Put an End to That Nagging Spam Mail - Run a Reverse Email Lookup

Though not all Spam is bad, the type that comes into your email box is probably not something with which you want to deal. Though there are some lucky people that never get it, most have had to deal with it on a daily basis. There is not always a lot you can do about spam, but you can use a reverse lookup to see where some of it is coming from. From there, you can see if there is anything else that you can do.

The problem with tracing the email address of someone sending spam is that they often change addresses. Most of the time, they get a new one for each mailing that they put out. That can mean a trace is useless for the most part. Some even know how to take over someone else's computer so that it appears to come from a totally innocent person. If nothing else, you can let someone know they need to do something about that.

There are a few ways that you can run a email reverse lookup if that is what you want to do when you get spam in your inbox. You can see if the email comes up when you put it into a search engine. Most of the time, if the email is from someone who mails out spam, you are going to find it on sites complaining about troublesome email addresses. Other times, you may find a hit that gives you more information.

You can also see if you can get a match through people searches. Most spam email addresses are not active long enough to come up on these, but you never know what will happen. Some small time spam emailers use the same address for a period of time, and you may find some information on them if you search them out through sites like Yahoo People Search.

You may want to do a reverse email search that can get you email addresses that are more protected. This could be something you do if you are being scammed through email, or if the ones you are getting are especially offensive. The fee you pay for the details to any email they can locate is very small, and very worth it if it helps you put an end to your troubles.

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How Do SPAM Filters Work?

Now that email has become a major way that many communicate, it has been, at times, reduced to worthless and annoying sales pitches. The problem with spam is that you don't want it, but it keeps coming anyway. You may never open these, or buy what they are selling, but someone must be doing it or it would not be coming at alarming rates. You can get spam filters on your email, and some already come with these, but they don't always work. Each filter works in a different way.

Spam filters can have point values that they place on certain words or phrases that are most commonly found in spam emails. They may assign points, and when those points add up to a certain number, that email is then considered spam, and is filtered away from your inbox. Filters also attempt to see if they can tell when a header has been altered to hide the origin of the email. Many spam mailers can spoof other email services to appear legitimate.

Some of the words that spam filters look for are probably ones that you associate with spam already. The word Viagra is always a red flag, along with many pornographic words. Phrases that urge you to act now, or tells you that an offer ends soon are also flagged. Even things like excessive exclamation points and typing in all caps can mean an email is deemed to be spam. Remember that when writing your personal emails. Links and emails that are nothing but a large graphic can also be flagged.

Spoofed headers are often much harder to detect. You may not know it, but a spam mailer can send out a program that can take over your email. Your computer could be sending out spam without your knowledge. Though some programs can detect some altered headers, not all of them can. That is why some can get through when others are deleted or sent to your bulk or spam folder.

No spam filter is ever going to be perfect, but some do very good by having each person emailing you verify that they are a real person. It can be a pain, but it does work. Some can be set so that only addresses in your address book come through, and that can eliminate spam, but also some other emails that you may want to get. If you have any concerns about any email landing in your inbox, use a reverse email search for more information on the sender.

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How Do Spammers Find You?

It seems the holiday season always means more spam mail. As you await important messages from family and friends, your inbox overflows while you're out shopping because of unwanted spam. Nobody wants to be exposed so how do these tenacious spammers find you anyway?

Here are a few ways spammers find you while you're going about your normal online activities:

Mailing lists make you subject to spam. Some mail servers provide mailing lists upon request. Others involve trickery on behalf of the spammers. Either way, use caution when signing up for mailing lists and make sure your information won't be shared.

Web pages you visit could leave you open for spam communications. Spammers have their own spiders that crawl through web pages to look for email addresses. Some even send targeted email based on web pages you visit. If you recently looked up a particular product then received an email from a similar site, you were spammed thanks to recent website visit.

Guest books, registration forms and other web forms also make you more accessible to spammers. The form may become available on the web or the website may sell email lists to other companies. Before you decide to register for a website or leave your personal information verify the SSL certificate and make sure your details won't be shared.

