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How DO Spammers Get Your Email Address?
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By Rosalind Gardner
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How DO Spammers Get Your Email Address?
As much as I try to stem the seemingly endless flow of spam, thecrap just keeps arriving my Inbox.
For example, this week I received "New affiliate programs from2004-02-10 to 2004-02-14 :: Subscription fromhttp://WeAreBlahBlahBlah.net".
I'd never heard of WeAreBlahBlahBlah.net, let alone subscribedto the newsletter. But the address used explained exactly howthe spammer reached me.
I've set up numerous 'special' addresses for customers,affiliates, subscribers, merchant partners and others.
For example, if I join XYZ's affiliate program, I might set upXYZ@nptinfo.com and give that address to them to contact me. IfI suddenly start to receive spam at that address, then I knowEXACTLY who the 'leaky' culprit is.
Here are other ways spammers get your address.
Web Pages
Spammers use scavenger bots, programs that 'harvest' emailaddresses contained in "mailto:" HTML tags. Those are clickableemail links that open your email program with the addressalready placed in the "To" field.
Web Forms
Some sites request various details via forms, e.g. guest books ®istration forms. Spammers get email addresses from thesebecause the form is publicly available on the web, or becausethe webmaster sells the list.
Paper (Offline) Forms
Some companies sell lists of addresses obtained from conventionparticipants or contest entrants.
Whois Searches
Unless the domain registrant has paid an additional fee to maketheir registration private, a simple Whois lookup reveals theregistrant's address.
Although most registrars have enhanced the security of theirWHOIS databases, by requiring a special code be entered beforeinformation is displayed, many spammers take the time andtrouble to grab addresses this way.
>From Web Browsers
Some sites use various tricks to extract a surfer's emailaddress from the web browser, sometimes without the surfernoticing it.
Chat Rooms
This is another major source of email addresses for spammers,especially as this is one of the first public activities newbiesjoin, making it easy for spammers to harvest 'fresh' addresses.
Sending Test Messages
Have you ever sent a message to an invalid address? You get an'undeliverable' or 'failure' notice back.
Some spammers use this to guess email addresses by sending testmessages to a list of made-up or guessed addresses. They knowthey've got good addresses for those that did not result infailure messages.
Online Yellow Pages
What could be more alluring to a spammer than a directory ofnames and email addresses filed by category?
Chain Letters
These are ingenious. I tell five friends, and my friends eachtell five of their friends, and so on and so forth. The emailaddresses all build up in the cc field and are a spammersdelight.
Buying Lists
Spammers buy lists of email addresses usually passed off asthose belonging to people who opted-in to to obtain informationin a specific category.
Let's put spammers out of business.
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Use'throw-away' addresses whenever you're not sure of the source,and don't sign up unless there are clear 'Privacy' statements onthe site.
If worse comes to worse, and you're fighting your way through amountain of spam, install anti-spam software on your computer.
? Copyright Rosalind Gardner, All Rights Reserved.
Article by Rosalind Gardner, author of the best-selling "SuperAffiliate Handbook: How I Made $436,797 in One Year SellingOther People's Stuff Online". To learn how you too can suceed inInternet and affiliate marketing, go to:
http://hop.clickbank.net/?nathanoct/webvista2
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