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The phenomenal spread of the Internet all over the world has led to countless innovations and practices. In the recent years, another phenomenon has risen to the top of the things to do list on the Internet blogging. Relatively unknown several years ago, blogging is now one of most common activities online. It is derived from the root word blog, which is actually short for web log an online diary of sorts. Then there is spamming. Spam, in the broad sense of the word, simply means anything that is junk. E-mails and other information that is repeated and essentially irrelevant are considered spam. Put blog and spam together and you have blog spams.

What exactly is a blog spam? A blog spam is simply a blog that does not have much in form of content. A blog spam exists merely to drive traffic to certain sites. It is in fact used by many people as a SEO technique. Blog spamming is not acceptable to a wide range of sectors. With the main aim of generating traffic, blog spams do not really contribute anything relevant. They exist to provide links to their parent websites and nothing else.

How do you spam blogs? As already discussed above, blogs are normally used to publish information related to website content. Thus content is the most important thing. For blog spams, however, no such importance is placed on content. Thus blog spams may contain just about anything! To increase traffic to the parent website, blog spams are normally filled with only links or classifieds (which actually point to another site). Another aspect of spam blogging is the comment feature. Programs are created to post spam as comments in different blogs. This has become an irritant because spam posted as comments are generally unrelated to the blog topic.

Of course, many legitimate blog hosts condemn spam blogging and are coming up with ways to prevent spam blogging. One of these is through the image verification process where the person posting a comment has to enter a security code before the comment is published. Another one is trough comment moderation options made available in some blogs. Companies which host free blogs are the worst hit by blog spams. However, despite the efforts of these companies to counter blog spamming, unscrupulous individuals somehow still find ways to spam blogs. Maybe this is due largely to the fact that the Internet is a fast evolving technology, and what may work now may not do so the next day. But the best thing you can do is this: provide great content and you will find that there is no need for blog spamming.

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The damage spam brings you is huge: loss of time, bandwidth and money, risk to delete a legitimate message together with junk emails. So, an anti-spam filter is not a whim but a necessity for almost all PC users who actively use email.

What criteria should you follow to choose the right spam filtering program? What capabilities must an anti-spam tool have to filter and cut off spam mail in most effective way?

Here are the main features a good anti-spam software must have to block spam effectively:

1) it should be a standalone spam filtering tool, which checks all incoming emails on the server, detects and deletes spam messages.

2) deletion of spam without receiving it in your inbox. This way you won’t download all the superfluous kilobytes into your inbox and you won’t see annoying spam mail.

3) powerful antispam filters built in one program that analyze the message from “outside” and “inside”: message header, message body, and message source. Flexible whitelist and blacklist easy to edit and update are also very useful as they help save much time when filtering emails. Good anti-spam software must also have the Bayesian filter in its arsenal of spam filtering tools.

4) easy and safe method to preview emails marked as spam. Inherent in antispam technology is the fact that there will be false positives and false negatives, i.e., email can be flagged as spam even though it is not actually spam and vice versa.

5) flexible spam filtering. Spam emails should be moved to a separate folder. A good spam filtering software should provide the ability to recover an email if it was accidentally marked as spam and trashed.

Simply put, an anti-spam program must be a standalone, easy-to-use software supplied with powerful anti-spam filters able to be adjusted by every user for his personal needs. Now with all that said above you can choose the right anti-spam software among all spam filtering programs available on the Internet.

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Unless your website is dead and six feet below the virtual ground, you are ever prone to the Internet evil commonly known as comment spam. Comment spam infiltrates every active online website which supports or accepts links from users or participants.

A comment spam is generally characterized with links and no sense, understandably so since its main concern is to be able to take advantage of the algorithm techniques of most search engines in making certain websites rank higher than the others.

Senseless as a comment spam may look at the outset, the makers of these said comment spam are extremely intelligent creatures that are properly harnessing the power of the Internet and its users to generate undeserved income.

Strangely enough, the object of affection of the makers behind every comment spam is not to gain popularity from the people and websites that they are spamming, but rather they use it to get an edge in the totem pole of user access which we know to be called search engines.

Comment spam in huge volumes actually allows the culprits to generate high ranking in search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Ask Jeeves. It helps them generate more revenue from receiving more clicks and having their links displayed all over the World Wide Web for all the people to see, regardless if these people care about what they’re advertising or not.

The allure of resorting to generation of a battalion of comment spam actually emanates from the fact that it works. No matter how hated spammers get for being an online pest for websites, they get to earn a lot from it. Even when the growing number of efforts to reduce comment spam is alive and kicking, a lot of people are doing it since it is a very powerful marketing ploy.

