SPAM: Are you taking the Asterisk*? by Michael Hopkins

SPAM: Are you taking the Asterisk*? by Michael Hopkins

SP*M is the scourge of the Internet. Everyone hates SP*M. Even SPA*MERS hate SP*M!

For the average email user it's an annoyance. But for the
Internet marketer it represents a serious threat. If you're
sending ezines, autoresponder messages or solo ads as a means of building your business, then there's every chance that between 10% and 50% of your recipients never get your email.

It's the SP*M blockers you see.

More and more email users have installed SP*M blockers to
prevent all the thrash from ever reaching their inbox. Likewise,
an ever-increasing number of ISPs use similar technology to
protect their users.

This represents a serious challenge to the legitimite marketer
who's sending legitimite emails to legitimite opt-in recipients.

It's gotten to the point where I can't even spell the word SP*M
in this article for fear it never reaches you. I should also
avoid words like FR*E or M*NEY or OPP*RTUNITY or even something apparently harmless like CLICK BEL*W!!

In fact, there's so many things that will clock up points on the
SP*M blocker's index, that it's getting near impossible for us
to write anything in our emails. (If you're interested, you can
see an extensive list of the kind of stuff that will earn you
SP*MMER points at http://spamassassin.org ests.html).

So what can you do to get around this problem?

Simple. You've got to determine whether the emails you send out are going to pass the SP*M blockers criteria or not.

Here's how to do it without spending a penny...

1. Download and install Eudora email software from http://eudora.com (it's FR*E!).

2. Download and install Spamnix from http://www.spamnix.com
(the FR*E version is fine).

3. Set up one of your existing email accounts in Eudora or
create a new one especially for the purposes of testing your
mails.

4. Every time you have an email ready to send to your opt-in
subscribers, send a test copy to your email account in Eudora
first. Spamnix will examine the mail and, if it looks like SP*M,
it will filter it into a special folder it creates to handle
this kind of thing. Spamnix will also tag a report on to the
bottom of the message that shows you exactly what's wrong with your email to earn it such a poor reputation.

Now, all you have to do is tweak your message according to the Spamnix report and try again. Keep doing this until Spamnix no longer considers you a dirty rotten SP*MMER.

Because Spamnix uses the same criteria as just about every other SP*M blocking software, you can now be quite certain that your email will reach its intended recipients.

So, don't let those SP*MMERS drive you out of business. Take
action today to ensure that their dodgy business practices are
not costing you dearly.

And with that I've got to sign off... I've just received a H*T
offer on how to make L*ADS of M*NEY selling VI*GRA to people with M*RTGAGES who W*RK from H*ME to pay off their CR*DIT C*RD B*LLS!

Or something.

About the Author
Michael Hopkins is owner of BizzyDays Ebook Publications.
Visit now to download original ebooks for FREE at:
http://www.bizzydays.com
This article first appeared in Michael's newsletter 'Ebook Times'.
To subscribe visit: http://www.bizzydays.com/free_newsletter.htm

How to Protect your PC from Atrocious Spyware in the Cyber Age. by George Papazoglou

How to Protect your PC from Atrocious Spyware in the Cyber Age. by George Papazoglou

Wouldn't you be shocked to find that
your personal sensitive information,
like files, credit card information,
operating system / software and other
non-disclosed data to be penetrated
by unscrupulous prying eyes? Even worse...

"Is your computer infected by Spyware?"

What is Spyware? Spyware are infectious
programs developed to secretly subtract
and transfer electronic information over the Internet, without a User's apprehension.

Norton Anti-Virus or any other "virus protection" solution, will not protect your computer from malicious applications like Spyware.



Ever Downloaded any kind of Music, Video or even "Free Software"?

On the Internet, anything "free" has a hidden cost... much more than the cost of a highly-priced product.

How much is your Privacy's worth to You?

To diabolic marketing companies, your identity my friend, is worth thousands of dollars... they get rich by capitalizing and selling your privacy to third parties, who will in return, sell (again!) or use you as a guinea pig for their promotions - your Anti-Virus won't protect you from Spyware!

Hint: Some even sell your information to telemarketers, or bulk e-mail marketing companies.

The question is... are the gigantic companies selling "anti-virus solutions", a part of this greedy industry?

Two of the best "Spyware Scanners" you must-have to protect your computer and identity from prying Spyware.

Spyware Removal Tools

No Adware : Stops privacy invaders like Gator, Kazaa or Adware and PC cluttering pop-ups.

http://cyber-software.com/spyware-removal

X-Block Probably the most powerful tool to automatically tracking, cleaning and informing you about malicious spyware, Trojans and
Privacy-intruding programs.

http://cyber-software.com/x-block

Scan your Computer now for free. Open the program here and then opt to choose "RUN" instead of downloading it.
You will be probably shocked to see how your Computer's system is infected with several spyware programs.
About the Author
--------------------------------------

Article written by George Papazoglou
This article maybe freely republished
provided that it is left intact
including Author's credits and
this resource box at it's total
entirety.Cyber-Software.com

--------------------------------------

Is Your Website Blacklisted? by Niall Roche

Is Your Website Blacklisted? by Niall Roche

A blacklist, as the name implies, is a list of people or companies who have met with the disapproval of others. In
the online world a blacklist refers to those people who have been marked as responsible for generating spam in a very big way. Blacklists are also known as blocklists.

Blacklists are used to combat spam in a very specific way. When spam is reported to one of the relevant spam fighting organizations the IP address the spam originated from is added to a banned or blacklisted IP addresslist. An IP address is the unique location of you or your website on the Internet - think of it as your "home address" online. To put it simply every www.domain.com Internet address has a
matching IP address. Any email coming from your website domain also has a corresponding IP address. If your IP address is present on a blacklist then you're potentially wasting your time sending email to customers.

Why are you wasting your time? Modern spam blockers come with the most common blacklists installed and/or allow you
to import updated blacklists into your spam blocker. This allows to you block a huge amount of spam but you may also,
potentially, block legitimate email. Blacklists are not foolproof.

There are two types of IP address:

Dynamic - changes every time you connect to the Internet. Most commonly used for dialup Internet access. Spammers love these because they're very hard to track and 100% disposable.

Fixed/Static - All websites, most large companies and some individuals use fixed IP addresses. This can cause huge
problems if they're reported for pamming.

When an IP address (dynamic or fixed ) is reported for sending spam it's added to a blacklist. There are three different types of blacklists:

Temporary
An IP address placed on a temporary blacklist will have email coming from that IP address blocked for several hours. After a few hours the offending IP address is removed from the blacklist.

Permanent
When an IP address is added to a permanent blacklist any email server configured to block email from this list will never receive email from that range of IP addresses again.

Comprehensive
This is the most damaging of blacklists. Not only does it block a single IP address it also blocks the IP addresses next to it. For example if the IP address 192.156.66.67 was added to a comprehensive blacklist then all IP addresses close to 192.156.66.67 will also be blocked. This can be a huge problem for those website owners using virtual hosting because if your host has ever appeared on a blacklist then you're also on the same blacklist, by default, because of the shared hosting from the same IP range.

It's important for all website owners to check whether or not they're on a blacklist. You'll need your IP address (available from your webhost) and you can check your blacklist status at: www.mail-abuse.org/cgi-bin/lookup

Blacklists are a necessary evil due to the volume of spam being sent each day but are not an exact science. Take a few moments from your day and ensure that your website or email address is not being blocked.
About the Author
www.spam-site.com reviews and tests antispam software solutions for the business and end user. Niall Roche is the content author and owner of spam-site.com