E-Mail Spam Prevention Tips

Check out the sections below for tips and tools.

• Spam reporting

• Tracing Spams

• Hiding addresses from spammers

• Spam e-mail blocking and filtering

Spam reporting

• How to complain to the spammer's provider is a write-up on the steps of generating a spam complaint.

• SpamCop is perhaps the biggest and best-known spam-reporting tool there is.

• Spam Identifier is a tool for looking up the owners of an IP address or domain name.

• SpamAbuse.org has spam tracing and reporting tools.

• Remove Spam is a spam-reporting service that offers manual tracking and reporting of your spam on a per-report or monthly fee basis.

• Spam Control is a shareware reporting tool that works with Microsoft Outlook to forward spam to a reporting organization.

• Spam-Abuse is an open source reporting tool for Windows.

• Spam Punisher is a program that assists with creating complaints about received spam.

Tracing spams

• Tracing the real account behind a spammer.

• Google Groups can be useful for discovering how widely a Usenet spam is distributed.

• Spam Tracking Page tracks Usenet spam.

• Sam Spade web-based tools for tracing spam and Win95/NT freeware tools

• UXN Spam Combat web-based tools for tracing spam and decoding obfuscated URLs.

• S.P.U.T.U.M.'s SpuTools provides background info on spam tracing, and some FRAMES based pages for novices and experts.

• Ungoopspam is a UNIX command-line tool for de-obfuscating spammers' URLs.

• Spamtrak is a UNIX tool for adding tracking headers to incoming e-mail.

Hiding addresses from spammers

• Tim Williams' E-mail Countermeasures page has a collection of hiding techniques at various levels of complexity and security.

• James Thornton has information on doing a redirect to protect addresses and using a graphical '@' to prevent address harvesting,

• Sneakemail is an address-hiding service.

• he Spam Motel:Spam checks in, but it never checks out? This is an address-hiding service with some extra features.

• NetMails.net is another address-hiding service.

• TrashMail is a free disposable e-mail address service.

• MailMoat is another disposable e-mail address service.

• Escrambler is a site for web page creators that creates a JavaScript program that regenerates your mailto: address on the fly.

• CGI::ContactForm is a perl module that generates contact forms for web sites.

Spam e-mail blocking and filtering

• Mozilla, the open-source browser, has a 'Bayesian' (learning) anti-spam filter built in.

• SpamX is a Java-based blocking and reporting tool for any POP3 e-mail.

• despammed.com's filter service removes UCE from email you receive.

• spamgourmet.com's limited use addresses expires addresses after a certain number of messages.

• N-Dream is a service that logs into your e-mail account and deletes spam out of it.

• Tmicha.net is a free e-mail forwarder that filters using ORDB and Spamcop.

• Mailshell [trial service is free, permanent service available for pay] offers a personalized e-mail domain and filtering and forwarding to a real address.

• eioMAIL.com's Target Revocable E-Mail lets you give out new addresses on the fly and revoke them whenever you like.

• Emailias allows users to generate a unique per-use address which can be used to track contacts by source and easily stop unwanted communication from that source.

• Spamex protects your real email address by letting you create disposable email addresses to use instead.

• Spamfree.net provides a variety of filters (content, relay, attachment, hyperlink and image) and works with your existing e-mail address.

• Broadband Antispam is a service designed to do spam filtering for broadband (cable/DSL) users.

• Atqui Spam Filter is a service that prefilters e-mail and lets you use your current e-mail address and mail server.

• Clean MyMailbox is an anti-spam ASP that requires no software to install, no DEAs, no MX record changes. Users simply sign-up and enjoy clean POP mailboxes.

• CruelMail is an email service provider that lets its users charge senders a delivery fee for all email sent to their accounts. Users may list addresses who won't be subject to the delivery fee. Email for which the delivery fee was not paid won't be delivered to the user. CruelMail collects the fee and transfers it to the user (minus a modest commission).

• Bluebottle Systems operates an asp service to help individuals to protect their mail accounts (including Hotmail) from spam.

• Email Filtering is an e-mail scanning service for single (POP) email accounts and domain filtering. This hosted service means no software to install and updates are managed on hosted servers. 90-95% of spam removed without over blocking. Free 1 month trial available.

• Apexmail Professional is a spam and virus filtered e-mail account service.

• Herbivore prevents spam by automatically utilizing all email messages sent to the users on the Herbivore network. The messages are hash coded to ensure privacy and given a unique ID that identifies sender, title and body content. If more than 2 messages are received and find matches in the database the message is sent to the bulk file allowing the user to make a final determination of validity.

• ChoiceMail is a challenge- response system, software that intercepts e-mail from unknown correspondents and makes them prove that they're humans and not spammers.

• NoSpam is a consumer-centric tool that provides a simple web interface to manage POP account spam filtering. Users are given a new POP account which will filter incoming email and apply user specified whitelist and blacklist settings.

• GoodbyeSpam.com is anti-spam protection for consumers and small businesses that works with all e-mail accounts including POP3, AOL, Yahoo, Hotmail, MSN, IMAP and Juno. Offers three levels of security to defeat even the most persistent spammers and allows users to import addresses from e-mail programs to an "approved" list with a single click.

