New Spam Prevention Product that Works! by Lee Traupel

New Spam Prevention Product that Works! by Lee Traupel

Businesses and consumers are drowning in a never-ending deluge of Spam (junk
mail)according to reports just released by Quris, Inc. Spam has increased
450% from June of 2001 to now. Furthermore, 70% of respondents indicated they
are receiving so much e-mail in the form of Spam that its negating their
acceptance and responsiveness to legitimate opt-in e-mail messages (permission
based). The average business user is forced to spend 20-30 minutes a day wading
through Spam clogged e-mail in-boxes trying to separate legitimate e-mail from
the junk in order to delete the latter.

Many companies have tried to offer Spam solutions that are based primarily on
filtering technology. But, most of these products and services have not worked
well in practicethe ingenious spammers have learned work arounds by
constantly changing their fake e-mail addresses and text to avoid the blocking
filters. Its been a war of attrition to date and the spammers have been wining
so far!

I am pleased to report that one company has developed an elegant but simple
solution that has blocked 100% of the Spam that was sent to me during a test
period of five days. The company is DigiPortal Software, Inc. www.digiportal.com
and their Spam killer application is called ChoiceMail. It works extremely well,
is easy to setup and only costs $29.95 (introductory price) and they even offer
a fourteen-day trial period for no charge to test drive the product. And, the
solution runs on your desktop and does not necessitate your working with a third
party server and doesnt require any service charges. Most importantly, it puts
the burden of proof on the Spammers, forcing them to have your permission to
contact you.

Here is how DigiPortals clever solution and software work: You download or
purchase the software and install it on your PC (sorry PC version only right
now) and setup your approval list by exporting your address book. From that
point forward ChoiceMail automatically assumes all inbound e-mail is Spam and it
blocks any e-mail that is not on an approved list that you have created.

If the e-mail sender is on your approved list it makes it through to your inbox;
if not, then ChoiceMail blocks the mail if the address and adds it to a
rejection list and sends the sender a notification that your on a permission
network and that he/she has to clickthrough to a web site and send you a
message by filling out a form that automatically forwards the persons message
to you, so you can elect to receive or not.

DigiPortal is effectively acting as a trusted middleman in a process that
reminds me of PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) the defacto industry standard e-mail
security application that incorporates a similar process via a key held by a
trusted third party. Your ostensibly guaranteed never to receive any Spam based
e-mail as spammers will never receive your e-mail, let alone reply to itmost
use automated systems that have no human intervention in the process. Its
relatively painless for you to manage new contacts - if your receiving in-bound
e-mails from a new a person (contact) that you have no existing relationship
with its easy to accept his/her request to reach you and the software also
automatically updates your permission list.

ChoiceMail is an elegant solution that works well, is easy to use and solves a
problem very cost effectively. There are a few hiccups with the softwarebut,
these are minor when you consider the significant benefits of the product and
assuming the company will broaden its support for other applications in the near
term. At present DigiPortal only works with standard ISPs such as Earthlink,
ATT, etc. and with specific desktop clients including Outlook Express and Eudora
no web-based e-mail services (HotMail or Yahoo mail) work with the software
yet and there is no support for AOL at present. My biggest complaint is that
they dont support a standard Outlook e-mail - you have to manually import your
contact list from Outlook, which can be painstaking depending on the number of
recipients in your address book. And, their initial focus is on the small
business user or consumer, as they offer no support at present for the corporate
enterprise.
About the Author
Lee Traupel has 20 plus years of business development and marketing experience -
he is the founder of Intelective Communications,Inc. www.intelective.com, a
marketing services company. Lee@intelective.com Reprinted with permission from
Intelective Communications - this article may be reprinted freely, providing
this attribution box remains intact.

De-Spam Your Inbox: "How to Fight the Spam War and Win!" by Merle

De-Spam Your Inbox: "How to Fight the Spam War and Win!" by Merle

Spam, Spam everywhere... what's a person to do? If you're
an online entrepreneur, odds are your mailbox is filling
up daily with Spam. The longer you've been "working" the
Net and the more visible you've become, the more you're
probably receiving. I've been online about five years now,
and one of my mailboxes alone is over 85% Spam.

