.mac spam is out of hand
Seems that over the past month the spam thats been hitting my .mac address has been growing. I got at least 10+ emails yesterday for various sex-aids and random word messages.
Now normally I wouldn't pointing any fingers, I've had this account since Mac OS 9 so I expect I've been added to quite a lists over the years. The annoying thing is that most of these that i've been getting aren't specifically addressed to me. They are to another .mac address that is alphabeticlaly very similar to mine. If you then look at the headers, its just a big list of .mac addresses in alphabetical order. WTH? How did someone get hold of this list? Really ticks me off.
They are also being sent with no ADV in the subject line, and half the opt-outs are 404. I've been forwarding all these to [email protected] and hope Apple is working to do something about it, but somehow I doubt it. I really wish they would take legal action on all the idiot spammers out there harrassign their customers.
Has anyone else noticed increased .mac spam?
Now normally I wouldn't pointing any fingers, I've had this account since Mac OS 9 so I expect I've been added to quite a lists over the years. The annoying thing is that most of these that i've been getting aren't specifically addressed to me. They are to another .mac address that is alphabeticlaly very similar to mine. If you then look at the headers, its just a big list of .mac addresses in alphabetical order. WTH? How did someone get hold of this list? Really ticks me off.
They are also being sent with no ADV in the subject line, and half the opt-outs are 404. I've been forwarding all these to [email protected] and hope Apple is working to do something about it, but somehow I doubt it. I really wish they would take legal action on all the idiot spammers out there harrassign their customers.
Has anyone else noticed increased .mac spam?
Comments
More than likely, you just have an easy name for spammers to figure out. Sending messages en masse to users via a name generator is the oldest trick in the spammer's book. They've been doing it for years.
Reminders for future e-mail usage (not directed to you specifically):
half the opt-outs are 404
Are you clicking on the opt out link?
Chances are, that 404 message is linked to a database that tells the spammer "hey, this address is real!" Never EVER click on a link in a spam email.
Now I guess they should have banned me rather than just shut off posting priviledges, because kickaha and Amorph definitely aren't going to like being called to task when they thought they had it all ignored *cough* *cough* I mean under control. Just a couple o' tools.
Don't worry, as soon as my work resetting my posts is done I'll disappear forever.
Here I am, living my life and so forth, and I have to go out of my way to sign up for "do not call" registries, activiate spam/junk mail filters, wade through 19 pieces of "ONE DAY ONLY MATTRESS LIQUIDATION" flyers in my mail to get any real mail, etc.
By default, none of should be subject to bugging, annoyance, harrassment, etc.
If I want record-low refinancing, 6 more inches of "thicker, stronger penis", or see barely legal Asian lesbian housewives, I'll come to you, asshole.
It's just sad that, again, I have to go through the hassle of setting up a stupid Hotmail or Yahoo account just so I can enter an e-mail at a site.
When I check those accounts once every few weeks, there are 300 pieces of porn/financial/marketing spam crammed in there.
My .Mac account, thankfull, is pretty righteous and spam-free.
And it's nothing clever...most of you can probably guess it.. Ahem...
the only ways to get e-mail back to the ones who DON'T abuse it are:
never subscribe for anything that you don't want
read all pertinent privacy policies
make sure nothing is checked that shouldn't be
if you have domain names, make sure your main e-mail account is NOT listed on the registration info.
do not use a standard "mailto:" link for your address on a web site (some harvesters are savvy to javascript tricks, but railheaddesign's spamstopper is still better than nothing)
if talking to someone verbally, NEVER give out your e-mail unless you specifically tell them to not give out your e-mail address to third parties. they WILL do this by default (citibank tried to do this on me, and i told her "don't give it out to anyone outside citibank," and THEN she made that modification -- i shudder to think how many e-mails i would get if i hadn't caught that)
you can leave on html e-mails (they're not friggin' evil), but turn OFF the preview pane in your e-mail client. that way you can delete e-mails without loading them.
I generally only opt-out of things I get multiple mails from over time, i.e. the bastards don't give up. But really Tori, the easiest way to see if an email address is valid is just to see if you get a bounced mail. No tricky 404 page necessary.
These aren't all directed at me specifically so much as a group of .mac addresses. Most of the time my address isn't even the main one being sent too, me and a big list of .mac's are bcc'd on them. I'm guessing it what Brad said, probably some kind of name generator.
Bleh. Die spammers die!!
If only states would actually ENFORCE existing spam laws!!
Originally posted by dviant
the easiest way to see if an email address is valid is just to see if you get a bounced mail. No tricky 404 page necessary.
There's a difference between a valid email address and an email address that you know someone is reading the mail for. That's what these webbugs, as I believe they are called, are designed to find out.
Not using Mail either, no filters or everything. If the mail servers let it come through, its going through.
OTOH, email address that I get from my ISP offers SpamAssassin and Graymail(Thank you Sonic.net!), so I see none on that account.
There is one feature I would like to see added to Mail.app. I'd love to see a rule where I can set some emails to load images and some to not. For example I get a few newsletters that use images, and I send those to a seperate folder. By default, no messages load images, but I'd like to be able to set those newsletters to automatically load images without having to click on a seperate button.
I get about 15-20 spams a day, but the filter catches almost all of them. No big deal. Just an annoyance.
The random words are to defeat bayesian spam filters, but it can't be too hard to detect messages with a large percentage of garbled words.
Maybe I'm just lucky.
Originally posted by Brad
[BTranslating your name to "leet" is another good one. This will help reduce the likelihood of a name generator catching you... [/B]
I don't have a .mac account, I actually use a free email and don't get any spam. Not a single piece. If I sign up for it, I get it, but I can always unsubscribe because it's not spam, it's legitimate stuff. I just use a little precaution before giving my email to web sites.
I never partake in those web chain emails, and always tell the person to stop, but that is just because I find them annoying.
The only thing I get is the rare blank email from an @aol.com account.
While the spam filter in mail works very well (I know from my parents/family account) I don't see that it is a good problem solver, just a temporary solution. I don't know what can be done but something should.
It should work the same way any service does, residential gets say 5,000 emails a month to be sent, maybe more even. But businesses need to register to be able to mass email so that if they abuse their emailing privileges by not really taking you off a list, than they get in trouble. I guess over the residential limit that I could live with gates' $.01/email but who does that money go to?
Originally posted by torifile
Jeez! Today has been a spam-full day. 45 messages and counting.
You are not alone! I remembered that I had the same thing in the past month or two. I think it is just a weird day. Normally, I don't get more than 10 spam /day on my .Mac account.
Originally posted by Kenneth
You are not alone! I remembered that I had the same thing in the past month or two. I think it is just a weird day. Normally, I don't get more than 10 spam /day on my .Mac account.
Up to 75!!! today. Unbelievable. I don't know what's going on. Usually, I'm at around 6 or 7. I hope this isn't the beginning of a trend. This is outrageous.
Or it's Google which has eyes everywhere, including in the ads here.
BTw, every so often, it's good to re-train your junk mail filter for a few days. The spammers get crafty and a few more slip between the cracks as time goes on.
My .Mac e-mail gets spam all the time, but I know it's my fault for using the address willy-nilly on the net.