I think that most of us would call spam a waste of our time and Internet resources. It clogs e-mail servers not only with the e-mails themselves but also the replies that most servers are required to send for e-mails that are not delivered. I cannot imagine why there are so many spam e-mails but obviously it is working because the number is continuing to increase. What can we, as the receivers of this unwanted e-mail, do to combat the problem?

The first method would be to never buy anything from an unsolicited e-mail. If spamming did not provide an economic benefit to the sender, then it would become obsolete. Even if the item that is being advertised is something that you would normally buy, do not buy it from them. Just like your mom used to tell you, do not encourage them. Some of the e-mails are actually a front to get your personal information and could then be used to start the process of identity theft against you. You could end up spending money and not receiving any product, and then find other charges that you did not authorize showing up on your bill. If that were not enough, you also will most likely be added to numerous e-mail lists that are sold within the spamming community. Verified addresses are much more costly than non-verified ones.

The next item is to delete any messages sent by a sender you do not know. While most spam is just annoying text or pictures, there are also those that contain viruses or some other exploit that could damage the computer when it is opened. There are also many e-mails that you could receive from people that you know that you would want to delete because of possible virus activity, but that is for a different column.

Next, never respond to any spam message or click on any links in the message. You might think that you are unsubscribing but usually the only thing you are doing is to verify that they have a valid e-mail address. Now you are back to being added to many more lists because you tried to unsubscribe.

If you choose to use auto preview for your e-mail, there is an option in most client programs that will block any external content. Be sure that you do not turn this on since there is the possibility that the spammers can verify your address when the pictures within the e-mail are shown in the preview pane. This would be the same as responding to the e-mail.

The last item would be to never give out your primary address to anyone or any website that you do not trust. It would be better to have a secondary e-mail address like Hotmail or Yahoo that you use for all your online activity. This would help to keep your online activity separate from your normal correspondence. Then all of the junk e-mail will go to the online account and not your personal account.

Now we can move on to filtering the junk out. Hotmail has a very good filtering system for spam e-mail. The basic setting will send most of the spam to a special folder labeled Junk E-mail and you can change the setting to only allow e-mail from addresses that appear in your contact list. This would defeat the purpose of the account since most everyone that had this address would not be listed as a contact.

The newest version of Microsoft Outlook also has a very good spam filter built into the program. You have the same options as with a Hotmail account and you can also create a list of safe senders, recipients and blocked senders. You can even choose to block any e-mail that originates from any address ending with a specific top-level domain. This could stop all of the traffic that you might receive from the Russian or Czech domains. I do not know of one e-mail that I have received from either of these countries that has been legitimate.

The best defense is going to be to use some sort of filter as well as a secondary address. After that it is going to be up to you to follow the guidelines for the spam that happens to get past the filters. One slip up and you could find yourself on many more lists. Try to use the suggestions that have been provided. There is no absolute way to stay off the lists, but these suggestions should help reduce spam.