Domain name registrations are another way spammers attempt to contact you. Since website contact addresses are typically correct, spammers attempt to sent emails about your domain registration to harvest your information. Know your web hosting company and don't accept communications about your domain name from anyone else.

Browsing the web leaves you open to spam. Some spammers use a variety of tricks to get a surfer's email address from the web browser. Often the surfer doesn't notice even notice it but the spammer gains access to your email address to send unwanted communications. Certain viruses can even harvest email addresses from your address book, leaving everyone you know open to spam.

Chat rooms may give out email addresses to those who ask so be aware before you share. During the holiday season, we often visit chat rooms and forums to talk to old friends. Only visit secure chat rooms that don't share personal information. Use a designated email address strictly for the purpose of visiting chat rooms and forums so you can more easily target spammers.

As a webpreneur, you are likely to engage in all of the activities above. Superior spam protection from a reliable web host helps ward off undesirable communications that waste your time and may even subject your computer to viruses. With some caution, you can get rid of spam for a more rewarding and profitable online experience.

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Can an Email Address Ever Really Be Anonymous?

For the most part, you are going to send out emails to those that you know, and you have no problem with them tracing the email back to you if they needed to do so. There are many clues to your identity in your email, even if you don't sign your name or if you sign up for a new account. There are times when emails can not be traced, though those tactics are not entirely infallible. For the most part, sending out a truly anonymous email is too complicated for the average Internet user.

You can try to start an email account with a new provider, and leave all identifying information out of the sign up process. You can even try fake names and data if you wish. For some Internet users, they will never know who you are because they don't know anything about IP numbers or email headers. In this case, those IP numbers and headers can give you away if someone knows what they are looking for. This is not the best way to send anonymous email messages.

You can send an anonymous email through what is called a remailer. What this does is it alters the information about IP address and it also alters other things on the headers of the email so that it can not be traced back to you. However, the remailer still has your information, and that means it could come back to bite you if you are doing things you should not be doing. In that case, using a second remailer can help, but again, not foolproof.

If you want to use any service that allows you to send what they call anonymous and untraceable email, you should think about a few things first. These services are not in place to allow any one to do anything illegal. If you are going to threaten someone, or use the service to run an email scam, they will give your information over to the authorities. However, if you have something you want to get off your back, but don't do so in a threatening way, or wish to make a statement in an anonymous way, these can help.

When you get an email that appears to be anonymous, don't be sure until you have had a chance to check it out. You want to find a place to use a free reverse email lookup. If there is any name or other information associated with that email address, this type of site may be able to give you that data. If an email is threatening, skip that and go straight to the authorities and your Internet service provider.

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How to Deal With Threatening Email Messages

Email is used to communicate through the Internet, and though it is the preferred choice of communication for many today, it has its pitfalls. One would be that if an email is lost, you may never know it. Another is spam, and though that is annoying, it is often not threatening. However, there may come a time when an email does come into your inbox that threatens you in some way. When that happens, you have to know what to do about it.

The most important things to remember when you get threatening emails is that you should not delete them and you should never respond to them. If you respond, you are giving the matter the attention the sender wants. If you delete it, you have no proof that you have received anything. These are sometimes saved on email providers servers, but it is hard to get them to give them up, and the process can take a while.

The next thing you should do it to print out the entire email, headers included. The headers are important because the information contained within can be used to trace the email back to the person that sent it. Take your print out and go to the police to file a report. If you get more, do the same thing. If you can, do the same with the FBI. This is actually a Federal crime.

You may also want to forward a copy of the email to your Internet provider and the email service you use, if the two are different. You should also send the entire email (again, headers included) to the email provider from which the email was sent. No matter who you have sent this to and how many times you have printed the email out, still refrain from deleting. If you don't want to look at it, make a folder in your email account to file it away for later use, if needed.

