Is anybody else getting totally frustrated with this? I am continually getting at least 50+ spam messages a day. I use IE6 and have the spam blocker function in effect, but that just throws "detected" spam into a spam area that you still have to look at and delete in two steps.

Is there any program that accurately detects spam and deletes it before or after it enters your inbox?

Are you using something like Yahoo or Hotmail for your e-mail or are you referring to e-mail from your ISP? The ISP may have a spam filter function that keeps it from going into your inbox.

With Comcast their spam filter has a setting where the spam can go into a folder called "Screened Mail" which I can access at their website, in case I want to look at it before it's deleted -- just in case some legit non-spam gets in there. It's only happened once to me, but I figure better safe than sorry. It doesn't come into my Outlook Express Inbox at all.

I know there are anti-spam programs but I'm okay with my setup for now so I've never checked them out.

Not really,

As fast as the anti spam prgrams catch up, the spammers come up with a new trick.

Its a continuing war like the battle against viruses or spyware.

One solution is only allowing email from people whose email address you already know and have on your 'Safe' list. For many people though, that is not practical.

Ohhh for the old days....

Solutions:

Cheap - For about $3 a month you can subscribe to OnlyMyEmail by www.onlymyemail.com - all your emeail is sent to a corporate server and 'scrubbed' - its pretty accurate and easy to use.

Expensive - For between $6k and $8k you can get an IronPort C10 from IronPort Systems Inc. or a BorderWare MXtreme MX-200 from BorderWare Technologies Inc.; both offer excellent spam and content filtering, with low false-positive rates, and decent management options

There is very little in between that is worth anything.

Frankly the expensive options do no better than the cheap option.

The only drawback to OnlyMyEmail for some people is having to sign on to the central server to view the spam in case there is a false positive.

Short of those solutions MS, Symantec, and McAfee, are all pretty equal. IE - not great with lots of false positives.

R

I use Firefox for my browser and Yahoo! for mail and have next to no problems with spam. I've heard about people who get hundreds of spam emails a day and I really can't understand that. And I visit lots of websites and register and sign-up for stuff, so my email is out there. However, I use a second email address for these. I notice that account gets a couple dozen spam emails a week, but those go into the Yahoo! bulk mail folder and I never bother to look, I just delete the folder contents en masse. Any emails that I want to get I use my "real" email.

OOPS, Spam you say? I thought you said sperm.
Mia culpa.

[ September 08, 2005, 04:14 AM: Message edited by: Merloni26 ]

Bobby,
Why would anyone complain about sperm?! wink

Patsanfran. I agree. Like you I use a yahoo account for my second e-mail, and their spam filtering is excellent and aggressive. I have had little problems with it period.

Some people have a one-track mind.

I'm on AOL (yeah, I know...) and while there's plenty of things I do hate about it, it's pretty good on spam. Only about one per month actually gets to me. Of course, I've had to type this message in twice because it bloody well crashed the first time I tried... and I was being nice about it! Not Fair. Oh yes, and it's cheap.

With Verizon as my ISP, my email is me@verizon.net, but for $20 a year Yahoo Mail Plus gives me POP3 access, so messages to/from my Verizon AND my Yahoo accounts are received and sent from my Yahoo mailbox. Verizon's spam filter acts as a first line of protection, and Yahoo traps spam sent to either address, so I get VERY little.

Yahoo also lets you create "disposable" addresses (e.g. me-paypal@yahoo.com) to keep your real address hidden and out of the wrong hands. Plus, all my messages reside on the network, so they're accessible at work or on the road, and immune from a hard drive crash.

You can download this little app for Internet Explorer or the Maxthon browser that makes Yahoo your default email program, so when you click on a mailto: link, your outgoing message is created in Yahoo Mail rather than Outlook or whatever.

All very cool, and spam-free -- mostly. wink

[ September 08, 2005, 08:38 PM: Message edited by: redsoxbreath ]