Hiding email address

I have searched the forum and do not find an answer to this one. How can I keep web pages I visit from sending me SPAM. I do not give them my email address or sign up for anything and I block cookies. All I do is browse the pages and for the next weeks I receive hundreds of SPAM messages. I run an IP Blocker, ZoneAlarm and Avast anti-virus. I do not get any virus, but am overloaded with SPAM. I use MailWasher, but still have to tell it what to block. This is very time consuming. How do they get my address?
Thanks for any help you can give!

 

WayneH--I am almost sure that a normal visit to a webpage offers them no method of learning your email address.
So either you have some spyware on your harddrive, or you have at some point in the past given your email address to a site that has sold it to spammers. It is also possible the spam is randomly generated by computers. Much of that occurs lately.
To check on spyware
http://www.windowsbbs.com/showthread.php?t=37074

Do you have any reason to believe the spam is a result of recently visiting a particular website?

 

Welshjim:
Thanks for the reply. There seems to no one particular web site that causes this. I Google for information and go the some of the links. The next day, I am overloaded with SPAM. I am Running Windows XP Pro, and along with the programs I originally listed, I have AdAware SE Personal, Pop Up Stopper, Spyware Blaster, Spybot - Search & Destroy and HijackThis. All are updated weekly. None of these programs show any spyware. If you have any other ideas, please let me know.
Thanks for your help.

 

Coincidence. As Jim said, there's no way a website can get your email address by just visiting them and browsing their pages. Either you or somebody else gave it to some website(s) in the past and it got passed on from there. If you've never gave your email address to a website, perhaps a friend did. An example..... ever get one of those e-cards from a site like Blue Mountain or Hallmark? I'm not pointing my finger at those two sites. I have no idea what their privacy policy is. I only use them as an example to point out ways the spammers can get your email address without you giving it to anybody.

 

WayneH--Assuming you have no spyware, you are stuck with the fact that spammers have your present email address. The best solutions are
1) Change your email address. (Yes, I know that involves a lot of work, and computer generated spam will still arrive.) Your present email service usually will allow you to create a new email address. Cancelling the old one is optional.
2) Use an antispam program.
First of all, your email service provider may offer one free. Either as a download to your PC or on their own servers. But even if they do, you usually have to activate it. It may not be turned on by default.
And/or you can get/buy an antispyware program on your own. MailWasher is well thought of.
http://www.mailwasher.net/
In either case, you will have to learn the procedure to report or bounce spam when you get it. You are essentially educating the program what you consider to be spam and with time helping it screen out the spam.
3) Use a whitelist, which can be a pain to set up. Another problem with a whitelist is that you will not get email from people (even friends) you have not put on the list.
http://www.google.com/search?source...s=GGLD,GGLD:2004-31,GGLD:en&q=email+whitelist
4) If you are using Outlook Express, use Tools|Message Rules|Mail.

You can pick any or all of the above ideas.

Recognize that methods 2 and 4 will not eliminate all spam. With time, however, the amount appearing in your Inbox will be substantially reduced.


Two things not to do are
1) Open emails from sources you do not recognize. And do not open email attachments, even from friends, without first scanning them for viruses.
2) If you open spam and it offers a link to "unsubscribe ", do not click that link. That only confirms that your email address is a live one. They have no intention of unsubscribing you.

 

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Thanks. I never open anything without scanning for a virus.I never even read mail from someone I do not know unless I have requested it as I have from this board. I just delete them as they arrive.
I really do not want to change the email address, but as a last resort I may have to. MailWasher finds the stuff and deletes and bounces it, but I still get the same stuff already marked for deleting and bouncing.
I am trying somethin different as of today. I will use my laptop to browse the web. It is not as fast as my main PC and has a smaller screen, but I have no email address on that system. I'll see what happens with that method for a while.
I really appreciate the help from this board. Keep up the good work!

 

You can find out what information your browser sends about you with the ShieldsUP! page on Steve Gibson's site.

Scroll down and take the "ShieldsUP!" link. Read the info on that page and click the "Proceed" button. Start with the "Browser Headers" button (top row, on the right), but certainly try them all to see what kind of information you're displaying to (or could accept from) the world.

