You all tear your hair out in frustration every time you see your inbox crammed full of spam again. Have you ever stopped and asked yourself where you get so much spam? This isn’t to suggest that spam is your fault but… if everybody hates spam so much then… why is there so much of it?

There’s a simple answer folks. Spam is an industry. There exists an entire infrastructure to support it and be supported by it. From the guys who design the email address harvesting software to the spammers who put together their mailshots to you right through to the ISPs and webhosts who make wads of cash for allowing the spam to pass through their mail servers. Spam is a living, breathing entity - make no mistake about it.

As with any business the spam industry needs customers. Those customers are you - you’re their target market. Every time you click on a hyperlink in a spam email you potentially make money for these guys. If you actually click through and make a purchase you’re making their job truly worthwhile. To remove spam we need to put a cease and desist order on ourselves. Stop opening the emails (spammers know when you do), stop clicking on the links (they know when you do this too) and most definitely do not, do not, do not buy anything, call any numbers or fill in any application forms that you receive via a spam email.

Defeating spam once and for all means boycotting it. The smartest spam blocker or most private email filtering system can never hit a spammer as hard as one thing - take away their source of revenue. Hit them where it hurts them most - in their wallet. No cash = no business = no spammers.

Could it really be that simple? If we ignore them will they go away?

This article was provided courtesy of Spam-site.com which reviews and tests spam filters.

As the flood of spam increases end users are looking for new and more efficient solutions to block spam. In turn software developers are knocking themselves out trying to come up with the killer app that will stop spam forever.

For several years now companies have been focusing on faster and smarter software to be installed on your PC or on your servers that will detect spam through increasingly more complex algorithms. The ingenuity behind these products can’t be argued with. The problem was that as the spam filters became better so did the quality of the bulk email software used by the spammers. The battle to fight spam was spiralling out of control.

There’s an old scientific principle called Occams Razor. It simply means that all things being equal the most simple solution is often the best one.

Somebody somewhere realized that there was a simple solution to the vast majority of spam. Spammers email millions of people each day. This is an automated process that they can’t possibly monitor manually. Enter challenge response spam email filtering.

When using a challenge response system each email address must be authorized to deliver email to you. You can either authorize these email addresses manually by adding them to your challenge response whitelist or the challenge response email server can take care of that for you.

The process is simple but incredibly efficient.

Spammer sends email

Challenge response email server doesn’t recognize address so issues a challenge email that must be phyiscally answered by a real human.

Challenge answer = yes = sender is authorized to send you email

Challenge answer = no = senders email address is added to blacklist and all future email from them is automatically blocked.

Challenge repsonse spam filters demand that a real person reply to the challenge email. Spammers who generate millions of emails a day simply don’t have the time to do this and are therefore blocked from sending you any future junk email.

Using a challenge response system initially can be extra work but after 30 days you’ll see a dramatic reduction in the amount of email you receive from spammers. Our challenge response system is currently showing 11,000 blocked pieces of spam in the last *5 months*. Those are hard figures to argue with.

Challenge response spam filtering programs are one of the single most effective ways to eliminate any spam problems you might have.

About a month ago I had the privilege of giving a demo of the next version of Sonic Page Blaster to the attendees at Yanik Silver’s “Underground Online Marketing Seminar”. I fielded a couple questions afterwards that bear a better treatment than I could manage on the spur of the moment and in less than 60 seconds.

Q: If we create “feeder” sites that point to our main sales page or “money site”, won’t they be adversely affected by Google’s sandbox?

A: Let’s first define what we mean by the “Google sandbox”. Over the last seven months or so it has become apparent that new web sites do not tend to show as high a page rank as older established sites. The reason for this is not a raw prejudice against new sites. According to my sources, it is instead an attempt by the search engine giant to discount the effect of reciprocal linking, especially paid linking. If links cost you money and they have no immediate effect, chances are most people will abandon the practice.