First, you need to realize that Spam is part of doing
business online and there's really no escaping it. But
that doesn't mean you can't rid yourself of it by using
the right tools and arming yourself for daily battle.

There are many excellent tools, some even free that will
help you fight the war on Spam and Win! Let's review some
of my personal favorites:

1) SpamNet: http://www.CloudMark.com

This excellent piece of software is a relative newcomer
and free to download. It only works with Outlook and
runs invisibly in the background of your mail program.
The software adds 2 new buttons at the top of Outlook's
interface named "block" and "unblock" and adds a "Spam
folder" where it puts all of the Spam it finds so you
can review it if you want before deletion.

If you get a piece of junk when you download your mail,
just hit the block button. This sends it and whatever
the sender tries to mail you in the future straight to
the Spam folder. It also casts your vote to CloudMark
and when they receive enough complaints on a sender
that mail is automatically labeled as Spam.

If, after reviewing the Spam folder, you find something
that doesn't belong there, just highlight it and click
the "unblock" button to bring the sender back in to your
inbox forever more. Right now this software only works
with Outlook, but there is talk about a version for
Outlook Express coming soon.I've been using this
software for a few months and am very pleased with
the results. Runs on Win 98/NT/2000/XP.

2) MailWasher: http://www.MailWasher.net

Another ad-supported free piece of software that works
beautifully. I've been using this with my Outlook
Express accounts and couldn't be happier. You run
Mailwasher before downloading your mail from your
server. It automatically marks mail it suspects
as Spam - then you can designate the sender as a "friend"
or blacklist him with just a click. You then click
"process mail" and any "bad" email is bounced back to
the sender and the good stuff is sent to your inbox.

You can upgrade Mailwasher to an ad-free version by
sending a donation to its creators. Believe me, you'll
love it so much you'll want to send them money for all
the headaches this software will save you. It can be
configured to check multiple accounts so it's great
if you're managing multiple identities and boxes.It
does not support web based accounts like Hotmail or
Yahoo, but a version is supposedly underway for them.
Runs on Win 95/98/ME/NT4/ 2000/XP

3) SpamBuster:
http://www.Contactplus.com/products/spam/spam.htm

The free version of this software is ad-supported,
which means it displays banners at the top. If you
spend the 19.95 and register it, the ads are removed.
Before using your POP mail account you run SpamBuster,
which looks for junk and comes complete with a list
of over 17,000 known spammers. It checks your email
periodically for new messages and provides stats and
charts of how much Spam you're actually receiving.
Also Works with AOL, Hotmail, or Yahoo! accounts.
Works on Win 95/98/2000/ME/NT/XP

4) MailShell: http://www.MailShell.com

Blocks 99% of all junk mail and works with your
current email address. Free 30 day trial available.
Less then 3.00 a month after that

5) SpamKiller:
http://www.mcafee.com/myapps/msk/default.asp

SpamKiller was recently purchased by Mcafee Software.
who makes the award winning virus software. Works with
POP based email accounts and will run you 39.95. Like
most Spam filtering software, it checks for new email
and possible Spam on your server before downloading it
to your email client. Filters are automatically updated
and you can create your own custom filters. You can
also lodge complaints with spammers and their hosts
from within the interface. Supports Win 95/98/NT/
ME/2000 or XP.

6) JunkMuncher.com: http://www.JunkMuncher.com

Works with POP email accounts and includes its own
email porn filtering utility. Does not support AOL or
Hotmail accounts.

7) SpamWeasel:
http://www.mailgate.com/products/spamweas/sw_feat.asp

Free software that supports multiple email accounts.
Spam Weasel uses powerful rules to identify Spam and
permits a range of user defined actions like blocking
and deleting. Easy to Install and use.

