Why Wait Webs

Today, many people are simply reserved to the idea of receiving anywhere from 20 to 1000 spam email messages every day. Some deal with it by filtering their email to stop spam, but in my experience they will also lose at least some of their actual email as a result of this, even with the best filters. Others have simply given in, and spend a half hour or more every single day just hitting that delete button to get rid of their spam emails.

While it is very difficult, if not impossible, to get your email address off of these spam lists once you are on them, you can stop email spam for the most part by being careful with your email address from the beginning. If you have a new email address or an address that receives very little Spam, following these guidelines will help you keep it that way:

• Don’t make purchases from companies you do not trust. - Many companies build their lists by purchasing emails from other companies who have sold something to that individual.
• Stay far away from websites that offer free iPads or other up-scale electronics in exchange for your email address, recruitment, or signing up for offers. They are not always scams (although that often is the case), but they do make their money by selling your email address. This is the single fastest way to get signed up to literally hundreds of spam lists. If you absolutely must participate in one of these, I highly advise using a secondary or “throw-away” email address.
• Avoid signing up for free email newsletters, unless you are genuinely interested in the content. Some will tempt you with a free offer, and there is nothing wrong with that if you are interested, but sometimes they can be difficult to get back off.
• Do not list your email on any website. Ideally, use a web form, so that no one can find your email address from the site. But if you feel it is necessary to include an actual email address, you should use one separate from your normal work and use an image instead of text so that spam robots will not pick it up as quickly. I speak more on the details of this in How to Publish Your Email Address.

Despite your best efforts, you may still eventually end up getting at least a little bit of spam in your inbox. When you do, I highly recommend you follow these guidelines, or you could find yourself swimming in spam before you know it. Stop the flow of spam before it begins by:

• Avoid opening the spam emails at all. Just loading it up is enough to alert the spammers that your email is actually read by a real person. If you can, disable automatic image loading with your email provider so that you can preview it without loading the images that will detect it being read.
• The last thing you want to do is click a link in any of these emails. This includes the unsubscribe link, which will almost never actually unsubscribe you, and may indeed increase the flow of spam.
• Same goes for replying to these emails, it is not a good idea. Chances are no one will read it, and it will just be detected as proof that your email is real.
• Any bulk email without a legitimate, working unsubscribe link is in violation of the law. Sadly it is a law nearly impossible to enforce. Although it is unlikely to have much effect, you can try forwarding the spam (still avoid loading any images!) to the FTC, who claims to use forwarded email to prosecute deceptive Spam email. Their email is spam@uce.gov, and normally I wouldn’t put it out for spam bots to access, but I have a feeling they wouldn’t mind for this particular email!

That’s it for the tips on stopping the flow of spam to your email inbox. I will try to keep adding more helpful tips on this blog more frequently. Let me know in comments if you have any questions about these methods, or another tip to contribute to people looking to stop getting spam emails.