And that’s exactly what Google is hoping for. Frankly, I understand and support this move. The reason is that Google’s motives and mine coincide. Google is trying to make sure they return the most relevant and highest quality results available for a given search term. If I have the most relevant and authoritative web site for a given subject that encompasses those same search terms, I want Google to return my results at the top of the heap. I don’t want spammy link farms to change this.

The key is quality. Really, over time, the best search engine marketing strategy is to create a killer web site. Wouldn’t it be nice if all the energy we direct towards search engine optimization could instead be focused on the quality of our web site? Google feels the same way, believe me, and the refinements they make to their alogorithms are designed to move in that direction. For that reason alone, the quality and focus of your web site is your best long-term SEO play.

Q. Could automatically generated web pages be penalized as "spam" by search engine spiders?

A. I call Sonic Page Blaster “SPB” a lot, and I definitely don’t think of the “S” as standing for “spam”. On the contrary, Sonic Page Blaster simply saves you time in creating search engine-friendly web pages that contain really good articles that pertain exactly to the content of your web site. No “automatic” content system can find the content that best fits your niche. You need to either write or find the articles that will help your web site visitors or subscribers the most. I know that a few of the seminar attendees I talked to had spam-filled stars in their eyes when they saw SPB churn out a bunch of pages at the push of a button.

Trust me, you don’t want to go there. Google will eventually punish you in a big way.

Here are some rules that I believe will not only help your search rankings, but also drive the right kind of traffic to your primary web site (at the seminar Jeff Johnson called these “money pages”).

1. Do not post duplicate content at multiple web sites, especially if you own them all, if they are on the same server, and if they link to each other. SPB makes it so easy to generate article mini-sites, why would you want to duplicate content, anyway? With SPB you have a huge advantage over those who have to manually create web pages. Use your advantage. Create many web sites that focus on narrow subject matters, each having their own set of articles.

Worried about duplicate content and potential search engine punishment? Good. You should be. Don’t do it.

Ah, but what about duplicate content on other people’s web sites? If they don’t link to you, you don’t have anything to worry about. I’ll save a further explanation about that for later, but I don’t believe it makes sense for Google to punish you for something that is not giving you any advantage. Besides, they understand content syndication. Google’s developers and designers are anything but stupid.

2. Your money site does not necessarily need to be extremely narrowly focused on a few key words, but your feeder sites should be. For example, I will soon be starting a web site for those folks trying to develop an online business in their spare time. That is, they hold down a regular job and do this stuff at night. The site is called MidnightMarketer.com and it is not live yet (but the sign-up page works). Anyway, that will be one of my “money sites”. It will cover a plethora of topics related to internet marketing, time management, technology, and even health.

In order to “feed” it potential customers, I am also developing “feeder” sites that will focus on each of those more focused topics. The feeder sites will contain as many highly focused articles on their subject matter as I can find. My goal is that the search engines will (rightly) see them as quite valuable and relevant results for some important search terms. Then visitors will see the links and ads for MidnightMarketer and head on over. I can even make a little money off those that don’t click through to MidnightMarketer.com, thanks to Adsense ads mixed into each page by Sonic Page Blaster.

3. Don’t use reciprocal links, especially between your feeder sites and your money page. Yes, I know that flies in the face of conventional wisdom. But try to understand Google’s motivations–that is the key to predicting what they will eventually do. They understand that one-way links are usually more meaningful than reciprocal links, which are often just trades between webmasters. A one-way link usually points to something useful.

OK, I’ll back off on this just a little: When you can, get one-way links. When there is no other choice, reciprocate. And yes, you can be sure Google keeps track of all links into and out of a web site.

4. Do use a blog, hopefully even more than one. Blogs don’t have to be on your server(s), they’re not owned by you, and it is going to drive Google’s software gurus nuts trying to sort the wheat from the chaff in the blogging world. Even though I support Google in most things, it is kinda fun to do something that makes them a little crazy. [I mean that in a good way, Sergei.]

