Speaking of spam......

[Liz]

I'm posting a request for "help" on this forum since this is OT and not connected to any spam here.

I need some advice as to how to deal with spam in my emails. I figured I'm not the only one experiencing this.

I have gmail (google version of email) which is the best email service I've used. There is a spam folder into which all spam goes. If one appears in my Inbox, I just move it to spam and the next time the culprit won't get into my inbox.

I don't surf the web much - just frequent about 3 websites and once in a while make an online purchase.

Up until 2 weeks ago my spam gmails added up to about 5-6 a week. All of a sudden they increased to about 20+ in one day. They are still increasing - I got 35 in the past 8 hours while I was asleep.

Does anyone know what would cause this sudden change? I can't find a "customer service" number or any way to contact google to inquire. The only thing I can think of is that I made a first Ebay purchase and at the same time a first Paypal payment, and wonder if someone "tracked" my address.

Is there any way to stop these from the daily increase - and get rid of them?

The good news is that these spam gmails go directly to the spam folder. However, it's just annoying - and I do look through the subjects to see if there are any non-spams. So far I found only a couple.

Thanks.
Liz

[another view]

It seems like when the right (actually, wrong) person gets ahold of a valid email address the spam just multiplies... I've been getting about 30 or so per day for a long time. When I was using Microsoft Outlook Express the only thing that worked was Cloudmark Desktop, and it was well worth the $40/year annual subscription.

This one's different than spam folders, etc - it's actually a community not unlike this site. Any one of the spam messages that you get probably go out to thousands of email addresses. One person reports it as spam and then that same message goes into everyone else's spam folders. Sometimes it will guess wrong on whether a message is spam or not, and that could be from other users incorrectly tagging a message. An example of this would be a store's newsletter that someone signed up for but now would rather not get - this isn't technically spam since that person did ask for it and shouldn't be tagged as spam. Best way to handle something legit like that is to select their (required) unsubscribe option. It's always good to check even the Cloudmark spam file and unblock any messages that aren't spam, and that's easy to do. You can choose to always allow messages from a particular address, etc.

I made the switch to Mac so I'm not using OE anymore. Mac Mail is very good but nothing is as good as Cloudmark. With gmail, you're probably looking at it online, but can you set up OE with that account? You can have multiple email addresses in OE but I haven't had that for awhile so I can't remember how it works... Pretty easy to switch between accounts though...

[mjs1973]

One thing that I have done in the past is to set up a free web based email account such as hotmail or gmail. Then if I go to a site that requires an email address, I will but in the hotmail address so I don't get spammed at my regular address. I never check that hotmail account, so I don't care if it gets spammed.

Another thing. They always tell us at work NOT to unsubscribe to spam messages. Just delete them. If you unsubscibe to the spam, it tells the spammer that your account is still active, and you are more likely to be hit even harder with spam.

[another view]

If you unsubscibe to the spam, it tells the spammer that your account is still active, and you are more likely to be hit even harder with spam.

Good point, but I'll add to that spam senders are of course not playing by the rules to begin with. In the case of a store's newsletter you should be and I've done this in the past. Surprisingly, the only one I've ever had a problem with was for the Maine Workshops. I signed up for the photo newsletter and they started sending me that and the film (as in movies) newsletter. I asked to be removed from the film list and nothing happened. I asked again and got removed from the photo list. Finally i just had them delete me completely...

[Liz]

Thanks for the info and suggestions. I guess there is "no turning back" in what has already happened.

One good thing about gmail spam folder is that you can check off a gmail that got in the spam folder that you didn't want there such as PR's newsletter . You then check "not spam" and the next time the newsletter/gmail will go back into the Inbox.

One thing that happened that was a bit scarey - included in the subject line of one spam email was a password I use for places that I wouldn't care if someone discovered my password (such as a website I'll only use once for ordering something and the password is temporary). Recently I forgot this password and notified the website - and in turn they sent me the information - password included in the gmail. Like I said, it doesn't matter that someone discovered it, but I do wonder how they did. Maybe it was just a coincidence.

At any rate, I have 2 other gmails, one I use for my work and the other for more personal gmails. Neither have any spam.....I'm thinking I should slowly transfer the gmail I presently use for one of the others.

