Do you get emails saying 'you have won a lottery'?

[arnab_das]

I dont know why but i have been getting loads and loads of these mails recently. i know these are spam and phishing scams but frankly, it makes for a quite interesting read sometimes.

Eg. today's mails were from Congo, UK, and hold your breath Microsoft! (which had apparently opened a gmail account :P ) etc. all asking me to take action coz i had won lottery worth over 30 million usd. :D

u guys get any of these mails?

[Bachstelze]

Yes, it's called spam. SpamAssassin blocks most of those, though.

[_h_]

Some of them are fun to read, others not so fun.

[|Mitch|]

No I don't get any spam mail, but I keep my email hidden and don't use it to subscribe to anything.

My parents on the other hand always subscribe to those free coupons, publishers clearing house etc...and they get A TON of spam.

I'm assuming they sell their email list to other companies...

[oldsoundguy]

Seldom .. I have an ISP that screens out about 99% of the spam. Get maybe one or two a week. Never have received the Nigera scam, for instance. How much crap you get in your inbox is really dependent on your ISP.
One way I used to use in Windows when I was USING Windows was a program called Mail Washer.
It WILL run under Wine in Linux.
Nice (free for one eMail account) program in that you can pre-screen your mail and leave it on your server (sort of like AOL), but if it is spam .. unlike AOL, you can BOUNCE the crap back.
ALSO .. get a junk mail account to use to sign into those on line sites. THAT is where some of the spammers get your eMail!

NOTE: never clear out that junk account (have fun .. use MS!! LOL) and let it fill to the eyeballs. Eventually it will get full and the spammers will get an automatic "non-deliverable"!

[lisati]

No I don't get any spam mail, but I keep my email hidden and don't use it to subscribe to anything.

My parents on the other hand always subscribe to those free coupons, publishers clearing house etc...and they get A TON of spam.

I'm assuming they sell their email list to other companies...

Good advice. I have one email address which I created to use here and which in a moment of carelessness I used on a blog site. The spambots didn't take long to discover it, and the only email I receive on it is junk.

I generally report spam at Spamcop (http://spamcop.net).

Side note: The thing to watch about programs like MailWasher that can bounce emails is that often the "from" address in spam is often bogus - bouncing emails with a bogus "from" address can mark you as a spammer because innocent third parties receive the bounce instead of the real spammers. I've had one of my email addresses "borrowed" by a spammer and used in the "from" address - it wasn't much fun getting up in the morning and having to delete several thousand bounce messages.

[oxf]

I never got any in a personal email I used because never used it to post on blogs etc. Until, a few weeks ago that was. I was involved in organising a project so we all CC'd all communication to the roughly 20 people involved (all legit emails as well). Suddenly I get spam. I presume someone on the list had some sort of security compromise, exactly what I dont know.
Sigh....!

[oxf]

Good advice. I have one email address which I created to use here and which in a moment of carelessness I used on a blog site. The spambots didn't take long to discover it, and the only email I receive on it is junk.

I generally report spam at Spamcop (http://spamcop.net).

.

Is there any risk or downside to reporting to Spamcop?

[lisati]

Is there any risk or downside to reporting to Spamcop?

The only one I can think of at the moment is that if the spammers set things up so that they receive abuse reports - this could confirm to them that they've stumbled onto a real email address. You can, however, ask Spamcop to "munge" (obscure) identifying information in reports they send out on your behalf.

[oxf]

The only one I can think of at the moment is that if the spammers set things up so that they receive abuse reports - this could confirm to them that they've stumbled onto a real email address. You can, however, ask Spamcop to "munge" (obscure) identifying information in reports they send out on your behalf.

Glad you defined "munge" for me :)

[Frogs Hair]

I get Mexican medication mail and UPS mail stating I have a package to pick up if only I provide all my personal information. I'm still getting that fake Facebook password scam too, but I'm not a member.

[Doctor Mike]

Thunderbird, Thunderbird, Thunderbird, and did I mention Thunderbird for Windows. :)

[lisati]

I get Mexican medication mail and UPS mail stating I have a package to pick up if only I provide all my personal information. I'm still getting that fake Facebook password scam too, but I'm not a member.

What amuses me is that a lot of the time the scam/spam that comes in claiming to be from a legitimate organization where the sender has used a free email account like Yahoo, hotmail or gmail instead of the real organization's email system.

[Berk]

The one's I'm currently getting are all from Blizzard telling me that they're investigating me for account trading.
Shame that not one of the links in the e-mails go to the right address, or that the email address (along with URL) keep changing each time. I also haven't activated my WoW account for 2 years now. :D
Silly spammers.

[-grubby]

They've slipped through Gmail's filters a couple times.

[Irihapeti]

I was very careful what I did with my main email address. I have a couple of others that I use for websites, blogs, online purchases and so on.

The trouble is, you can't prevent other people doing silly things, such as getting their details phished or doing a "forward to everyone in your address book" when they get a fake virus warning. A family member was a victim of a phishing scam and since then I've been getting spam on my main address only.

As it's not massive amounts and the ISP's filters mostly work, I'm just putting up with it.

PS: Does it ever go away if you don't respond?

[J V]

From experience, Bayesian filters are great against spam... Afaik evolution has one... not sure about Thunderbird but I'm sure theres a plugin somewhere :)

Best anti-spam is not posting your email all over the internet (Mine must have leaked somewhere as I got my 5th spam message in 6 years today)

[samjh]

I've actually received spam email from my own email address (the one I have with my ISP) on two occasions. It was quite unnerving, and I reported it to my ISP, but they said the address was spoofed (obviously) and they couldn't do anything about it.

Weird.