== Rossaroni, no baloney ==

The MidnightMarketer

Copyright 2005 Ross Lambert

Ross Lambert is a senior software engineer for a fast-growing telecommunications firm in Kirkland, WA. He is also the founder of MidnightMarketer.com and TheVentureForge.com.

Q: I am so sick of all the spam that is sent to my business email address. I spend an hour every morning just trying to sort out the good email from the bad. I know I could just delete it all, but I’m afraid I’ll accidentally delete email that might be important to my business. Short of unplugging my computer, what’s the best solution for dealing with spam?

A: I feel your pain. I, too, miss the good old days when the only time you’d spend an hour dealing with spam was trying to pry it out of the can.

Due to the nature of my business, I get a lot of unwanted email. I’ve been working on the Internet since 1995 and my email address has been publicly exposed for most of that time, so I am a spammer’s delight. It is no exaggeration to say that I used to receive more than 400 email messages a day. Out of those 400 messages about 10% were from people I knew, 10% were from people I needed to know, and the rest were from people that I would like to track down and field dress with a very dull knife.

Spammers, they are called… the scourge of the Internet… the digital kin of the lowly telemarketer and dreaded junk mailer.

After listening to me complain about spam for months, my lead engineer burst into my office a few weeks ago and announced, "I’ve solved our spam problem! I’ve installed a spam filter on our server that will prevent spam from getting through."

Great, I thought, now I can find something new to complain about.

I wondered what I would do with the extra two hours a day this wonderful spam filter would give me. My joy quickly waned when within a day my email went from 400 to 40. It was the saddest day of my life. Sitting there staring at my empty email box I suddenly felt very alone. At that moment I realized that not only had I come to expect the morning deluge of email, but I had come to find comfort in it. The spammers had become my friends. They wanted me to get rich quick and brighten my smile. They wanted to enhance my love life with generic Viagra and give me great deals on miniature cameras, low interest loans, waterfront property, and more. And the sheer number of folks concerned about the abundance (or lack thereof) of my anatomy was incredibly heart warming.

And the ladies that sent me email were so nice. They were worried that I was lonely and offered to cure my loneliness if only I gave them a credit card number. How sweet is that?

After a few days the withdrawal symptoms ceased and I was happy to be free of the majority of the spam, though to this day I’m afraid that I might be missing out on something grand.

You and I are not alone, Anna. According to a recent study by eMarketer, the average Internet email user now receives 81 emails a day, and nearly one quarter of them are spam. Spam now makes up more than 40% of all email and costs U.S. companies more than $10 billion annually. Seventy-six billion unsolicited e-mail messages will be delivered in 2003.

So how do spammers get your email address in the first place? It’s easier than you might think. While some spam comes as a result of online purchases (yes, there are companies that will sell your email address no matter what their privacy policy says), that’s just one of the ways spammers get you in their sites.

Spammers use "spider software" to crawl the web and harvest email address, so if you have a personal or company website that has your email posted on it, sooner or later a spam spider is going to grab your address and add it to the mill. Likewise when you sign up to take online surveys or receive email newsletters, you are potentially exposing yourself to spammers.

How can you reduce the amount of spam you get? Many people think that you can’t fight spam, so you should just accept it and move on. In other words, you can not fight the Borg, so smile and be assimilated into the fold. While spam is hard to eliminate, there are things you can do to lessen the amount of spam you receive and it’s impact on your daily business life.

First, stop clicking on the "unsubscribe" links at the bottom of spam emails. While some of the links are valid and will get you removed from spammer’s lists, other are actually there just to let the spammer know that your address is valid. Click the link to unsubscribe and you might actually see the amount of spam you receive increase.

Second, it’s a good idea to have at least two e-mail addresses. Use one for personal or business use, and the other for surveys and online purchases.

