Stop Spamming Me!

I hate SPAM! Am I talking about the infamous canned meat product made of pork shoulder and ham? Yes I am. I hate that stuff. But I'm also talking about the junk email that clogs your inbox. Apparently I'm related to some person in Nigeria who's trying desperately to reach me so that I can claim my inheritance! I'm also apparently interested in buying a lot of black market Viagra?!

The people who send spam do so because it's virtually free to do it (though many countries are passing laws to make it illegal) and because every once in a blue moon, someone will actually click on a link that's in one of those emails. Why someone would even open a spam email, I don't know. Don't be that guy. If you get an email that looks suspicious or is from someone you don't know - don't open it! Also - don't click any 'unsubscribe' links in a spam email. Many times, that simply verifies that your email address is a viable email address and you get even MORE spam. These spammers get your email from a lot of different places - primarily by using tools that scour the internet looking for email addresses. If you've ever signed up for anything online, your email address is out there and is likely accessible if the right tools are used.

Here's what I recommend doing. First of all, if you think that the spam email involves fraudulent or deceptive practices, simply forward it to uce@ftc.gov. That's the Federal Trade Commissions box that they use to monitor what's going on in the cyber world. They'll add your spam to their database and, hopefully, find the home of the sender of the spam and incenerate it. If you get an email from someone in Nigeria asking you to wire them money or something like that so you can claim your inheritance, send it to mailto:419.fcd@usss.treas.gov. That particular type of spam is serious - you may have seen something about it on Dateline. There's a crime ring stealing lots of money from people using that email trick - so the address I just gave you is actually the US Secret Service's box that they're using to track this scam.

Additionally, and this is the real useful part, if you have to sign up for something online - a newsletter, a site that you have to sign up for before you can log in, etc. - don't use your real email address! Either create a free email address at Google or Yahoo and use it for this type of thing - basically make it your spam account or give them a 'disposable' email address.

There are several sites that offer 'disposable' email addresses. Two that I know of and use are:

Mailnator
Tempinbox

The way these work is simple. When you have to sign up for something online, give them a fake email address that looks something like this: youmakethispartup@mailnator.com or anythingyoucanthinkof@tempinbox.com

Then - go to mailnator.com or tempinbox.com, type in the email address that you just used to sign up for something and you can actually access any emails that come to that address without needing a password. Sometimes, when you sign up for something, these sites send you a confirmation email that you have to click on something to verify, etc. - so these disposable email sites allow you to access those verification emails, do whatever you need to do, and then never get another email from the site you signed up for again - since all the email they send you is going to the disposable email account.

I'm probably overexplaining this - check out the two sites I mentioned and you'll see how they work. I use them all the time! Obviously don't use a fake email address if you're buying something online and giving credit card information out. The last thing you want is for your credit card info to be sent to one of these disposable accounts!!

Oh - and by the way - did you know that there are more than 10 varieties of Spam (the canned meat product) including one that has cheese already inserted into the Spam? Holy cow that's disgusting.