Stopping spam

Albert Einstein said “We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them". This is certainly true of spam.

In the early days of email being widely adopted people were excited to use this new tool - and unaware of the threats that this new tool came with - so they handed out their email address willy-nilly. Every site that asked them for it, they gave it. If they wanted a personal response on a forum, they posted their email address for someone to respond to. In order to communicate with customers, they'd put their email address proudly on their "Contact us" page to show how "tech savvy" they were.

Then the unthinkable happened. People started emailing them.

Not about the thing they downloaded, not in response to their forum post, or even any customers from their "contact us" page. These emails were offers to buy prescription drugs or pornography. The senders had the unfortunate duty of informing them of the death of a rich loved one in Africa somewhere, or had good news of their winning a lottery Microsoft was running right now.

By the time they realized what was happening, their email address had already been abused, traded to other spammers, or sold in batches of "opt in" email addresses to the highest bidder. Their new email "toy" rapidly became much less fun to play with.

This is the "kind of thinking" that "we used when we created (the problem)". Email is a phenomenal tool, but it is a tool not a toy. You wouldn't let someone who had never used a chainsaw play with yours, and you wouldn't use a bandsaw to hammer a nail. Tools have purposes, and misuse can be dangerous.

So, what do we do? What's the "right" way of thinking we should start using?

1. Protect the email addresses you have.

Don't give it out to just anybody, and block unauthorized access to it. Use a spam blocker with not just a high block rate, but that also won't block your real email. This will save untold amounts of time (and therefore money) troubleshooting issues or even just searching through your junk looking for legit messages.

2. Use a unique email address.

This doesn't always mean creating new addresses every time you want to sign up for something. If your email address is YourUsername@YourDomain.com, try sending email to YourUsername+Whatever@YourDomain.com. If you receive it, you can do this when you sign up for things online and use something unique for each.

For instance, YourUsername+TheEmailAuthority@YourDomain.com if you sign up for a newsletter from me or YourUsername+TigerDirect@YourDomain.com if you sign up with Tiger Direct.

This will allow you to see WHO has compromised your email address, and also set up filtering rules if one of your "new addresses" gets compromised.

3. Use a "disposable" email address.

Ugh. We live in such a disposable culture. Disposable razors, disposable diapers, disposable this, that and something else. You mean to tell me there are disposable email addresses now too?!?! Yes. And they have a GREAT purpose.

When you sign up for a service, or a newsletter, coupons, etc you WANT to continue to receive emails from them. If you didn't, you wouldn't have signed up, right? Well, what about all of the myriad of websites that you need to give them your email address just to sign up and then you never want to receive another email from them, EVER? Use a disposable address, that's what.

Keep in mind, password resets, changes in TOSes and other vital email will go to this address as well, so don't use it for everything, but it's a great addition to your privacy protecting arsenal. Someone could guess to strip off everything after the "+" sign if you use the method above, but they'll never guess the real address associated to a completely fake address.

There are several services out there. I've used several, and I like Mailinator, but you can find a ton with this Google search.

So, here's the breakdown:

Give your real email address to friends, family and business partners.
Give your "+" address to sites you need to have ongoing communication with, but aren't in your immediate "circle of friends". Examples are stores, newsletters, blogs/websites, etc.
Use a disposable address for anyone you only need to communicate with once.

Using these simple steps will help keep your inbox clean and your privacy protected. To help protect against everything else, you need a good antispam service.


-TEA