Third, consider installing a spam blocking software on your computer or company network. There are a variety of spam blocking applications on the market that range in price from free to a hundred bucks. Though none of them will completely eliminate spam, they can greatly reduce the volume you receive. Search the Web for "spam filter" and investigate the ones that you feel are right for you.

Your Internet Service Provider should also offer an anti-spam application, but be careful how you use it. I have a client who recently increased the sensitivity of their ISP spam blocker to the point that nothing was getting delivered to their company email accounts, including their own company newsletter. They had effectively built an email brick wall that stopped the spam and everything else. Not a good idea.

Before investing in a commercial spam blocker you might also try adjusting the email filtering settings in your email software. Microsoft Outlook, for example, lets you set rules for handling incoming mail. The same is true with Outlook Express, Eudora, and Apple’s Mail OSX. Each have built-in filtering features that can help eliminate unwanted email by parameters you set.

One thing to remember is that if spam didn’t work, it would quickly go away. In other words, if spammers weren’t profiting from sending unwanted emails they would go do something else.

Probably become a telemarketer or credit card debt collector.

Whether you use a commercial product or rely on your existing email software to filter out spam, just be careful that you don’t batten down the hatches so tight that you no longer receive any email at all.

Here’s to your success!

Tim Knox

We asked 58 Top Internet Money Makers: If you lost is all tomorrow and had to start from scratch, what would you do to be back on top in the 30 days? Their answers just might make you rich!

http://www.prosperityandprofits.com
http://www.dropshipwholesale.net
http://www.30dayblueprint.com

I’m really, truly fed up with spam. Every day when the spam arrives and Norton Security moves it into the Norton Anti-spam folder of my Outlook email client, I wonder how anyone can be so incredibly stupid as to waste their time sending me such garbage.

Let’s face it; I never read it. I never buy anything from unsolicited sources or do anything as a result of spam. I detest it! And God knows I don’t need viagra, however many times it’s offered.

What fool would send anyone a message about a mortgage application approval when he has owned his house for years?

What fool would write offering me a peep at her new porn site? I’m not interested in porn … I prefer the real thing. Offer me something tangible and I may get excited.

I guess you probably feel the same.

Unfortunately, the plague of spam isn’t going to fade away any time soon, although authorities (at least in Australia) have started taking legal action and imposing hefty penalties for spamming. Hallelujah!

As a last resort, I decided to make my own small contribution to reducing the spam plague. If each of us does something, the cumulative effect will be damaging to the spammers. Here’s what I did. I’ve collected thousands of email addresses that arrived in spam messages and ended up in my blacklist. I decided I’d give those people using automatic harvesting software an opportunity to suck up all those addresses and reuse them.

I’ve dedicated quite a few pages on my site that have nothing but the email addresses from the blacklist. That is, the addresses of the spammers, most of which are false and don’t lead to anyone … at least not to anyone who can read (otherwise I’d include an obscene message).

When the spam harvesting software goes through my site, it won’t find a single working email address in my site proper, but it will stumble on a goldmine of addresses and load them into it’s database. It will be stuffed full of email addresses, none of which work. The spammers will pay to send them out and they’ll bounce somewhere, hopefully right back to them.

Imagine what would happen if we all did that? There would be so many dud addresses floating around that harvesting would be a waste of time. the spammers would all go away and do something legitimate … perhaps.

You and I would get some relief from these annoying intruders in our email inboxes.

If you are in a position to load your site with a few thousand dud email addresses, why not give it a go and Stuff the Spammers?

Published May 2005. Copyright Robin Henry 2005

Robin Henry is an educator, human resources specialist and Internet marketer whose firm, Desert Wave Enterprises, helps individuals and businesses improve their performance by using smart processes, smart technology and personal development. He has a number of tertiary qualifications including a Master of Education degree majoring in education technology and online learning. He lives at Alice Springs In Central Australia. Visit Desert Wave Enterprises

A hearty welcome to all the spam fighting filters and programs created to rescue us from the deluge of unwanted e-mail! There is practically a “solution” for everything. But as with most online “solutions” filters and programs are only tools that users need to make some effort to use properly to reap the benefits.

