Porkchop Technology Review's

This article is not about the delicious spam that comes in the can, this is about the spam that attacks your email, forums, and blogs.  Spam is the most evil thing on the Internet, I for example on this site get spam daily, but I use Akismet, a spam plugin for Wordpress that stops it.  I find it quiet amusing reading all the spam I get, usually its for that amazing medication called Viagra.  I don’t see how these companies see that most people do not read/care about spam, but I guess some people get fooled by it.  The worst case of spam are those emails you receive that say some guy overseas has passed away, and has left you a huge amount of money, with information for you to contact them.  I know most of you, will know this is bogus, but I also know some people will think it’s true and actually go ahead and follow up on it.  Always remember if it sounds to good to be true, its not true.  Also never reply to spam, you will get double or triple spam emails back.  Unfortunately there isn’t a lot you can do with spam emails, I use to back then, look-up the IP’s (whois) and send it to the abuse email there ISP’s have, but that does not work, since most of spam come from spoofed IP addresses, proxy’s, and botnets.  So its virtually impossible to get back at spammers.  The only thing you can do is flag them on your email program, install junk mail filters, they usually come with your security software, and ignore it.  The worst part about spam is that it affects the legitimate marketers, it virtually makes them impossible to actually advertise through email anymore, due to the spam that has ruined there reputations.  Email spam can be ignored it’s not that bad, but the worst spam I have seen is the message board spam, such as PHPBB for example, that spam, they register multiple accounts and spam your message boards, ruining them, and most likely the only thing you can do to combat it is making it, approve by admin each user, which takes time.  Spam is also ruining places like Facebook, Myspace, and Twitter, a lot of people go on there and use it to have fun, but then the spammers see that, there are a lot of people there, great place to spam everyone.

Here are a few things you can do to reduce the amount of spam you get in your email:

• Make 2 email addresses, use one for personal friends and family, never give it out to anyone, use it in signup’s, or forms requesting it online, just use it strictly with friends and family, people you know.  Use the 2nd email address that is signed up, to register on websites, and other places that require you to use an email address.  Use a hotmail.com address or another address for your 2nd account, hotmail seems to have a good spam detection, never use a outlook client on the PC, as this might execute code from spam, but use outlook for primary email if you want.
• Never reply to spam, ignore it, never click on any links in the spam, I’ve seen spam include now .exe’s in there attachments and these are viruses/Trojans
• A lot of spam now looks like authentic url’s, like @paypal.com requesting passwords and stuff, always be sure to double check messages, and note that never give your password to anyone through an email, nobody will ask you for a password/username or personal information.
• If it sounds to good to be true, its not true, don’t get fooled by emails stating you won 1million dollars, or have a property that was given to you overseas, if something like that ever happened you would of got a phone call and mail, and you would have to know the person personally.
• Try not to give out your email address

For forums like phpbb, set it so you have to review the people before they can register also look for plugins that can prevent spam registrations, this will vary from forum to forum.
For wordpress install plugin such as Akismet, that flags spam, helps prevent it, I found though that it usually flags posts that are not spam sometimes

Another evil spam that is going around, is the MSN Messenger spam, the way it works, is that your friends on your list go to some kind of online block checker, the block checker basically checks to see who has blocked you and checks online status.  These block checker websites ask for your MSN username and password, which then record’s it, and then they use it to spam friends on your list, using your email, login.  The bad part about this is that when this happens, you basically have to delete that friend off your list, since there account is compromised.  Those websites are tricky as well, they have a TOS that states they will use your account for advertising, but of course nobody reads it.  So remember never put your MSN username and password into these sites requesting it, it is a scam.

So here are a few pointers to combat spam.  Governments are trying to fight spam, but it is virtually impossible, most of the spam comes from other countries such as Russia and China, the US laws do not apply there.  As I said before they also use proxies to hide there real IP addresses, which makes it virtually impossible to catch the person sending out the spam.

• NVIDIA Graphic cards crashing in Game, The nvlddmkm.dll error I've always been a fan...
• ESET Smart Security 4 Review This review is about ESET...
• Computer Games that you Should Own If you are either looking...
• Making Money Online is not Easy [/caption] This is a very...
• Computer Security Computer security is a very...

• Today’s Retirement Planning Advice is a Sick Joke Most of today’s retirement planning...
• How to Get Blog Readers Many people start blogging and...
• Building My Tribe: Part 2 So today brings part 2...
• Saving, Spending and Investing Philosophy How you think about saving,...
• "You Need A Reality Check!" - Why Everyone Wants You To Fail This study is a guide...