Liz

[another view]

Like I said, it doesn't matter that someone discovered it, but I do wonder how they did. Maybe it was just a coincidence.

Could be. Some passwords are more important than others, of course - and you may want to throw some numbers in the middle of a word to make it harder for someone to figure out (and/or less of a coincidence). An example, a friend has been selling off a lot of his equipment on ebay with a user ID of peli04kan - the "0" is a zero. Pelikan is a brand of pens (he collects these too...) and 04 was the year he registered. Easy for him to remember, hard for someone to just guess.

[Liz]

Could be. Some passwords are more important than others, of course - and you may want to throw some numbers in the middle of a word to make it harder for someone to figure out (and/or less of a coincidence). An example, a friend has been selling off a lot of his equipment on ebay with a user ID of peli04kan - the "0" is a zero. Pelikan is a brand of pens (he collects these too...) and 04 was the year he registered. Easy for him to remember, hard for someone to just guess.

Steve,

Thanks for the suggestions. I actually do use a combination of numbers and words, etc. for most of my passwords like the bank, credit cards and the like. However, I didn't see any reason to do this with websites that I'm only using temporarily. Reading your post here though I realize that I ordered something from one of the "temporary" websites and may have used my credit card. I guess that's taking a chance. I'll take your suggestion for all of them. My password list keeps getting longer and longer.

Liz

[SmartWombat]

And once you have a password list, that's insecure in itself.

[Liz]

And once you have a password list, that's insecure in itself.

Well, I don't keep that online - or anywhere else that any predators can reach.

Besides I'm getting too old to have a buch of pw's and no list.......

Liz

[SmartWombat]

Oh me too, a few sites I remember my username and have to ask for my password every time I log in ! I suppose it's secure because it changes every few weeks

I use AVG anti-virus, and use Thunderbird for my email - which has pretty good spam filtering built in. I have to manually remove about 10 a day, and the test get spam filtered automatically. I've not had any non-spam emails getting in the kill list at all, quite impressive.

[Frog]

I have a separate hotmail account just for ebay and have never had a single spam in 3 years so I doubt your ebay transaction has anything to do with it.
I do get spam in my other hotmail account but its actually tapering off as I never respond or open any of them. If I give that address to someone I watch what's in the junk mail folder so I can move them to my safe inbox.
We only get junk in our outlook once in a while....comcast seems to filter it.
As was mentioned, don't use the cancel or do not send anymore option....they just sell your address to a hundred other spots. If you go long enough without opening any they gradually disappear.....long enough means years though.

[Liz]

If you go long enough without opening any they gradually disappear.....long enough means years though.

Thanks John......this is encouraging. I've not opened any of them - with the exception of one or two that got into the "spam folder" and I changed it to the Inbox where it should have gone.

eta: whoops...you said "years?" I must have missed that at first - not so encouraging now. I just hope they don't continue growing by leaps and bounds.

Liz

[Frog]

The main thing is to read privacy policy of any place that needs your email. If they say they share it stay away.
Another place spammers get addresses is from those chain mail jokes and other stuff we all get from our friends who got it from some one else who got it from someone else who...... etc. They never cut the addys and it can add up to hundreds.
Please people, cut those addys when you forward stuff.

[another view]

Please people, cut those addys when you forward stuff.

Yes!! Got some spam because of this - verified, long story. Also, the "BCC" function is your friend. Send the message to yourself, then BCC everyone else. BCC = blind carbon copy which of course is a hold-out from the old typewriter days. CC means that other people get the letter, and everybody knows who gets it, but BCC means that nobody sees the other recipients.

[JETA]

Thank you for the cloudmark link. I just downloaded it and it's working amazingly!

I had to have my ISP stop filtering my email because they were removing important emails I needed. So now I'm getting all sorts of nasty things sent to me. Norton doesn't work at all. Cloudmark found every bit of spam and got rid of it for me the second I opened outlook after downloading it.

[Skyman]

my work email address is publicly discoverable by the "bots" as it is posted on our website for anyone to see. our isp filters out the spam and i might get 20 or more a day, but i am lucky if i get 3 a week make it through the filter. every once in a while the filter will grab something legitimate, but it is one click to release it and mark it as safe.