You have to learn how to use these programs to your advantage or you can experience the unexpected downside. How can there be a downside when we’re talking less spam you say? Unfortunately, all too often legitimate and expected e-mails are being eaten by filters and are ending up in the trash!

Twice this week I received terse e-mails from new clients awaiting my response on certain issues. Because they were new to working with me, they didn’t know that I usually respond within an hour to most e-mail. My responses were not returned as “undeliverable” so what happened? Where are they? In both instances I called my clients only to find my messages had inadvertently landed in their junk or trash folder because of their ISP’s filtering systems.

When communicating with clients and in my day-to-day communications, I do not go to extremes to alter certain words that may trip filters in my day to day communications. With folks I know, that shouldn’t be an issue because they are supposedly expecting my e-mail. In addition, I always instruct new clients and subscribers to add me to their address book, approved or white list.

Plus as I am sure you’ll agree, you’ve seen all those funky ways of spelling certain words with characters or spaces that are unnatural. I believe they ruin the flow of your message because the reader can’t help but take pause to notice.

Before you send off a terse e-mail complaining or assuming no response, be sure you have covered the following:

1) When you know you will be communicating with a specific person on a regular basis, make sure you add them to your approved list or address book as soon as possible. Many onliners now use Web based e-mail such as Yahoo! and MSN that allow them to control who they receive e-mail from. Just as the majority of ISPs now give you the ability to filter e-mail based on level of spamminess or by adding e-mail addresses to your list so they can get through. Be sure to use these tools to avoid trashing wanted e-mail.

2) Same goes for Web sites or eZines you sign up for. Add their dot com to your list as soon as you sign up. Most legitimate eZines use a double-opt in subscription process that requires you respond or click on a link within an e-mail from them before you get formally added to their list. If you don’t get that e-mail to respond to it—you will not be added.

3) Before you empty your trash or junk folder—go through the trash! Take a quick peak and look at the Sender: and Subject: fields to see if names are familiar or for a topic that is expected. Otherwise you risk wanted e-mail going out with the trash!

Three simple little steps can help ensure the e-mail you do want lands in your inbox. The e-mail you are waiting for may have already arrived!

About the Author:
Judith Kallos is an authoritative and good-humored Technology Muse who has played @ http://www.TheIStudio.com for over a decade. Check out her popular Software, Programming and Web Design Cheat Sheets @ http://www.LearnAndThrive.com

Spam is out of control! I guess that would be the understatement of the year. Like any other annoying fact of life, you let it drive you crazy or you deal with it.

In the age of cyber communication, "Spam" has become the main way to get the message out to the masses. But if you think about it, I guess "spam" has always been with us. Before the Internet, when it came in our mailbox, we called it "junk mail". On TV, we call it an "infomercial". Over the telephone, it’s "telemarketing.

The determined marketer will always find an annoying way to try to get his message to the people, whether they want it or not. But to me those other methods always seemed more controllable.

"Junk mail", a quick look and chuck it in the trash. I guess it was a lesser volume of mail because the advertiser was paying for it? You know, postage and real paper.

The TV "infomercial", just turn off the Telly or change the channel. This form of bombardment is costly to the advertiser also.

Now "telemarketing" is a whole other animal. It doesn’t seem to matter what the cost to the advertiser is, the return is greater. The deterrents, like the national "don’t call me" doesn’t really work. My solution. Caller ID and don’t answer the phone if no name and/or phone number comes up. Oh yea! and an answering machine to catch the strays is helpful.

As an Internet marketer, with a web site, I get upwards of 500 emails in my inbox daily. What used to take minutes to sift through them now takes me hours.