You can also find some tools that will help you trace the origin of threatening emails if that is something you feel you should do. If it ends up being someone in your town or someone that you know, it is a good idea to avoid them. You can't do that if you don't know who they are. However, no matter what you find, do not contact the person in any way. Take what you have found to the police.

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Turbo Charge Your Spam Filters

We all know what email spam is, and anyone who spends more than a little time online, has gotten more than their share of the stuff. It's the scourge of the internet world, and the one real chink in the armor of the webs first real killer application . . . email. Most of us probably can't remember how we managed to survive without email, and far fewer of us, remember a day when spam was just a really cheap and questionable luncheon meat byproduct.

Fortunately for us net-citizens, the good guys have been battling the evil forces of email spam pretty much ever since that first ludicrous email was sent out questioning thousands of men's manhood and potency. Unfortunately, spam blocking, and spam filtering is not an exact science today, and likely never will be. It always needs a little supervision and feeding from the good users of all those email services. Free or otherwise. I'd like to make a few suggestions, as to how to make your filters work better for you.

Throw Away Email

While this suggestion may not be really considered a filter, it is probably the most effective method of combating personal spam as any. That would be, a throw away email address. With the plethora of free email accounts available out there, this one is a no-brainer. It's always a good idea, to have one email account, that you use to give out to all those website offers, and forums that require one before letting you use their service. Whenever I sign up for any service that I'm not all that familiar with, I make sure to give them my throw away email account. I rarely if ever check this account. If at some point down the road I feel comfortable with the web service or forum, than I'll change my account information to reflect my "real" email account. The one I usually only give to family, friends, and trusted sites. Think of this throw away email account, as one big spam folder. This technique kind of makes you the filter, by using your own common sense as a filter for whom to trust with your personal email information.

Teaching Your Filter Right From Wrong

As I mentioned earlier, your spam filters are not perfect. They can all benefit from a little guidance. It's important, to not just delete spam from your email inbox every morning with a vengeance. It's far better to flag it as spam. Most email providers provide this feature somewhere prominently displayed on their email screen. If your email software doesn't, then it's time for a switch. Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo Mail, and Excite all provide this functionality. When you flag incoming spam mail as spam, your teaching your email filter to be a better filter. Filters make a best guess as to what is spam based on a very complicated set of algorithms running behind the scenes. Every email provider has slightly differ rules they follow, but the one rule they all follow is secrecy. They'll never divulge how they identify email spam, to anyone, including you their client. It would make it to easy for the spam kings to use it to their advantage. The point is, that when you flag spam, you make the spam filter a little smarter for you, and for everyone else. Most filters will collect flagging information from all their customers, and use it as a filter for everyone's email, not just the original flagger. So, don't just delete your spam, flag it.

And Vice Versa

Of course, the opposite is true. Sometimes filters can be a little too aggressive, and important personal emails you really need, can end up in your spam folder. Be sure to check your folder whenever your reading your email. And, don't just move any good emails you find to your inbox. Tell your filter this is real email, and not spam. Once again, most email software provides this feature, and if it doesn't then move to one of the previously mentioned that do. This works the same way as before, and makes your spam filtering better for you, and everyone else that uses your email provider.

Who knows, with a little perseverance from the good citizens of the net, maybe our grand kids will only know spam as that somewhat questionable luncheon meat.

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Best Anti Spam Software - Spamwasher Review

Many people today are using electronic mails (e-mails) to send and receive messages with others as it is the fastest way possible. With businesses getting their hands involved in the internet and most specifically, e-mail, our e-mails tend to receive lots of spam messages advertising everything from discount electronics to male enhancement products.

Its purpose is to get you attracted to anything they sell. It is prohibited under the Can Spam Act and is an abuse of electronic messaging systems to indiscriminately send unsolicited bulk messages currently known as spam and its most widely known form is the e-mail spam.

Spamming cost your e-mail accounts memory space that can make you unable to receive new e-mails, due to lack of memory space. It has become a major problem for internet users.

Email and internet service providers also encounter problems and the solution that they come up of is to increase the memory space allotted for users' e-mail so that spam will not occupy that much space. Some providers do provide web based anti spam services however, it is unable to completely eradicate the email spamming problem.

