Spam!!!

[blinc]

Being spammed more and more over here and it's really getting ridiculous. Good news is, we're going to be getting a new provider and that address will be new and we'll know to do things differently.

Anyways, the spam started getting bad around late September/beginning of October and is getting worse and worse, a few more in the email box everyday. Here's the latest one, and I'm wondering if it has anything to do with getting AOL's instant messenger? I've never been to AOL until I downloaded the AIM thing. Does this look like it's AOL orgininated to you guys? Oh yeah, they have my REAL full name and private email address, which I didn't use when I signed on... hmmm.... and one more thing, I never signed on anywhere for a newsletter! Arrghh!

Hello (My real name was here)
This message is to verify that you wish to have your
email address: blinc@(private address was here).com added to the MicroCapMarkets.com Newsletter mailing list.

You MUST click on the link below to have your address added
to our list. This is to ensure that someone doesn't add your address to our list without your knowledge or consent. It may be necessary to cut and paste the URL below if your email reader does not support long URL's.

MicroCapMarkets.com Newsletter is a Free Newsletter designed to be your most important research tool. They are e-mailed to subscribers prior to publication on our web site. Our newsletters feature in-depth company profiles, breaking financial news, links to free delayed and real-time stock quote, company news releases and educational articles prior to general publication. We are here to help you identify and trackprospering companies.

Once again, you MUST click on the link below to confirm your
subscription to our free newsletter.

Thank you,

If the below links do not work correctly, please reply with "Subscribe" in the subject line and we will add you manually.

[url]http://www.microcapmarkets.com/cgi-bin/sm-new/s.pl?a=1&l=1&e=blinc=: (my priveate address).com&p=942714&first=(my full name)

America Online users, please click: <AREF="http://www.microcapmarkets.com/cgi-bin/sm-new/s.pl?a=1&l=1&e=blinc=: (my private address) =942714&first= (full name was here too)

[jamesglewisf]

If you signed up for the option to not receive any mailings, I doubt that AOL would have violated it. Can you imagine the size of the class action suit against them? Some new company may have just come out with a CD that you got listed on. Who knows?

[blinc]

I definitely didn't sign up for any newsletters. Think I'm going to uninstall it. Ya know, I heard MSN was possibly selling names from their site, but no proof of course. Is it against the law? I didn't think there was any recourse for internet privacy breaches.

[blinc]

Ok, now I'm really ticked. I went through our blocked senders list because someone said they couldn't send us an email... they weren't on it, so evidently there's just a glitch going on.

However, someone who shouldn't be on the list was! My mistake of course, but if I hadn't been getting spammed I wouldn't have to use the block senders option to begin with, Arrgh! Ummm.... to the person who I accidentally blocked, I'm emailing you here in just a second to let you know it was a mistake!!!

[jamesglewisf]

I'll tell you what really drives me nuts: people who ignore me no matter how many emails I send them! LOL! {toothy}

I have my ways though, I've got an army of smashers that can bust through even the best email blocker.

{smash}{smash}{smash}{smash}
{smash}{smash}{smash}{smash}
{smash}{smash}{smash}{smash}

[blinc]

{eek} {eek2} {eek} {eek2} {eek} {eek2} {eek}

RUN!!!

[Debby]

Okay, please contain your laughter....I am new to computers....I have only had one for a year and I never even had a computer class. So I have learned by doing. And asking. So what is spam? I have heard the word several times but never knew what it meant. i dont know what "cookies" are either, though I have heard that word frequently also.

[blinc]

Spam is this meat product you can... ok, sorry.

Spam is the junkmail you get in your email inbox. So far mine has mostly been adds for at home businesses, credit, satellite dishes, make money fast schemes, etc. even a few porn ads that REALLY TICKED ME OFF!! I hate spammers! They should all have repeated system failures til there computers blow up and cause moderately severe electrical shocks to the spammers themselves! {toothy} *blink*


James gave an excellent description of what cookies are, over in the "Internet" section of the forum. Here's a link to it:
http://marriedadults.net/forum/showthread.php3?threadid=27

[kezzer]

Ugh!! Just last night I got a porn email! How disgusting! How do these people know they are not emailing children!!! I blocked the address. I don't want to see that message ever again!

[jamesglewisf]

About Spam - See also http://frappydoo.com/forum/showthread.php3?postid=435

[Debby]

Thanks guys...I need all the help I can get when it comes to computers...lol. :)

[jamesglewisf]

If you ever have any computer questions, just ask them in the Hardware/Software or Internet forums. That's what they are there for.

