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Holt Offers Strategies to Keep Spam from Clogging Your Inbox
By Fran Rensbarger
If you use the Internet, you will almost certainly find spam—unsolicited
e-mail commercials—clogging your e-mail box. And the more we use the Internet,
the more we increase the chance that a spammer will obtain our address, says Tracy
Holt, manager of e-mail systems and accounts for the Information Technology Unit
(ITU). However, there are ways to limit the amount of spam you receive. In his
paper, “How Do I Get on Bulk Email (Spam) Lists?” Holt presents strategies
for avoiding spam.
Just Say No
If an e-mail address is not necessary, don’t give one, Holt advises.
But if you do receive spam and the vendor offers a link to remove yourself from
future mailings, do not click on this link. A reputable site will remove you from
its mailing list but less-reputable sites use this to determine whether your address
is legitimate; in some cases this will cause you to be added to even more spam
mailing lists.
Often, online vendor services require us to create an account to place an
order, browse a catalog, or subscribe to a service. In addition, many vendors
seek online registration so they can keep us informed of product changes or warranty
issues. It is common practice to use these registrations for mass marketing purposes.
While some vendors allow you to select the type of information you want to receive,
other vendors will flood you with “important” information, or they
will provide your e-mail address to third parties or send you information on a
third party’s behalf. When vendors allow you to choose what mail you will
receive from them, opt for none, says Holt. “Make sure to choose any options
that specify that your address information is not to be shared.”
Try a Pseudonym or Alternate Address
“If you’re truly not interested in receiving mail from vendors
but still need to use their services, obtain a second account from one of the
free services like Hotmail and use that address when doing product registrations,”
says Holt. If you’re an active participant in online chats, newsgroups,
and mailing lists, the chance of receiving spam is very high, so, if possible,
use a separate account or name for postings to these services.
Because web sites can obtain your e-mail address settings by software run
from their web sites, consider using separate clients for e-mail and surfing the
web. This is problematic at George Mason since the university supports both the
Netscape browser and e-mail client. Another option is to disable Javascript and
cookies so that programs to extract information about you cannot be executed.
However, be cautious because a number of sites also use Javascript and cookies
to function, and disabling these features may prevent you from using these sites.
Watch for the Web They Weave
Spammers use a number of different, often illicit, ways to get our addresses,
such as using tantalizing subject lines and seeking open mail relays so that their
e-mail comes via unsuspecting sources. Many advertising companies have software
that will scan newsgroup postings for valid e-mail addresses, or pirate improperly
configured mailing list software and automated mailing lists.
Another technique used for very large sites is to try random addresses—jsmitha,
smith, john_smith, john.smith—in the hope of finding some valid addresses.
A small percentage of IDs will turn out to be valid, and some percentage of those
users will respond.
Finally, spammers love university sites because many of them, like George
Mason, run the Unix operating system, which requires that a public file of valid
accounts on the system be readable by all users. Since everyone on the system
has an e-mail address, the spammer who can gain access then has a massive list
of valid e-mail addresses. WebShield, the new virus scanning software and hardware
ITU installed to screen all incoming e-mail, has the ability to stop some spam
as it enters George Mason.
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