There are many anti spam software on the market that provides the ability to stop spam before it reaches your inbox. One of these is Spamwasher, one of the best anti spam software I have used.

Spamwasher is suited for new internet users who want to stop spam and phishing emails from reaching their email inbox without the technical difficulties of setting up. It is easy to use and works well to block 99% of all spam emails. The default automatic spam rules setup is pretty efficient and works well right out of the box.

Spamwasher anti spam software has an update feature that regularly updates it's anti spam engine without user intervention. Currently, it works with any POP3 account such as outlook, fedora, mozilla and netscape. It also works with any webbased email clients such as hotmail, yahoo Mail.

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Join the Fight Against Spam

You are asked to join the fight against spam email. If you or a friend has ever received a bunch of marketing messages from people or companies you never gave your email address to, you will know what I am talking about. Unsolicited junk mail is annoying and a waste of your computer resources and time- unless you actually like receiving and reading junk mail. However, the chances of that being true are very slim.

Just to be certain, here is my attempt at a general definition of spam email. Spam or junk emails are unsolicited electronic messages that are sent in bulk to email addresses harvested from the World Wide Web without the consent of the respective owners. The messages usually contain material of a commercial or marketing nature. How much email spam is actually being sent on a daily basis? Some figures suggests that about 100 billions spam emails are sent each day. Networks of virus-infected computers are used to send most of the junk mail. Yet some figures suggest that the spam mail originates from only a few hundred spammers around the world.

The amount of spam mail has decreased in recent years, mainly due to the increased use of spam filtering and new spam laws. However, spam laws have proven difficult to implement and still has a long way to go. The use of opt in email has also had a positive impact.

In the fight against spam there are other types of electronic spamming that presents a problem to daily users.

-Spamming on newsgroups.

-Posting irrelevant information on forums.

-Posting useless information or advertisements as comments on blogs.

-Sending lots of unsolicited text messages via mobile phone.

-Search engine manipulation for search ranking popularity alone is called 'spamdexing'.

Where do spammers normally harvest email addresses? They usually collect addresses while surfing around chat rooms, forums, newsgroup or websites. They also employ viruses to gain access to personal computers and their address books. Spammers usually send harvested email addresses to each other as well.

What can you do to help fight spam? Well, first of all you should install anti-virus software on your computer. This will help to keep your computer free of viruses that may steal your personal contact details, passing it on to spammers. You can also run daily scans and updates to keep your computer healthy while removing any virus or spyware it may find. Use a spam filter to check your emails as you receive them. You may set up your email program to filter out unwanted words in the title or message and so forth. Your internet service provider may also provide this service to you if they can by filtering the emails on the server itself.

If your internet service provider is not capable of blocking those spam emails or they block the emails from friends or family, which they should not block, then you have to be prepared for some work. If you setup spam-catching rules within your email client software, it will help. If this does not help you catching more spam - then at least it should help by organizing your e-mails.

The second last resort before forking out a monthly payment for an anti-spam filtering service would be to setup your own spam catching system. It will take much more time and effort but it will work and it is not going to cost you anything. The fight against spam continues! Join the anti-spam community and do your part to make the world a more original and less repetitive place. Who knows, you may be the next target of unsolicited junk mail. Report spammers and promote spam protection.

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A New Approach to the Spam Problem

Current anti-spam efforts are mediocre at best and have us chasing our tail like the proverbial dog.

According to the estimates reported in the references below, the annual cost of spam has increased from about $ 20 billion (1) in 2004 to $ 35 billion (2) in 2007, for the US alone. Globally the estimate is over $ 100 billion and the spam volume could possibly double in 2008 (3).

If any of the current approaches to solving spam were effective we would not see this trend, and doing more of the same will not solve this problem.

Spam will not be solved by any law enforcement means because beyond questioning the constitutionality of anti-spam laws here in the US, spam is a global problem; and the jurisdictional and evidentiary issues are so resource intensive that they will not be practical for anything but anecdotal success. Therefore, such efforts will have no significant impact on the spam problem.