[kezzer]

Originally posted by kezzer
Ugh!! Just last night I got a porn email! How disgusting! How do these people know they are not emailing children!!! I blocked the address. I don't want to see that message ever again! Argh!! I got another one today too!! But the strange thing is that they're not addressed directly to me but to a mailbox similiar to mine. Why am I getting it if it's not to me directly???

[CommunistPanda]

Luckily I don't tend to get much email spam (at least, now that I don't use AOL any longer), but I tend to get a fair bit of mass-unsolicited porn (and highly illegal porn at that I might add) ads on ICQ, to my disgust.

[kezzer]

I've been getting it wicked with hotmail. I'm almost ready to get rid of my account there. It seems almost every day I have to block at least 1 address from my box, but, the very next day there's always more.

[CommunistPanda]

Eeek...I wonder why...
I've never tended to get much Spam...

[blinc]

Consider yourself lucky CP. It's very annoying, especially when you get the porn stuff. That irritates the living daylights out of me.

I'm with Kezzer... my hotmail inbox the other day had 4 new messages. 3 spam, 1 good email. Of the 3 spams, 1 was porn. Really beginning to wonder how hotmail is set up... it seems that our addresses are readily accessible to the spammers.

[CommunistPanda]

That's kinda weird...my current hotmail account has never recieved a spam email in the whole time I've had it (mind you, I don't know about previous ones, can't remember that far back).
As I said, the only place I get spam is ICQ, and there it's usually illegal porn, which is REALLY annoying.

[JamesUS]

Up until recently I got very little Spam, but as I've been a little more public with my email address etc I just get more and more each day. It really is annoying, so over the last few days I've been reporting the spammers to their ISPs and getting reasonably positive results. I've got at least a couple of their accounts closed :)

[CommunistPanda]

That's a good idea.
What I personally find more annoying than the usual definition of spam is when you sign up with a reputable site, and they force you to sign up with some mailing list or something you don't want on the side.

[jamesglewisf]

I agree about signing up with a site and getting on a mailing list. Since we've been in operation, we've had one email to members, and it was targeted. We notified all the people with less than 25 posts about our Charter Member status, our new name (FrappyDoo!), and some of the new forums/moderators that had been added.

There is one unnamed board that sends me an email once every week or two. Grrrrrrr. Post it on the board or have a separate email list. Just becuase I told them that Admins could email me, doesn't mean that I want them to regularly.

[Karenluvs6]

I hate that too....It drives me crazy!!
everytime I register somewhere, I have sign up for the newsletters and I get pop up windows telling me to choose which ones I would like to get....AAAAAAARRGGGGG!! {fire}

[CommunistPanda]

My favourite virtual pet site is very annoying for that, as if you want to expand the things you can do on the site, you've gotta sign up with a few million sponsors, which all send you out mass unwanted email - thank god for the Outlook Express Inbox Assistant.

[Karenluvs6]

the only time I have ever gotten loads of unwanted email, was when I would go into chat rooms....that was three years ago, when I first got my puter. I would get tons of them, as soon as I entered the chat. I was ridiculous!

what exactly does the outlook express inbox do?

[CommunistPanda]

The Inbox Assistant just kills email with certain things in the title or sender, so most of this garbage can be deleted off the mail server before it even reaches my eyes.

[Karenluvs6]

wow....that's pretty cool.
ya learn something new everyday huh?
I have had that thing on my desktop for three years and have never known what it was. I guess I need to go in there and set it up.

[CommunistPanda]

Heh...that's a good idea.

[blinc]

{mad} Ok, that's it. I'm dumping my Hotmail account. More porn spam and I've had it! It makes me so angry, that it's just not worth going through having an email account there. Bye, Bye Hotmail and MSN Messenger! Aaargh!

[CommunistPanda]

Ouch.

[kezzer]

Ya know I'm about ready too also. Too much junk! And of course to block the sender you have to open it first,and who knows if any of these contain viruses.

[blinc]

Well I uninstalled MSN Messenger and dumped everything out of the inbox... but get this! The way to close the account is to let it sit for 60 days... after 90 days they will then close it permanently. I can't believe you just can't email them, or close it yourself, so that people who try to send you stuff will know it's a closed account. Nooo, instead their mail is going to sit there unanswered for 90 days. (and, they're probably going to think you're to lazy or mad at them because you're not answering the mail). If you log back on to check your mail... to find out if anyone is still trying to send you mail to that account, then it reactivates the account!! AAAAAAAARGGH!

