spam spam

Spam is everywhere — your e-mail inbox, your instant messaging windows, Web site guest-books, blog and now possibly running over your Internet telephony lines. As Internet-based communication technology evolves so do the methods unscrupulous individuals use to send you advertisements. Worse yet, the numbers of spam-related messages being distributed are increasing every day.

When you hear the word spam, your immediate thoughts go to the more well-known and common form of spam: e-mail spam. However, other types of spam are found in a variety of Internet communication mediums such as instant messaging, discussion boards, mobile phones with text messaging, newsgroups, Internet telephony, blogs — basically any device or client that provides a means for communications.

This week, we take a look at the "Internet junk mail" terminology and discuss best practices for protecting your system from these unwanted communications.

All About E-mail Spam

While many Internet users have resigned themselves to the fact that e-mail spam is here to stay, there is nothing more annoying than logging in to check your e-mail and downloading or sifting through tens or hundreds (or even thousands) of unwanted e-mail advertising for some product sent directly to your e-mail address.

E-mail spam numbers have been on the rise because e-mail spam is a cheap way to garner a few sales. For the solicitor, the costs associated with spamming are minimal. All they need is time and enough money for an Internet connection and lists of e-mail addresses.

E-mail Spam: Best Practices For Individuals

Currently, there is no way to completely stop spam. The good news, however, is that individuals can take proactive steps to limit the number of incoming spam e-mails to save time, frustrations and money.

Keep Your E-mail Address More Private

To avoid e-mail address harvesting practices, it's important to not post (in text) your e-mail address in public Internet chat rooms, on any Web site, newsgroup, guestbook or blogs to which you post. If you find you need to post an e-mail address, try typing your address in a graphics program and using an image of your address in a signature file or attachment. Or, you can also replace common characters (such as the @ or .) with spaces or spelling. For example, writing your address as

"webmaster — at— webopedia —dot— com" is one way to display your e-mail address so humans can understand it, but software or script harvesters cannot grab it and add it to a spam list.

You can also consider encoding your e-mail address by using its equivalent decimal entity. To people viewing the address in a browser, it appears as normal text. The code, however, consists of character entities and unreadable to many harvesting scripts (example e-mail address encoder). If you plan to take part in online forums or newsgroups, or you plan to join different mailing lists, you can always register for a free online Web mail account. This will help filter the bulk of spam from publicly posting your e-mail address to one e-mail account that is not used for family, friends or work-related communications. It doesn't mean your other accounts won't get spam, but it will help you time-wise by enabling your other account to have less spam build-up.

Choose More Complex E-mail Addresses

Some spammers basically attack mail servers and use a method called a dictionary attack to get their junk mail sent out. Basically, the spam is sent to every combination of letters and common names at an ISP. In this scenario, spam is more likely to get through to a common, short e-mail address like "mary @insertdomainname.com" than it would "mary_washinger @insertdomainname.com".

Don't Click Links in Spam E-mail

Even if the links reads "click to unsubscribe," if that link appears within a spam message, chances are your click to unsubscribe is used solely for the purpose of informing the spammer that your e-mail address is valid  and you may end up on even more spam lists. Studies indicate that the valid responses from spam is about 1 percent. Clicking any link to get more information or to make a purchase from a spam e-mail is only encouragement for spammers to continue these practices. Rather than using the links within the spam e-mail, try and find the Web site or service through a search engine or other means. Another alternative would be to find the same or similar service or product from a competitor who is not engaging in spam practices and spend your money there.

Use a Good E-mail Filter

The best proactive step you can take to limit spam mail in your in box is to use a good e-mail filter. There are many types of filters available today that will block or filter e-mail based its content, header or even language. Most e-mail programs will allow you to define your own criteria for blocking in addition to these filters. There is also a permission-based filter that means you can specify specific e-mail addresses that are allowed to send you e-mail. Filters that work at the gateway are extra beneficial in that they can also stop incoming worms and virus e-mail attachments.

Remember the Virus Scanner

The golden rule for any spam is to never open or accept files from people you do not know. Spam is rife with worms, Trojans, and viruses that can be attached as what seems to be legitimate files in e-mail messages. While the above best practices can help with lowering the number of spam e-mails you receive, only a real-time virus scanner can help with removing the risks to your system security.