The solution to the spam problem will not come in the form of an advanced software widget with new fancier algorithms because such a device is still being asked to interpret what only a human really can.

The solutions to some problems await a major technological leap, such as the leap scientists are awaiting to succeed with nuclear fusion. However, the solution to spam does not require any technological leaps. This is not to say that advances in technology cannot help solve the spam problem, but this technology is already here. It just needs to be applied in a particular Internet environment, with some added processes, in concert with minor human participation and the right approach to accountability and enforcement.

Over the last several years we've seen new modes of electronic communications emerge, such as text messaging, instant messaging, and systems within many social networking websites. Now these are subject to spam more and more. Overlooked within this emergence is the significance shown that the shifting of communications from one mode or system to another is a viable path. So, what if we built an entirely new email system based on a more effective methodology that people and businesses could shift their email communications to?

This may sound drastic, but considering that all anti-spam efforts to date have left us a spam problem in excess of $ 100 billion and growing, it may be time for an entirely new approach. It may be time for an entirely new email system. The question is how. For this reason, CapeMax is working on the "how". To learn more, please visit the CapeMax website.

(1) 2004 National Technology Readiness Survey, February 3, 2005, prepared by Rockbridge Associates, Inc., Great Falls, VA; sponsored by R.H. Smith School of Business, the University of Maryland, College Park, MD, page 6.

(2) Ferris Research - One San Antonio Place, Suite 3B, San Francisco, CA 94133, USA, http://www.ferris.com/research-library/industry-statistics/

(3) Communications News, May 2008 issue, page 8, Trends section, article headline, Spam volume could double in 2008. Nelson Publishing, Inc; http://www.comnews.com

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Is Email Harassment Illegal?

Not so long ago, a girl committed suicide because of messages that she was getting through the popular social networking site MySpace. This does not mean that MySpace is evil, but hopefully it was a wake up call for parents to know what their children are doing online, even if they feel they are being snoopy. Though you may not think of messages through MySpace as being email, they are. Not everyone behaves online, and there are times when email addresses can be harassing in nature, and even dangerous.

The nature of email makes it possible for people to think they are sending out messages that are anonymous, but that is rarely the case. There are some that know how to do this, but most Internet users have no idea. They just assume leaving their name off of an account means they are untraceable. That is simply not true, as many people have found out. They may feel free to send messages that are sinister and harassing in nature because they think no one will know who they are.

Though the line between a heated and illegal email is gray, and not all locations or jurisdictions with the US have the same laws, there are some that are definitely illegal. Some districts have deemed anything harassing to be illegal, no matter if it is going through phone lines, mail letters, electronic communications, or in person. Those that have this type of harassment in mind often use email because they think it is hard to trace. With the law on someone's side, a lawyer can get a service provider to hand over identifying information.

You may not know if a harassing email coming into your inbox is illegal where you live or not, but that does not mean you should not do something about it. You can try to find out about the laws where you live, and you can contact the authorities if you feel threatened in any way. You can also forward the email to your service provider, and then call them with an explanation to see if there is anything that they can do.

You may want to know who sent the email. You can find some limited information if you do a reverse email lookup Not all are traceable however. No matter what you find, do nothing with that information unless you want to turn it over to the authorities. Do not respond to such an email, and do not use what you find to contact the source of the email. You know who to avoid, if need be, but you don't want them to know you are on to them if they insist on remaining anonymous. Let the authorities deal with the problem for you.

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Keep Your Inbox Clean - Report Spam Email

Spam email can be overwhelming, and in fact, many people have changed or abandoned an email address because of the amount of unwanted messages they received. Now, however, you can use email lookups online to find out more about any unknown or suspicious email address by searching for relevant directory entries. Every server or domain name keeps its own email directory, and as these are the most up to date lists of account information, these are the resources that reverse email lookups search.

