this topic, search for ‘spam spider’ and be prepared, the results might be overwhelming. ‘Spambots’ and ‘spam spiders’ and similar rogues on the net is confronted ably by a site called WebPoison.org which is an open source project which just goes on sending them rubbish web pages which carry nonsense email addresses.
Number 2: Get spam blocking software. It is possible that you want to go for a professional version also but even if you do that, you must get the software and save hours. While the soft certainly does not claim to provide guaranteed results, it can still be dependable but remember that some manual setting could be needed to bar some particular types of emails.
Number 3: Take the approach of having many email addresses. There are several free email address you could choose from through which you could receive newsletters and have another address as a back up. Like you would like to give your personal cell number to your friends but all others get your official number.
Number 4: One of the common features about spam is that they carry attachments which could easily carry viruses. Personal email is far more ‘open country’ for spammers. General rule of thumb: if you do not know who is sending you something, DO NOT OPEN THE ATTACHMENT.
Number 5: email service providers are now providing ‘bulk mail’ packages. The concept is rather easy. All you have to do is to collect such mails and put then in a bulk email pile and ‘choose’ to let them dwell in your circle. The spam blocking software though they use the same idea, having some additional layers could make a big difference, hence it could deserve a closer look.