When I am done and close my email client, a little window pops up and asks me if I am sure I want to delete the 450 emails in the trash? Over 450 of the approximately 500 emails I get daily are trash. That’s ludicrous!

You might say to yourself, why doesn’t he use a spam filtering program to get rid of the spam? Well so far all the spam filter software I have tried seems to throw out the baby with the bath water. I would rather trust my own internal spam filter, called common sense; and the "delete" key to get the job done.

None of the filters I have tried, no matter how fine tuned, doesn’t throw out the good email with the bad. In fact they are so fine tuned, that in trying to out smart the spammer they include many legitimate words or phrases in their list of no-no’s. So you still have to scan it.

The spam filters are even contributing to the amount of emails we get. Many legitimate Internet marketers have resorted to sending out a second email in case a spam filter stopped their first email from reaching you.

In fact, just mentioning the word "spam" in this article would probably keep it from being read by millions of people.

So what can we do about it? If I had a definitive answer to that question, I probably would get the Nobel Prize for Solving an Annoying World Problem. Do they have a Nobel Prize for solving an annoying world problem?

Anyway. Here is my humble offering in an attempt to rid the world of this cursed menace!

The best way, of course, would be not to buy any product or service offered by a spammer. If they don’t make any money as a result of their spamming, they eventually will get the message and stop. However, this solution would have to be undertaken on a global scale to be effective and there must be plenty of people who are reading and acting on the spammer’s message to prevent this from happening. Although I can’t for the life of me figure out why!

Another solution that you and I, as individuals, can do is delete the email and more importantly not buy from the spammer. Like trashing "junk mail", turning off the "informercial" on TV or not answering the phone when it’s a "telemarketer". You can take an individual stand.

Like the great actor Peter Finch, in his Oscar winning performance in Network (1976), tell the world your "mad as hell and your not going to take it anymore!"

About the Author —- Jim Capobianco, the author of "10 Steps to Your Own Home-Based Business", has been self-employed for over 25 years, both on and off line. At his web site, Cap-Tech.com and in his newsletter, The Cap-Tech Times, he shares his experience and expertise when it comes to owning your own business. Come pay a visit at: http://www.cap-tech.com

While the Federal Trade Commission is busy fighting over definitions of “What is SPAM;” Microsoft and Bill Gates are taking it to the enemy. Today Microsoft announced another case and legal action, which is being taken against a spammer who is in Germany. Microsoft did not announce the name of the company it has filed suit against but it is based in North Rhine-Westphalia.

The company is alledged to have sent millions of SPAM emails advertising various things including web design companies, porn and online casinos. You probably have even had to delete a few of them yourself recently. Many Hotmail email addresses received these SPAMs and the company was able to fool the SPAM blockers set up by Microsoft. The Westphalia firm denied charges and said it was one of his partners, not him? The company ran a network out of the Ukraine said Microsoft on the Belyfish and stated: “In the context of these offers the deplored one offers at present US dollar also 750 to million E-Mail addresses for $499.00"

Not only did it send these SPAM emails it was actively recruiting more customers and clients to do the same for them. Thank you Microsoft; what is up with the FTC these days? Definitions? Think about it?

"Lance Winslow" - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

You can stop unwanted email spam, you can choose to reduce spam email or you can do nothing and continue to be annoyed. Those are your only choices because spam email is not likely to go away.

Every single one of us would love to stop unwanted emails but only a very small percentage of people do anything except complain about spam.

You might remember a couple of years ago they passed a new federal spam law that was supposed to eliminate spam email. So why is spam still around and why is it so difficult to get rid of it?

Email spammers buy lists of email addresses from list brokers, who compile their lists by harvesting email addresses from the Internet. Then they send millions of unwanted email messages to these email addresses with one click of a mouse.

Email spammers make huge amounts of money from these lists and that’s why they do it. These email spammers are breaking the federal spam law, The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003, in every way possible.

