Protecting Yourself from Unwanted Spam

Spam is the junk mail of the future, only the future is now. You need to protect yourself from evil or often times simply pesky spammers trying to get your personal information from you deceptively. Luckily there are a few simple ways to avoid being duped by a spammer.

While most email services have spam filters, which attempt to weed out unwanted and unsolicited emails there are always some that will find a way to circumvent the system and get through anyway. The basic and most important thing to remember is to never open an email from an unknown source. Sounds simple enough but when they're tricky enough to insert your name in the subject heading, you might click anyway if you're not careful.

There are plenty of free spam protection programs out there, many from well-known, reputable companies. While you could avoid spam through good old common sense, adding some spam protection never hurts, so long as you know that even the best filters won't catch everything.

Some spam is more devious than others. Some will attempt to trick you into thinking a company or website you belong to needs personal information from you. They'll invent an imaginary crisis, or tell you something terrible has happened to your account and they need your personal information immediately. Keep in mind that any company, such as the electric company, already has your personal information and using your social security number as "verification" is the spammers most often used tactic. Call the company directly using the phone number located on your bill. Often times, you cannot only verify that this is a scam, you can also report the spammer as well.

Remember to never click on any links inside the spam as well. This only serves to confirm to the spammer that they have reached someone with an active email address, so attempting to unsubscribe from such emails will prove ineffective. If they were sneaky enough to try to trick you in the first place, would they really care enough to actually stop emailing you?

Often times spam is a way for people to covertly install malicious software and spyware on your computer. Yes, it's true, the threat of it is as prevalent as you may have heard. One needs to be vigilant when trying to prevent such things. This is often why novice computer users fall victim to such tactics. They are not aware of what is the norm when it comes to computers.

Don't assume just because your email has a spam filter and puts unwanted email in the spam folder automatically that anything that winds up in your inbox is legit. Spam filters are as flawed as us humans. It's a constant battle between spam and spam filters. The second a filter finds a way to block an email, the spammers come up with a new way. A delicate balance of common sense and preventative software should do the trick and always keep in mind if something looks suspicious there's probably a reason.

For more information on spam protection, visit http://ihatespam.ca