Internet InterestsSPAMIt’s what’s eating your lunch…SPAM, if you have an email address you have probably already received SPAM email. What is SPAM email? SPAM email is email that is sent to you without being invited. It is, in essence, junk mail. Why would anyone get upset over junk mail besides it’s being a nuisance? Easy, unlike postal junk mail, if you have a dial-up connection, you are PAYING for your junk email. That’s right, while you are sitting there waiting for all of these junk emails to download, you are paying for the time it takes to download them. Depending on your viewpoint, SPAM email is theft. Regardless of your viewpoint, dial-up connection users are being stuck with download charges that they didn’t request. To make matters worse, some SPAM is even virus-infected which causes additional costs and problems for the recipients. Is there anyway to stop your being SPAM’ed? Unfortunately the answer is no. There is no US law that prevents SPAM from being distributed to American citizens. Although we have passed a law that says SPAM email must include removal instructions in them, these removal instructions rarely work and the requests are more often than not ignored by the SPAMmers. In fact, many requests for removal from SPAM lists will cause the following:
Does SPAM email work for the senders? Again, the answer is no. Most often, SPAMmers will generate animosity towards their products and services. SPAMmers often receive death threats or other derogatory responses. It is hard to believe that anybody ever uses this intrusive and unwelcome method of advertising while believing that it will actually help their cause. Is all uninvited email SPAM? No, there are many legitimate email lists that people voluntarily subscribe to. These legitimate email lists DO offer working removal options and they do comply with the law. Your ASIS SFBA Chapter uses one of these legitimate email lists. Don't give up hope though. You can purchase and install various email filters that will examine your email and then reject those that come from either common sources of SPAM or which have specific words or phrases in the subject. Some filters will even mail back a Remove Request or an Error Message to the sender. However, you should be aware that there are two kinds of SPAM filters; one for local email programs and one for Internet-based email programs. (No, you can't use the same one for both kinds because they are two completely different types of email setups.) Perhaps between the negative responses from recipients of SPAM, the use of SPAM filters, and people fed up with wasting their time and money on SPAM who are now taking the time to write to their legislators asking for SPAM to become illegal, we may yet see the end of at least this current version of SPAM. Respectfully submitted
by
Steve Duell
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