While thoroughly extinguishing comment spam may seem to be an impossible feat, there have been various ways created to diminish, if not eliminate the influx of comment spam in various online systems. One way of eliminating comment spam involves completely blocking off all comments. However, this method is very self-limiting and deprives the user the freedom for healthy online interaction. Not all comments are comment spam, and anyone who deprives himself of getting authentic feedbacks for the sake of blocking a spam comment is at a losing edge.

Some companies have already launched their own versions of anti-spam techniques for the benefit and protection of their users. Still, even with the best of the best anti-spam method, a comment spam can still find its way even in the most protected pages. But it is better to have some level of protection than none, so every user must exercise his or her right to have spam-free interactions by selectively seeking the websites which are more protected and encouraging other websites which are not entirely comment spam-protected.

Filters are also used by most systems to purge comment spam, but they need to be updated frequently since these notorious comment spam authors are extremely resourceful people with a knack for taking advantage of every online loophole they could find.

Read more on Comment Spam: Allure for the Online Totem Pole…

Though previously not acknowledged as a serious threat, spamming has now reached about 60% to 70% of all e-mail traffic all over the world. Different institutions and organizations, including government agencies, recognize the threat spam brings with it. Thus anti-spamming efforts have been on the rise in the past years.

Spam software is one of the most commonly employed tools against spam. There are many available spam software in the market today. They make use of a variety of methods and techniques. In choosing the right spam software for your company, you should at least know the concept behind them. This will help you choose the most suitable spam software to meet your needs.

Spam software usually makes use of spam filters. A spam filter basically identifies specific items keywords or IP addresses for example that are either allowed to go through or are blocked. One technique that some spam software make use of is the RBL or Real Time Black Hole List. In this method, the spam filter takes note of IP addresses, which are known to send spam. All communication from these IP addresses is then blocked.

Another technique used by spam software is keyword based filtering. In this method, the spam software is configured by the user by inputting specific keywords and key phrases, which are to be banned. All communication with these keywords and phrases are then blocked by the spam filter.

Other spam software makes use of permission-based filtering. E-mail addresses are supposed to be authorized, otherwise they are blocked. Spam filters, which are permission-based, also make use of tags embedded in the e-mails to determine whether to give authorization or not. The absence of these tags would then prompt the spam filter to block the e-mail.

Another technique used by spam software is concept-based filtering. This method scans the text and detects its concept. If the concept does not meet the requirements of the spam filter, the e-mail is then blocked.

These are some of the most commonly used techniques in combating spam through spam software. Determine which method would suit your needs best. Then you can look into different spam software that you can use

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Almost everyone who accesses the Internet and uses e-mail knows about spam. The common definition of spam is e-mail that is unsolicited, undesired by the recipient. Spam is sent out by automated programs to thousands or millions email addresses at a time. In most cases spam emails offer you different services, products (medicines, goods, software programs etc.), and “get rich quickly” plans. You can simply delete them if you receive several unsolicited emails per day. But if you get tens or hundreds spam messages every day, it is a real problem. In order to understand how to deal with spam in your inbox, let’s examine some core questions concerning spam:

Why send spam?

The right answer is to make money. If you have never opened a spam message, you should not think that others don’t do it either. Among thousands or millions people who receive spam you can always find one or several persons who actually purchase services or products the spammers advertise, or join the “get rich” schemes the spammers offer. Of course, they lose and the spammer wins.

How do spammers obtain email addresses?

Spammers use special software programs that search websites, forums, newsgroups and harvest posted email addresses. They can use computer viruses and spyware to steal the email addresses from personal address books. Spammers often purchase lists of email addresses from other spammers, or from some dishonest companies, which do not care about the privacy of their customers’ information.

What danger lies behind spam?

Never buy pharmaceutical drugs such as Valium, Viagra, Cialis, Anatrim, etc. advertised in spam emails. These medications are counterfeited for 99% and can be dangerous.

Viruses – one of the most common computer security threats – can also be spread in spam emails. The worst thing is that viruses slip onto your computer without being noticed. You may think that you will download new free software when you click on a link within a spam message but actually you will get at least one virus infection – most probably a trojan virus. This type of virus can destroy data, steal your personal information such a user name, password, or just download other nasty software onto your computer that will cause more harm. A virus can hide itself in a picture, video or audio file. Certain anti-spam programs such as G-Lock SpamCombat let you preview the messages in a safe mode, i.e. they don’t allow any suspicious pictures to be downloaded nor malicious codes to be executed.