Of course, to really get the most out of email lookups online, you will need to know what kind of information it can provide, and what of this will be most valuable to you. Directory entries commonly contain the name, IP address, and server information registered to an account, which is all you really need to know in order to determine whether or not you should report a spam email.

Spam itself is not illegal, so you have to have specific abuses and data to report with your complaint. This is where email lookups online come in, because they allow you to determine the legitimacy of any spam email. Simply by comparing the IP address provided with that listed in the email's header, you should be able to tell if the email originated with the inbox listed as the server. If these numbers do not match, of course, you have ample reason to file a formal report.

You can use email lookups online to protect yourself and your family against unknown email addresses, but by searching spam emails, you are also doing your part to protect other innocent email users of becoming spam victims. After all, by reporting a spam email, you have guaranteed that they will not be able to continue their practices with, at very least, this same account information, and you can know that your inbox really is clean, and not just for the minute at hand.

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Junk Mail - If You Are Worried About Electronic Junk Mail

The most popular use of junk mail today is probably e-mail spam. People known as spammers send out large quantities of unwanted e-mails containing product information or sales copy to a large list of e-mail addresses. They do this in the hope of generating a lot of sales or leads whilst having little mailing costs.

Spam and spyware may discreetly be using your computer's resources causing it to run slower than normal. You should scan your computer and remove any spyware you find. In extreme cases your computer can actually be used by spammers to help them to distribute their junk mail.

It is critical to have some sort of spam filter in place for ordering and screening your e-mails in your inbox. E-mail filtering software can do this for you automatically. A spam filter may remove suspicious junk mail so you do not have to do it yourself.

There are many anti-spam software available that may filter and prevent junk mail from reaching your inbox. This can better protect your computer against unwanted e-mails. You can look for software such as Comodo, SpamTitan, Mailwasher or SpamFighter.

There are many a free spam blocker that you may find by using search engines. Here are 3 free software options I found by just entering the keyphrase 'free spam filter' into the Google search engine and clicking on the search button.

#1. SPAMfighter is a free tool designed for use with the e-mail programs Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express that automatically filters spam.

#2. Mailwasher is reliable and protects your computer from unwanted junk mail.

#3. Spambutcher claims to be an advanced spam filtering software that can stop junk mail almost 98% of the time.

So why is spam protection so important? It is vital in order to protect your inbox and computer from insolicited junk mail sent by spammers, spam gangs and spam services.

What does the the law say about this issue? Spam law states that a message is spam only if it is unsolicited as well as sent in bulk. It is not just an issue of content, but rather of consent. It is about the delivery method. Spamming is illegal and punishable by law.

There are also spam filtering services available. You will have to pay for most of them. SpamRejection offers a comprehensive service with a money-back guarantee. Cudamail is another service that offers proven e-mail scanning technology and e-mail free of viruses and junk mail.

A spam firewall normally combines open source virus solutions, spam solutions and many different defense layers. For example, the Barracuda Spam Firewall is a powerful spam solution that is easy to install and operate. It is a paid system.

Refrain from displaying your primary address on your website or anywhere else on the world wide web. Spammers may see it and add it to their list of harvested emails. You will then keep getting junk mail you did not subscribe to in the first place.

Electronic junk mail will continue to be a problem for you as long as you do not have a strategy or software in place for handling this common internet threat.

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Finding Spam Difficult to Swallow?

Spam, or unsolicited e-mail, has become an accepted annoyance for any business that uses e-mail as a communication tool. Businesses accept the risk and take steps to minimise it; the problem is that the steps taken aren't always effective or, perhaps even worse, they are too effective - all at the cost of your business.

According to market research in 2005, spam accounts for around 45% of all e-mail. If you think that is unacceptable, statistics show that between 70-90% of all e-mails sent to SME businesses are unsolicited.

It is estimated by leading anti-spam experts that SME businesses could be footing a bill for between £1000 and £19,000 per annum in lost user productivity and server storage because of spam. The cost of spam doesn't stop there; phishing (fraud) scams and viruses are rife, often embedded into or attached to unsolicited mail.

