In computer news this week, 03/11/2003

In computer news this week, 03/12/2003

How much spam could a spam trap catch if a spam trap could catch spam ....

Spam is getting worse ... Most internet service providers provide you with some kind of a spam filter on your email accounts, but some spam still gets through. The amount of spam has increased significantly in the past year - I read somewhere that the Worldcom bankruptcy and other telcom company collapses have forced a lot of internet-related companies to turn to spamming to keep afloat, which might account for some of the increase. Another statistic I read just today from infoworld says that the online commerce figure almost doubled last year, to something like 1.8 Billion dollars. So people are online a lot more, and spammers have increased their efforts to reach them.

Washington State has had a very strong antispam law for a few years now - but the law only protects you theoretically from spammers who use misleading subjects to get you to read their emails. Most spammers today are pretty straightforward in their email subject lines - and they do a good job of getting their spam into your email box.

The good news is that there are several things you can do to decrease the amount of spam you receive. Today I want to talk about how you can customize the most popular email programs - microsoft outlook and outlook express - so that you can filter out spam that gets past your own internet service's spam filters.

I'll explain the concepts today and give you a website to see this in picture tutorial format

http://www.sitedeveloper.ws/tutorials/spam.htm

- or go to my Raw Bytes website and read the transcript.

Outlook has a function called a Rules Wizard which you can get to by clicking on Inbox and then click on Tools and then look for Rules Wizard on the next popup menu. Conceptually this Rules Wizard lets you set your own rules how to handle incoming email - For example - to check messages when they arrive - where in the email to look - such as the subject or in the sender's address - what to look for - like specific words in the subject such as Free offer - or specific email addresses or domains - and what to do with mail that contains these words.

In other words you can create you own spam filter for mail that gets to you - meaning email that gets past any spam filters on your account - and lets you trap incoming spam based on your own rules.

I have set up a filter that looks in the subject line of emails and searches for specific known spam words and terms like "free offer" or "discount toner" and moves these emails to a special spam folder I have created. Now I could set this to automatically delete any emails with these words in the subject - but I would rather look at them first to make sure they're not email sent to me by friends or clients that just happen to have one of my key spam words in the subject.

I also have other filters that look for email from spam domains - such as gossipflash.com - and automatically delete anything from these targeted known spam domains.

Outlook lets you do this very easily and the whole process is logical - programming by mouse clicks in other words. Not quite clapper technology but close. Soon you'll be a spam trapper and can help your friends out too.

For Raw Bytes, This is Frank Delaney

POB 222 Spangle, Wa 99031 (509)245-3736 624-7230