8) Spamex: http://www.Spamex.com

Spamex offers disposable email addresses so you keep
your real address off spammers' lists. Mail sent to
the fake address is then forwarded to your real email
account. As soon as the disposable account starts
picking up Spam and being abused you can delete it
and create a new one. 19.95 a year.

9) ChoiceMail: http://www.digiportal.com/product4.html

A Spam blocking system that's based on the fact that
most incoming mail is Spam unless the sender has
obtained your permission to email you. You may
preapprove senders from your address book. When an
unauthorized email is sent to you, its sender is forced
to fill out a form stating why he should be allowed to
communicate with you. Then it's your choice whether or
not to receive messages from him.

Supports POP accounts and runs on Windows NT, 2000, XP,
98, ME. It does not currently work with web-based
email systems such as HotMail, Juno or Yahoo or with
MSN or AOL's proprietary email. Currently offering a
2-week trial of their service, or buy it for 39.95.

10) Spam Arrest: http://spamarrest.com/

Another service that blocks the junk before it can hit
your inbox. All email goes through their server first,
and if the sender is already a "verified source" their
mail travels to you seamlessly. If they are not, you'll
need to add them to your approval list to make sure
you continue to receive their emails without any
interruption.

Spam Arrest works on Eudora, Outlook, Outlook Express,
Netscape, Incredimail, and any other email program
that supports the POP3 protocol. Free 30 day trial is
available and if you like it the price is only 19.95
every 6 months.

For more tips and helpful Spam resources check out:

Elsop's Anti-Spam Page
Excellent links and resources offered here
http://www.elsop.com/wrc/nospam.htm

Info. on More Anti-Spam Software
http://www.spamrecycle.com

JunkBusters
http://www.JunkBusters.com

More Free Anti-Spam Software
http://www.webattack.com/freeware/comm/fwspam.shtml

Let's face it. You can't wage your own personal war
on Spam and win, but you can reclaim your own inbox
by incorporating software that only allows "real"
mail to come through. So choose your weapon and
prepare for battle by protecting what's rightfully
yours -- your Inbox.
About the Author
Merle http://www.EzineAdAuction.com
"Where some of the BEST Deals in Ezine Advertising are Made"
Buy & Sell Ezine Ads in a live auction setting!
Publishers sell off your excess inventory and Buyers
pick up some Fantastic bargains. Free E-book on how to
write "glowing" ezine ads.....Download Now at
http://www.ezineadauction.com/ebooks/greatezineads.pdf

What is Spam Anyway? by Richard Lowe

What is Spam Anyway? by Richard Lowe

I've found when people discuss spam they really have no idea
what they are talking about. There are as many different
definitions of spam as there are people. In point of fact, this
factor alone (not being able to define what spam is and what it
consists of) makes it virtually impossible to control.

In order to control spam, a useful definition is necessary.
Why? Simple. In order to control something, you must know what
you are controlling. When you understand the basic facts, then
you can take whatever course of action is necessary. Until you
achieve that understanding, you will be shooting blindly at an
undefined target. This makes it very difficult to actually do
anything useful.

So on that note, what kind of definitions for spam work and
don't work?

Commonly spam is defined as unsolicited email. Unfortunately,
this definition by itself is NOT spam and means absolutely
nothing. What's wrong with it? This definition does not help
you solve the problem, and thus is incorrect. If this
definition was true, then to prevent spam you would have to
somehow contact a person to ask them if you could send them
an email.

For example, I don't generally call someone on the phone and
ask them for an email message. That would be silly. In fact, by
definition most email is unsolicited; I don't, for example,
expect my wife or a friend to ask me if it's okay to send me a
message.

Sometimes spam is defined as emails that are from unknown
sources. Hmm. This really doesn't work well either. I'll get
emails from my website from people I don't know - these are not
spam. Also, sometimes my friends will pass my email address to
their friends, who send me email. These are also not spam, even
though they were from an unknown source and were unsolicited.

How about just plain annoying emails? That seems to be the
definition that most people have in mind when they mention
spam. If the email is annoying in some manner, and especially
if it was unsolicited, it is spam. This definition probably
gets a little closer to the heart of the matter, but it really
doesn't define spam well.