A virus is a nuisance but phishing is a real danger. This type of spam is becoming very popular now. This is a method of tricking consumers with the purpose to worm them out of their personal information such as bank account numbers, passwords, user names, and credit card details. The spammers send a fraudulent email that usually appears to come from financial institutions like Ebay or Paypal saying that there is some trouble with your account and that you need to update it. There is a link within the message that you should follow to update the account details. The web site usually looks like a real company’s web site. But as soon as you start filling the presented form in, the program starts recording your keystrokes and your private details are now disclosed to the spammer.

How to fight spam?

It is prudent to use an anti-spam filter to block annoying, time consuming, and sometimes dangerous spam emails. Anti-spam software checks your incoming emails and immediately moves spam messages into a special trash folder. If you want a good internet security suite that includes a spam blocker, consider BitDefender Professional Plus, Kaspersky Internet Security, F-Secure Internet Security or eTrust Internet Security. For a standalone spam filtering program, look at McAfee Spam Killer, G-Lock SpamCombat, Spam Assassin, Mail Washer Pro or ZapASpam.

Read more on Spam – Problem Of Vital Importance On The Internet…

Almost everyone who used to communicate via e-mail has ever found in the Inbox the messages from people he doesn’t know proposing some services or products. All unsolicited and undesired messages you receive are SPAM. The emails of this kind usually offer pharmaceutical products, diet methods, sexual enhancements aid, and “get rich quick” plans. You can also meet bogus sales pitches, sales opportunities, and different types of scams. In addition to stock scams, in which spammers encourage you to invest money, a new spam-scam gambit called phishing is becoming very popular now. This scam is aimed to obtaining people’s private information such as user name, password, credit card details, etc. An example is an email coming from PayPal or Ebay asking you to go to the company’s web site and update your account. If you do it, the spammers will record your keystrokes and your private details will be disclosed to them. And have you ever received pitiful letters from a widow or a relative of the former ruler of Nigeria? Sure you have. It’s a famous Nigerian fraud that is still having a place on the Internet. Don’t be enticed by the millions they would promise you. All they want is your bank account details in order to rob you.

How do you identify spam among legitimate messages? You usually look at the sender’s name, which may be unknown to you or contain some gibberish. You also read the subject line of the message. As a rule the subject line of spam emails concerns gambling, pornography, or an offer to make a fortune in 24 hours. But the spammers are also able to create an email identical to legitimate one coming from a respected source. In other cases, the subject lines may indicate that the message is a reply to your email. A general way to distinguish spam is to read the To and From header fields in all the messages you receive. If you see strange, anonymous or scrambled alpha-numeric email addresses (for example, gt4590xx@domain.com) then you have spam. Some anti-spam solutions provide you with the capability to preview the emails. For example, in addition to a safe message content preview, G-Lock SpamCombat allows you analyze the message header in detail: From, To, Subject, Received and other header fields.

How to block spam? Remember, the point of spam is to have you open the email. Once you do it, the least trouble you may have is to let the spammer know that your email address is valid. It’s luck for a spammer. He can continue spamming you in the hope that earlier or later you will swallow the bait. Or, he can sell your email address to someone else. Also, be aware that spammers send millions emails at a time, so even a very tiny response rate is a great success for them. Let’s imagine that 100 out of 10 millions people invested 5 dollars each into a scam offered by a spammer. So, the spammer makes 500 dollars at a time.

If you are really suffering from a continuous spam flow, you can consider getting a new email address and disclose it to trusted senders only. Or, you can start clearing your inbox from spam right away using anti-spam software. Although not perfect, anti-spam filters are now very sophisticated and very effective at cutting out most of spam.

Anti-spam programs basically do one or more of the following things:

1. Check the senders’ email addresses and names against a blacklist of spammers they own and delete the message if the sender is on the blacklist.

2. Check the recipients’ email addresses and names and filter the messages according to certain parameters. For example, if the email is sent to a large group of recipients sorted alphabetically, the email is considered spam.

3. Analyze the message content and subject line and search for certain words or phrases, which are typically met in spam emails such as “Viagra”, “Cialis”, “Mortgage”, “Invest” and filter the spam email accordingly.

There are many kinds of anti spam solutions now. Software developers offer standalone spam blockers like Mail Washer, Spam Nullifier, G-Lock SpamCombat, etc. Most of the big, free email services such as Yahoo!, Google, MSN, and Hotmail also provide effective spam filtering. You just need to choose the right anti-spam solution that will serve you in the most effective way.