This federal spam law, which became effective January 1, 2004, is next to impossible to enforce. Email spammers make so much money they can afford to outsmart The Federal Trade Commission with sophisticated technology.

Now that you know the origin of spam email and why email spammers are sending this junk you realize that spam is not likely to ever go away. But that doesn’t mean you can’t do anything about it. Here are a couple of ways to significantly reduce spam that won’t cost you a cent.

Don’t display your email address in newsgroup postings, chat rooms or in an online service’s membership directory. Sometimes email spammers use these sources to harvest email addresses.

Another thing you can do is create two email addresses with one for personal messages and the other for public use, such as in newsgroups or chat rooms.

You can also create an account at a disposable or free email address service. You can then have those emails forwarded to your permanent email address. If the disposable address starts to receive spam, you can turn if off without affecting the permanent address.

You should also create a unique email address because email spammers often use dictionary attacks to sort through possible name combinations at some Internet Service Providers. A common name, like johndoe or thesmiths may get more spam than a unique name like fx721OMe9.

Check your email account to see if it provides a tool to filter out potential spam or a way to channel spam into a bulk email folder. When you’re choosing an Internet Service Provider consider what email options they offer.

If you want to end your headaches, you can stop unwanted email spam altogether. All it takes is installing an Internet spam filter. Most are reasonably priced between $25 and $40 depending on where you get it.

Once you install an Internet spam filter you’ll wonder why it took you so long because it takes all of the frustration away from your email.

A good Internet spam filter will completely eliminate spam email and that lets you take back control of your Internet message Inbox. You’ll have to find something else to get annoyed about because a good Internet spam filter will block 100% of unwanted spam.

Internet spam filters stop unwanted email forever, and after all, isn’t that the idea?

Copyright © 2005 Spyware Information.com All Rights Reserved.

This article is provided by http://www.spyware-information.com We offer you the safest, most effective and easy-to-use Internet spam filter available, blocking 100% of unwanted spam at http://www.spyware-information.com/anti-spam-filter.html

Over the past few years you’ve all become familiar with the terms spam, spam filter, whitelists, blacklists and a whole myriad of other terminology associated with the problem of spam. You now have to add a new and extremely worrying phrase to that list - spam zombie.

With the net closing in around them spammers are looking for new and more inventive ways to send out their junk email. Spam filters and challenge response systems are becoming progressively more intelligent and blocking more spam each day. What was a spammer to do? The spammers took the next step - infiltrating your PC and using it as a spamming tool.

When most of you think of the word zombie you’re reminded of old B movies with groaning zombies chasing the terrified actress through a castle, swamp or whatever low cost setting the movie revolved around. Spam zombies are, however, far more real and far more dangerous.

A spam zombie is when your computer is taken over by a type of virus called a Trojan. Once this Trojan virus is on your computer it sets up an SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) application which allows it to begin sending email directly from your PC to tens of thousands of victims. This all happens invisibly in the background and can be difficult to detect for even the experienced computer user.

How do these Trojans get onto your computer? As in most cases they come from porn, warez or similar sites. One of the first spam zombie trojans to appear became available via a link on sites promising viewers free access to a porno webcam. One click later and the Trojan is installed on your computer ready to send out spam. Phatbot and Proxy-Guzu are two of the more common Trojans used for the purpose of turning your computer into a spam zombie.

How can you check if your computer has become a spam zombie? Make absolutely certain that both your anti-virus and firewall software have current detection signatures and have been completely patched and updated. Working online without taking these necessary security precautions is simply asking for trouble.

Internet Service Providers are under huge pressure to quarantine the IP address of any computer which has been turned into a spam zombie. This is done on the basis that the ISP risks their entire IP range being blacklisted or banned by some spam filtering services or companies.

The very least you owe yourself is to run a full virus and spyware scan on your computer today. You might be unpleasantly surprised at what you’ll find lurking there.

This article provided courtesy of Spam-site.com which reviews spam blocker software and other anti spam utilties.