Lor

 

Wayne,

I had a major spam problem that was caused just by having an email address with my internet provider. This got so bad I just shut off the email addresses provided by my ISP. I had to keep one, I just check occassionally through my ISP's web mail.

I have a domain name and a hosting service that I subscribe to and this provides me with *almost* unlimited email addresses. I can create 'disposable' addresses, when the spam starts... you discard the address. I have addresses that I keep for my regular correspondence and I am very careful who I give them to (ie my sister-in-law who loves to forward **** to everyone in the world with all the addresses exposed)

As WelshJim recommended an address change is probably in order, just be very careful where you give it out and who you give it to. Mailwasher is a very good program, I have used it in the past. I haven't had to use it since I actively took control of my email accounts. HTH

B

 

My post #5 above referred to MailWasher as an antispyware program. Of course it is an antispam program.
I guess everyone understood.

 

Thanks to all who responded. I have ran all of the tests at Steve Gibson's site and passed with flying colors. I suspect the information the "Someone had sold the email address" is probably the cause. There is nothing being sent out from my system that I can find to cause this problem. Anyway, the SPAM has slowed down for a while. I don't know whether it is from using MailWasher and MailWiper or the fact that I am using the laptop with no email system to do my browsing.
Thanks again to all for the assistance with this problem. The users of this board are really great. Keep up the good work.

 

FWIW, I always use a Yahoo e-mail address for my business mail. I only use my ISP's e-mail address for close friends and family.

So far, that arrangement has worked out well for me, as I get very little spam through Outlook Express, and I have had the same e-mail address for three years now.

(Knock on wood )

 

James Martin--You are lucky. Much spam is now generated by computers, which "try" all sorts of addresses. I suspect they concentrate on the big ISP's/email providers.
I have one email address that I have never disclosed to anyone and never used. But I get spam on it.

 

That "is" unusual.

I wonder how I am getting by with so little spam? I think I might have gotten maybe 10 spam messages in the last 3 years (On my ISP's address) ?...Just guessing.

My Yahoo address averages about 4 per day. Hotmail averages about 1 per month.

Even my wife's Yahoo address gets few or none.

Our addresses are 15 to 18 characters long (before the "@" sign), and are a combination of letters and numbers.

Maybe that explains some of it?

 

Talking about spam...

My friend received a computer from his sister after she got a newer one herself. She got spamed a lot, and so did my friend, even after he deleted her account in OE6. (He never got much spam on his old machine)

One day this week, he sent me a screen shot of OE6, and I noticed that his preview pane was open. I instructed him to close his PP (Which he did), and all of a sudden, his spam stopped coming.

He hasn't got any since that I know of.

That's rather amazing to me.

 

If you open spam and it offers a link to "unsubscribe ", do not click that link. That only confirms that your email address is a live one. They have no intention of unsubscribing you.
__________________
how can you unsubscibe then?

 

That is not an option with spammers.

Try some of Welshjim's ideas and see if that helps. I like to filter most of my mail in OE6 by using mail rules.

Here is a link that explains how to use mail rules in OE6...

http://editor.actrix.co.nz/byarticle/0503emfiling.html

 

Thanks for clarifying that for me Tony...I've always wondered how that worked.



Does that mean that text only (Spam) e-mails are safe to open, and won't give the spammer your e-mail address?

 

Many probably know this already.
As has been said, the Preview Pane is a bad idea, so do not use it. ( View|Layout|uncheck Preview Pane|Apply.)
If, however, you are not sure whether a particular email is spam or not (and really would like to read it), you can read it in OE without opening it. Highlight the email on the Inbox list|Properties|Details tab|Message Source. Unless the email is in HTML code you should be able to easily read it and decide if you want to open it the regular way. If it is in HTML, you may be able to pick out pieces of the message, but I suspect most HTML messages are advertisements or spam and that you will want to delete or report as spam without opening.
This procedure will not open attachments.

 

Is that a good way to view full headers, and report the spammer?