• Cleanster is a $3/month filtering service for any sort of POP3 mail account.

• ePurity is a $25/year filtering service for your mail account. It uses SSL to provide relatively secure connections to/from their servers.

• The Spam Eater -  Third party delete from pop3 auto blacklister / whitelister, with bayesian filtering, collaborative filtering, user subject line filtering, and optional challenge-response.

• Cloudmark SpamNet is an Outlook add-in that saves you time and frustration by stopping spam automatically. The service is free and easy to use.

• spamXpress is an Outlook Express subscription-based filter system.

• George Eby has some instructions on how to delete junk e-mail before you see it under netscape.

• Email Magician is an e-mail management product for Eudora that includes highly flexible filtering capabilities.

• Spamfire is a POP filtering program for Mac OS 9 and OS X.

• Pegasus Mail, an alternative to Outlook, is known for good security and spam filtering capabilities.

• SCSMFILTER.EXE is a freeware NT service that filters both incoming and outgoing mail based on all sorts of criteria. It also supports a plugin interface so you can add your own..:-)

• SpamGuard is a Windows POP pre- filter that works with most Windows POP-based mailers. It uses a filtering list maintained by the developers on a centralized server, easing the user of the burden of maintaining their own filters.

• Spam filter is a program that you run on your PC; it logs into your POP account periodically and deletes e-mail messages containing words or phrases that you choose.

• MailWasher allows preview of messages and deletion of spam prior to download.

• Spammunition is a freeware filtering system for MS Outlook.

• SpamPal is a free blocklist client for Windows systems.

• SPAMfighter is a free Outlook client plugin that checks a server for blocking information.

• Spam Interceptor is a filter for Windows POP clients.

• MailSifter is a filtering program for Windows POP clients. It allows a mix of developer-supplied and custom filters.

• MailShield Desktop and Workgroup are filters for Windows POP clients. It features a grading and scoring system for messages to allow fine-tuning of the filtering setup.

• Spam Agent Spam Agent has a comprehensive set of filters that block spam and unwanted emails. It has the ability to create custom filters. It also has the ability to report spammers with a mouse-click.

• SpamAssassin Pro brings the power of SpamAssassin to Outlook and Exchange users.

• Email Express! is an anti-spam email proxy. It uses realtime blackhole lists, word proximity filtering, bug filtering, and active content filtering.

• Anti Spam Software Provides anti-spam email software for Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express and America Online.

• InBox Filter deletes spam messages at your e-mail server before you download them to your e-mail client. Flexible and online updatable filters will help you to catch all spam messages sent to your mailbox.

• Spam Outpost will eliminate the spam in your inbox before you download it. It will detect any possible spam using a comprehensive list of inappropiate words and strings that are common in junk mails. The list is totally editable to suit your needs. You can also add emailaddresses, domains and names that you want no more email from.

• SpamBurner is a combination of filter and restricted e-mail client that can use Outlook or Outlook Express as a viewer.

• No Damn Spam eliminates spam email essentially 100% for most net users (all POP3 and IMAP4 accounts), and is especially easy for Outlook Express users.

• SpamButcher is an anti-spam filter for Windows users. It uses Fuzzy Logic to eliminate up to 98% of Spam.

• SpamBully combines a number of techniques (filtering, blocking spamhauses, challenge-response, whitelists) in a single system.

• Spam Alarm blocks 99% of unwanted junk messages by combining our innovative multilevel filtering, statistical analysis of individual words and heuristic scanning.

• Spam Inspector works with Outlook, Outlook Express and AOL.

• PocoMail is an alternative Windows e-mail client with built-in spam filtering.

• spamPepper is 100% spam blocking for POP accounts without using filters. Valid senders register through a secure protocol to allow their m ail through.

• SpamWeed is a personal POP3 proxy that filters spam using a combination of Bayesian filter, auto-whitelist, black list and other technologies. It blocks most of the spam (usually over 95%) with almost no false-positives. Very effective and time-saving for users.

• McAfee SpamKiller is rule and filter based spam blocker for Windows.

• Sprocket Labs has a write-up on filtering spam in Eudora. Go about 3/4 of the way down the page.

• Eudora users can follow instructions for spam filtering for Eudora 3.0

• Here is another Eudora filter tutorial.

• A free tutorial on mail filtering for Outlook and Outlook Express.

• despam is a procmail + perl + BBDB package to filter spam.

• junkfilter, a comprehensive procmail-based junk e-mail filtering system by Gregory Sutter and Matthew Hunt.

• The SpamBouncer is a procmail package for filtering spam, as well as stopping some of the common viruses.

• SpamAssassin is a perl script which detects incoming spam to a user's mailbox, using text patterns, header analysis, Vipul's Razor and the set of DNSBL services. It can run from procmail, from .forward, or from a Mail::Audit filter.

• maildrop is a procmail like program, although larger (C++) and more efficient, with built in filtering capabilities.

• [UP] mapSoN can be used like procmail to reject certain domains, or require users to send a reply before allowing email to be delivered. It relies on properties of the remote system to work, so certain users may not be able to get email through.

• Bogofilter is a learning filter that can run from procmail or maildrop.

• Spamprobe is another learning filter that can run from procmail or maildrop.

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