Spam: Scams

The spammers never cease with their tricks. They know that what they are doing is unethical and immoral, yet they continue. Oh, they will protest that their spam is protected by the first amendment and other nonsense, yet the truth is spam causes tremendous problems for end users, ISPs and web hosts.

Here are some tricks the spammers have used to make their crimes even more sinister.

Off Shore Removal Number - I read about this scam on an anti-spam website. It is absolutely fascinating. Simply put, a spam email has a phone number at the bottom which you can call "to be removed". Call this number and you will be charged $2 a minute for your attempt. Pretty clever, eh?

Moral: Do not ever call any phone number in a spam email.

Opt-In Lists - Spammers will often sell their email lists. How better to make a few extra bucks. They will advertise their lists as "opt-in", meaning people have requested to be sent advertising. In reality, these spammers are often just selling lists of addresses that they have harvested off the web.

Moral: Create your own opt-in mailing lists (better yet, use double opt-in to ensure the list is clean).

Cons and scams - Since a spammer is already unethical and amoral, there is no reason to believe any claims of any kind in one of their messages. In fact, there is no way to know who is on the other end of a spam message. A good example of a long-running scam often sent via spam is the Nigerian scam.

Moral: Do not ever trust anything in any spam message that you receive.

Fake addresses - Since spammers know their are unethical scum, they often go to great lengths to hide their true identities. They will even go so far as to substitute real, innocent third-party domains and site names into their messages to make their emails appear more legitimate. This is also why you must be very careful when reporting back with a complaint - you may be complaining about an innocent bystander.

Moral: Do not trust anything stated in a spam message.

Fake Subjects - Spammers know that you do not want to receive their messages. In order to get you to open up and read what they have to say, they will go to great lengths to create a subject which may have some appeal for you.

Moral: When you open an email, if the contents have nothing to do with the subject, just delete the message.

About the Author

Richard Lowe Jr. is the webmaster of Internet Tips And Secrets. This website includes over 1,000 free articles to improve your internet profits, enjoyment and knowledge. internet-tips.net
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Claudia Arevalo-Lowe is the webmistress of Internet Tips And Secrets and Surviving Asthma. Visit her site at http://survivingasthma.com

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