What about unsolicited bulk email? This definition gets a
little bit closer but it still doesn't really define spam well.
I mean I give my email address to my bank and I really didn't
ask them to send me emails (although I didn't ask them not to
as well). Yet I would not call this spam as I do business with
the bank. Their emails might be annoying, but since I have a
business relationship with the bank I expect them to communicate
with me occasionally.

Okay, so what is spam?

I like to think of spam as "unethical mass email". By this I
mean emails which violate the netiquette standards of the
majority of users of the internet.

Note that by this definition, an individual email sent to a
person is not spam. A commercial email, however, is another
matter. Even a single commercial email might be unethical if it
does not follow the rules below.

Ethical emails are targeted well towards their audience.
Unethical emails are mass mailings sent out blindly to a large
number of people.

These are emails that are sent to thousands, tens of thousands,
even millions of people, hoping against hope that a few dozen
will be stupid or greedy enough to respond. These emails are
untargeted and will not pertain to the majority of the
recipients. Since the majority of the people reading the
message (usually upwards of 99%) will simply delete it
immediately, this makes the mailing unethical.

Ethical email messages include valid email header information.
This information properly identifies the sender of the message.
In addition, all of the other header data in the message is
correct.

Spam messages often have forged or invalid email headers. This
means it is difficult (if not virtually impossible) to trace
the source of the email based upon the header information
within the email message. Since the sender of the message
cannot be identified the message is unethical. In this case,
even a single email message would count as spam.

Ethical mailings include a method for opting out which actually
works.

If you run a newsletter or do any kind of mass mailing, you
must include at least one method of removal in the email
message itself. This removal method (and more than one is
preferable) MUST WORK. Some things which I often see in opt-out
schemes which ARE NOT VALID include the following:

- Any email message which states that the reader must go to a
web site, log in and then modify his email preferences is
UNETHICAL. This requires too much information from the user
and forces him to do too much work.

- If the email message includes an unsubscribe link (or other
means) which does not work, then it is UNETHICAL.

- Messages which validly allow for opt-out but then say "you
will be removed in a week" or some other long period of
time are UNETHICAL. These are computers people, and there is
no reason to include these long delays. Remove the person
immediately.

Ethical mass mailings are double-opt-in. This means after a
person signs up for the mailing list, he receives a
confirmation message. He must either reply to this message or
click a link to activate the mailings to him. Any other form
of opt-in is UNETHICAL as it allows people to be subscribed by
others or by accident.

Ethical mailings do not include webbugs, set cookies or perform
any kind of involuntary tracking.

Email messages are often opened up by the recipient before he
knows anything about the message. This means if you are doing
any kind of tracking, the person has no way to stop it, short
of blocking the receipt of the message entirely. This lack of a
choice on the part of the recipient makes this kind of tracking
UNETHICAL. The only time this would be ethical is if it was
clearly stated when the user signed up for the mailing. In that
instance, this behavior is known and this makes it ethical.
Note that while the web site privacy policy should state this
fact, it must also be stated clearly on the page where the
person actually signs up for the mailing.

Ethical mailers do not use email harvesters. Using special
robots to gather email addresses from web sites is UNETHICAL.
These email addresses are generally included on web sites to
allow individuals to communicate with individuals. Rarely is
the intention to join a mass mailing list distributed on CD.
ALL USES OF EMAIL HARVESTING IS UNETHICAL.

Ethical mailers do not take advantage of open relays or use
other "spammer tricks". If you are legitimate, then there is
no need to attempt to hide your whereabouts or cover your
tracks. Using a relay without permission or sending millions
of emails through an unprotected formmail script is simply
bad manners.

Get the idea? Spamming is NOT sending someone one or more email
messages without their express permission. Spamming is simply
ignoring the rights of others (your audience, system
administrators and even the users of the internet as a whole).
That's all it is.


About the Author
Richard Lowe Jr. is the webmaster of Internet Tips And Secrets at
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