[CommunistPanda]

Eeek...that stinks!

[blinc]

Oh look at what I found! http://www.junkbusters.com/ht/en/toc.html

A site on the web trying to help STOP Spammers! Yes! thank you, thank you, thank you!!

I haven't had a chance to read a lot of the information they have, but so far what I have read is really useful stuff! Like how to find the IP's of the spammers, etc. Love it!! There are good people out there, and it isn't costing anything to use their info. {angel} Reaffirms my faith a bit in the internet.

[CommunistPanda]

That could be really useful if I ever get spammed again.

[Freezerwaffle]

Get this, my sister forwarded an e-mail to an old school aquaintance. It happened to have a bunch of e-mail addresses of my friends & family. This guy took those addresses off a personal e-mail and spammed everyone with his multi level marketing junk!!!!

Is that bad netiquette or what??

{flake}Freeze {flake}

[jamesglewisf]

That is pretty rotten.

[blinc]

FreezerWaffle, I know exactly what you're talking about! I've gotten emails from people who have sent out a joke or something to everyone in their address book evidently. It makes me cringe when I see not only our address, but the address of people I don't even know! Who are those people and what are they going to do with our address? I think it's a shame people who mass mail everyone in their address book don't care enough about our privacy to be more careful. If I wanted other people to have our address I would have given it to them! Arrgh! You're right, this is one thing that ticks me off everytime I see it happen.

[Alec]

A lot of people don't know that you can use the BCC: (blind carbon copy) to address an email. You put yourself in the To: box and everybody else in the BCC:. No one in BCC will be able to see the other people getting the email. The only one everybody will know is the To:.

(The person in the To: box doesn't see the BCC: either.)

[kezzer]

That's cool Alec! I never knew what bcc was for!

[Freezerwaffle]

Cool Alec. I am going to make that a rule from now on. I just can't believe the nerve of people though!

[blinc]

Hey, that is a good idea! I've been emailing family & friends for months now without knowing that was an option. Cool! Thanks for the info. :)

[kezzer]

I am still getting spam! I'm about ready to get rid of my hotmail account, I just wanted to wait a bit to make sure I got no good emails. Lately all that's been there is spam! ARgh!!!

[spidergoolash]

hotmail = spam

dump hotmail; get yahoo, or excite even.

i've yad a yahoo account for over a year now and i love it.

[keithster]

I really don't mind spam. It sort of tastes like ham. A bit salty maybe. It always tasted good when backpacking after a long day of hauling around a 60lb pack on my back.

Spam sandwiches. Now there's the ticket.

And who could forget the Monte Python Spam song? Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spammety Spam.

Oh... You're talking about another kind of spam.

Never mind. ;)

[kezzer]

I keep trying to let my hotmail go but there's always a few people who don't read email that I send telling them of my new address! It seems I'll get a ton of spam and I'll block all the senders, then my box will be fine for a week or so and the Bango, it's loaded up again. Strange..!

[Debby]

Spider!! good to see you here....this is the first time I have seen your post!

Welcome from one alien to another :) You will love it here!!!! Glad you joined us! :)

[Mickyhoo]

Blinc... I did not read the whole thread yet.. but as to the first post you made about a newsletter asking you to confirm subscription?

Hubby's ex got a hold of my email address and filled out every newletter form she could find!!!

My mailbox kept filling up and none of the mail I wanted could get in..

Have you made any enemies online lately?

[Mickyhoo]

Just read the rest of the thread...

I saw where you posted about BCC.. I forward jokes to about 20 cyber friends on a regular basis.. I never use BCC because I got half the addresses when THEY replied to all on another list!!

Kind of like meeting new people..

[blinc]

There's only one person I can think of who had my private email address that was upset with me during the time the spam started hitting. I would hope the person would be more mature then that... but who knows anymore? I did sign up for a new firewall service today - guess what? Not the first spam ALL day long! Course, it's Saturday... maybe the spammers get the weekend off too! {toothy}

Oh Aargh! I bet you were so MAD Mickyhoo! Were you able to get ahold of her ISP provider to file a complaint? That's just so childish and petty!

[Mickyhoo]

She did it from a hotmail account at the library... I could not even prove it was her...

Just someone within driving distance of the town she lived in...Not that I even KNEW anyone else in that area!!

And now she has my address again, but her hubby of the week would not put up with her pulling that kind of stuff. She is a lot better person around him so for her sake and my sanity I hope it last with this one!!