At this cost, can businesses still afford to consider spam an acceptable annoyance and are the steps they take to protect themselves enough?

The predicament most SME businesses are in is that, although they employ an anti-spam solution, they are either still receiving too much spam or blanket blocking a large amount of legitimate senders, such as potential customers.

SME businesses require dependable, scalable and manageable anti-spam solutions with the ability to have a per user spam quarantine that individuals can query themselves in order to retrieve blocked emails. These solutions need to be updated automatically on a daily basis in order to stay on top of the ever increasing spam wave and have the capability to learn what is and isn't spam from the way users interact with the solution.

One such product is the Barracuda Spam Firewall range, which boasts anti-spam, anti-virus, anti-phishing and DoS (Denial of Service) protection all in one box. With daily quarantine updates per user, which includes the ability to retrieve legitimate e-mails, the days of users ringing IT departments in order to recover blocked messages are over.

With multiple layers of defence the Barracuda possesses a proven track record with some of the leading corporations in the world; Barracuda is leading the anti-spam market. This has recently been recognised once again with Barracuda's founders being awarded the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year® Award.

Spam is an ever increasing problem with very real cost implications for SME businesses. Unfortunately, no 'silver bullet' exists but with the right solution your business can stand up to spam, ensure business integrity and truly minimise the risk and cost.

The Scourge of Spam and How to Tackle It   Spam Filtering For Small Businesses - Increase Productivity and Protect Your Data   Ways to Fight Fraud   Email Spam Blocker - Free Up Space in Your Inbox   

Take Extra Precautions and Stop Spam

Victims of spam mails would often ask where spam mails come from. All they know is that they have never given out their email address to other web sites or individuals online. How come they still suffer from receiving tons of unsolicited emails from people or companies they don't know? With the rising clamor on how to stop spams, IT companies have designed various products to aid the victims of spam mails. Spam blockers have proliferated in the market and perhaps everyone who is using the internet has equipped their system with this software as a solution to stop spam mails.

Now, going back to the hanging question on how spammers gather thousands of legitimate email addresses of internet users. There are various ways how they do the job actually and one of the most common ways is to gather addresses from chain letters. If you are fond of reading and forwarding chain letters and other prank emails, you are actually helping these spammers to gather more addresses. If you would notice, forwarded emails would contain all the addresses of everyone who have received the same emails. Thus, this makes one good source for internet scammers to further increase their mailing list.

It is recommended that whenever you receive these kinds of emails, better yet put a stop to it by deleting it instead of forwarding it. By doing such, you are helping stop spam. So, whenever you receive suspicious emails, do not click on any links in that mail. Doing so will open a window for online spammers to invade your mailbox. Spammers are also spying on social networking sites where internet users would normally post their email addresses. This is such a perfect venue for them to get more data. In this case, making a secondary email address for your self is highly encouraged.

You can utilize free email accounts such as Yahoo and Hotmail. This secondary email account you can use when you want to join online forums or whenever you sign up for something where your address is required. There may be instances that you would want to subscribe to a certain web site; you may use your secondary email in order to activate your application. Having secondary email addresses can truly stop spam on your primary address. For affiliates who are obliged to post their email address in order to keep in contact with their prospective customers, you can stop spam by embedding your email address in an image that will make it difficult to read for OCR (optical character recognition).

In addition, you may also utilize CAPTCHA (Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart). This is commonly used by many online marketers as an effective spam blocker for their web site. This method may cause a very minimal inconvenience to your customers or subscribers, but its benefits will surely outweigh the said inconveniences. There are many other possible sources of spams and spammers are definitely working overtime to create new techniques in sending spam mails. Give extra effort to stop spam or at least limit exposure to spam for a better and hassle-free online business.

The Scourge of Spam and How to Tackle It   Spam Filtering For Small Businesses - Increase Productivity and Protect Your Data   Ways to Fight Fraud   Email Spam Blocker - Free Up Space in Your Inbox   Spam Blacklist Services Saves the Day!