The document discusses spam and its various types. It defines spam as unwanted, unsolicited emails sent in bulk. Spam is usually sent to promote commercial products, schemes, or services. There are two main types of spam - cancelable Usenet spam and email spam. Email spam harvests addresses from public sources and sends messages to large numbers of recipients. Spam has become a major issue on the internet and comprises about 10-15% of all websites and messages. The document provides tips on identifying and preventing spam.

2. Spam is the practice of sending unwanted, unsolicited
emails to a large number of people.
Spam is flooding the Internet with many copies of the
same message, in an attempt to force the message on
people who would not otherwise choose to receive it.
Or -
•Emails you did not ask for that were
•sent in bulk
•from senders you do not know
Above points are suspicious of being spam.

3.  Spammers manipulate search engines results in
order to target users. Motive can be:
 Commercial
 Political
 Religious
 Approximately 10-15% of web pages are spam
 Most spam promotes get-rich-quick schemes,
questionable products, fraudulent offers, or pseudo-
legal services.

4. Spam is of two types-
A)Cancelable Usenet
B)Email spam-
o Harvested Address Spam
o Virus Spam
o Domain Name Spam
o Dictionary Spam
o Windows Messenger Spam
o Hacked Mail Service Spam
o Hoax Spam

5. It refers to spam email in which a single message is sent
to 2 or more Usenet groups.
This type of spam is directed as “lurkers”, or individuals
who read newsgroups but who either do not or infrequently
post or give their email addresses away.
Cancelable Usenet spam reduces the utility of
newsgroups by forcing through advertising, and as such
decreases the ability of administrators and managers of
newsgroups to manage accepted topics. This spam is run at a
low cost to those sending out spam.

6. It refers to spam email that is directed at individual users
with direct addresses.
Email spam lists are usually created by scanning Usenet
postings, sterling Internet mailing lists or searching the Web
for addresses.
A variant of this form of spam is sent directly to mailing
lists and email discussions that are used by public and private
forums. Email spam costs individuals submitting spam email
money; for example, ISPs and online services need to pay to
transmit spam directly to subscribers.

7.  The spammers use a computer system (spider or
spam-bot').
 The 'spam bot' looks for the '@' symbol.
 Collects the bit either side of the '@' symbol to
capture your email address and add it to the
spammers database of millions of harvested
addresses

8.  Someone else's computer (not yours) gets infected with a
virus.
 The address book on their computer has your email address.
 The virus sends a spam to every address on the address
book.
 The virus 'spoofs' the 'from address' in the email it sends i.e.
the spam does not appear to have come from the senders
email address, instead it says it came from another address
taken from the address book.
 This is why you might receive emails from people saying you
sent a virus to them, when you know your computer is clean

9. You can sometimes receive dictionary spam
when you use a well known email service.
The spammers know that there is going to
be a janesmith@bigmail.xyz.
They setup computers to spam billions of
names at that mail service simply by targeting every
persons name.

10. Some ISPs or webmail services may be
hacked by spammers or the addresses may be sold
to spammers.
Read the small print when signing up for an
email account. Look hard for that box that says 'we
might give your address to a 3rd party, tick here if
you do not want to receive marketing info from
other companies...'.

12.  These are messages that innocent people may
forward to you with some kind of hoax warning or way to
make a fortune.
 Never respond to or forward this kind of message.
They are hoaxes, see real example below. If you 'CC'
(copy in) your friends and contacts you may be
providing a way for spammers to harvest the email
addresses of your friends/contacts. These rubbish
emails sometimes end with something like: "Try it; What
have you got to lose?"
 What you have to lose is your privacy and credibility!

13.  The following keywords can be used to identify web
spammers in this industry. (23 April 2008 results)

14. a)Use a separate email address.
b)Consider acquiring multiple email addresses for
different purposes.
c)You can subscribe to services online that provide
you with disposable addresses.
• http://email.about.com/library/weekly/aa072002a.htm
• http://sneakemail.com
•

15. d)Remove your email address from your website.
e)Never buy anything from a company that spam-
over 95% of spam offers are scams!
f)Filter your email-
For more anti-spam filtering information, visit:
http://email.about.com/cs/spamfiltering/
http://email.about.com/library/howto/htnegativespamfilter.htm
g)Consider subscribing to a spam prevention service.