Email Spam is illegal

[souleman]

I wondered how long it would take before the govn't tryed to regulate our email usage.

More than 2,000 people involved in an Internet chain letter that promises "$46,000 or more in the next 90 days" are receiving government warnings that the scheme is illegal, the Federal Trade Commission said Tuesday.


Story at: http://abcnews.go.com/wire/Politics/ap20020212_1203.html

[Ennis]

There is nothing more irritating than spam, I think I am going to write an article condemning spam right now.

In the AO newsletter Foley wrote a pretty interesting article on spam!

Also in Futurama there is a scene where Leila gets mail, it then says 'Not spam' after she sighs, nice touch.

;)

[RiOtEr]

hmmmmmmmm
just a thought if spam is illegal now shouldnt junk mail that u get in the mail be illegal also well im just annoyed at the amount i get over icq i never used to get them now its like every 5 mins ohh well ill live but my ignore list is getting big

[the_JinX]

icq and mail are filling up..

my spamm acount is disabled by hotmail becouse my account size is too large, on a weekly bases...

daamn spamm

[gold eagle]

Email spam is out of control. One branch of ours gets thousands of these per day. we have dozens of branches. We are not one of the "big" companies. Imagine.

[akanicknick]

I completely agree,
Spamming is really pissing everyone off these days to the point where I get about 50 mails a day for things I did not even sign up for. Sometimes I feel like taking off my white hat and going to turn into a Black-Hatted CRACKER FROM SPAM!!

[dspeidel]

Yesterday the WSJ did an article on restrictions the FCC is condisder putting on telemarketers. A RFC (request for comments) as been initiated in which the FCC proposes setting up an 800 number that allows US citizens to call in and place there number on a no call list. Telemarketers would be forced to honor this list (it would be illegal to call list members). The FCC is also considering ways to make limit spam -such as requiring spammers honor there do not mail me links rather then using it verify the mail is being read by a real person. The FCC is also reviewing spam.

The link would be http://online.wsj.com/article/0,4286,SB1013382008591906640,00.html?collection=wsjie/30day&vql-string=%28spam%29%3Cin%3E%28article%2Dbody%29 but you must be a registered subscriber to read the story (I am a subscriber and read the paper daily but I never signup for online access).

Cheers,
-D

[smirc]

I've had a hotmail account for years and, although I get spam, it's under control. I think a lot of people who have problems with spam are partly to blame. Don't get me wrong. Spam sucks and I think the people doing it should placed in a burlap sack and beaten with reeds. But there are a lot of things people can do to keep spam to a minimum. To me and probably a lot of people, this seems like common sense.

1. Don't forward on chain letters. Most of the time they are complete rubbish and if a spammer gets hold of the email (which is very likely), there's a hundred or so active accounts he/she can now add to their list of people to spam.

2. Never reply to spam. You have just told the spammer that your account is alive. If you do this, expect more spam. Besides, no one will listen to your reply and it just generates more network traffic.

3. Never give web sites and member logins your real email address. You're just begging to be spammed.

4. Use BCC instead of CC wherever possible. I get really irritated when people include me in the CC list of an email. Now all the people that got that email know my address plus anyone that the email was forwarded to plus anyone those emails were forwared to...

5. Don't use the same account for your day to day email and for subscribing to newgroups and stuff. Newsgroups are a great place for spammers to get valid addresses.

If you're thinking "duh!", that's fine. I'm sure most people already do all this and more to stop spam in their accounts. But, in my opinion, there's still enough of those stupid chain letters around to warrant a post about it. :)

[RiOtEr]

just a warning n what smirc said dont reply to a email that says if u did not want to recive this email unsiscribe if u cant remeber u suscribed beacuse they are just checking for active emails just a warning

[gold eagle]

so they use that for checking for actvie emails. hmmmm.

[Ennis]

The sad thing is spam is almost unavoidable...well it is but if you were just a normal user say like my brother etc. you are not conscious about putting your e-mail into lil shiny boxes or forward this crappy joke to a friend etc.!

Them feckers.

[hot_ice]

Email use to be good. Spam will be the end of email - unfortunately, I cannot see the situation getting better.

Greg

[cold_connection]

Spam is about the same with normal post. In France, we get about 2 prospectus a day. Most of it is just from some fortune tellers and so on. Sadly, we get no porn.
Hotmail is a nest for spam. No matter the filters you put on, some smart ass will always find a way to anonymously send you a mail.
People like that should be arrested and fined. But then again, who are those people?

[Tedob1]

--------------------
so they use that for checking for actvie emails. hmmmm.
--------------------

i like the sound of that.

[CyberSpyder]

Spam may be illegal but it still is a problem and there is really no easy way to stop it.

[the_JinX]

There is only one thing you can do...

filter your mail thoroughly (however that is spelled)..
or make your server filter it for you..

[PhiBerOptiCx]

THats soooo weird.....I have almost 0 spam in my hotmail inbox but my sister has a ton!!!!!!!!

[thesecretfire]

I too have been pretty lucky, possibly because I switch e-mail adresses every 6 months and use old one to sign up for sites that seem to have a high risk of spam.

[I am a cracker]

There is only one thing you can do... the jinx

Thats a lie there's plenty you can do I am going to right it later

[Ennis]

Its wise to have a few E-Mail accounts, you know personal ones that you give to most people, a damn spam account for when you sign up to ANYTHING and finally an important e-mail addy for well you guessed important stuff!

;)

[smirc]

A short article on fighting spam in the land of Oz.

http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,3797687%5E15318%5E%5Enbv%5E15306,00.html

Other supposed protections against spam include bans on advertising online gaming, laws to prevent people being harassed or offended, and a code of practice for internet service providers.

I'm not sure how these laws are supposed to be enforced?

[Guus]

Hey, this thread made me think of that story Pooh-Bear brought to my attention in this thread (http://www.antionline.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=139890), back in november last year. Who remembers Bernie Shifman? I desided to check up on the story, and guess what: there has been an update to the site this week (16feb02) - he's still at it! (http://petemoss.com/spamflames/ShifmanIsAMoronSpammer.html#still) Talking about persistance, eh?