Read more on What Is Spam? How To Identify And Block It?…

Spam involves sending unsolicited e-mail to many people, and is a very common practice today. It is not unusual for the average person to have 30% of his or her e-mail as spam, and there is a huge demand for new techniques to block spam including the existing methods, such as spam blockers, spam filters and the creation of e-mail whitelists.

The most unfortunate aspect of how spam works is that it is quite simple. A spammer needs only collect a large number of web addresses and an unwanted advertisement can be sent to hundreds of people. Many spammers use software to make their spamming easier. There are many different kinds of spam and people who are responsible for this annoyance.

E-mail spam involves simply sending out an ad to hundreds of recipients. Many people have spam blockers in place, which bounce the unsolicited e-mail back tot he sender, or filters which place the suspicious e-mail in a bulk folder until the recipient has time to decide to accept or reject it. In addition to e-mail spam, which is the most common form of spam, there are also forms of spam that appear on Instant Messenger accounts, newsgroups, blogs and mobile phones.

Spammers are quite happy that there is no operating costs involved in their schemes and that the barrier to their entry is quite low, even given the newest filtering and blocking systems. Even though these programs might be effective in weeding out spam, spammers are becoming more sophisticated and re-wording suspicious looking headings and subject lines. In a word, spamming is as easy as sending an e-mail, except that one has to manage exceptionally large e-mail lists.

Since spamming is discouraged and against the law in some places, many spammers are desperate to avoid detection. They launch their spam campaigns from other computers or “zombie” computers which send the spam for them. Once they bypass security devices and are able to obtain sensitive information about a PC, they can use the PC for sending unsolicited bulk mail.

Another possibility is to get a hold of addresses and to get them to send spam. The result of this is that a spammer might be unaware that he or she is spamming, since another computer is controlling his or her PC. The unwitting spammer might be placed on blacklists, could lose internet service and denied access to certain chat groups. This is very serious in addition to the fact that spammer face stiff fines and even the possibility of incarceration.

Spammers are becoming increasingly sophisticated in avoiding filters and blockers. The heading of an e-mail may say simply “Hey” or lack a heading altogether. Spam filters are not vigilant about such subject lines and allow many of them through. Since spam filters are concerned with blocking e-mails with certain words, some spammers intentionally misspell words to bypass these restrictions.

Spam is, unfortunately, all too easy, but more e-mail users who do not want spam are setting up whitelists that allow only certain people to e-mail them. It is impossible for spamsters to penetrate these walls, but the added protection may spell a lack of spontaneity for the consumer.

Read more on How Spam Works…

Spam involves sending unsolicited e-mail to many people, and is a very common practice today. It is not unusual for the average person to have 30% of his or her e-mail as spam, and there is a huge demand for new techniques to block spam including the existing methods, such as spam blockers, spam filters and the creation of e-mail whitelists.

The most unfortunate aspect of how spam works is that it is quite simple. A spammer needs only collect a large number of web addresses and an unwanted advertisement can be sent to hundreds of people. Many spammers use software to make their spamming easier. There are many different kinds of spam and people who are responsible for this annoyance.

E-mail spam involves simply sending out an ad to hundreds of recipients. Many people have spam blockers in place, which bounce the unsolicited e-mail back tot he sender, or filters which place the suspicious e-mail in a bulk folder until the recipient has time to decide to accept or reject it. In addition to e-mail spam, which is the most common form of spam, there are also forms of spam that appear on Instant Messenger accounts, newsgroups, blogs and mobile phones.

Spammers are quite happy that there is no operating costs involved in their schemes and that the barrier to their entry is quite low, even given the newest filtering and blocking systems. Even though these programs might be effective in weeding out spam, spammers are becoming more sophisticated and re-wording suspicious looking headings and subject lines. In a word, spamming is as easy as sending an e-mail, except that one has to manage exceptionally large e-mail lists.

Since spamming is discouraged and against the law in some places, many spammers are desperate to avoid detection. They launch their spam campaigns from other computers or “zombie” computers which send the spam for them. Once they bypass security devices and are able to obtain sensitive information about a PC, they can use the PC for sending unsolicited bulk mail.

Another possibility is to get a hold of addresses and to get them to send spam. The result of this is that a spammer might be unaware that he or she is spamming, since another computer is controlling his or her PC. The unwitting spammer might be placed on blacklists, could lose internet service and denied access to certain chat groups. This is very serious in addition to the fact that spammer face stiff fines and even the possibility of incarceration.

Spammers are becoming increasingly sophisticated in avoiding filters and blockers. The heading of an e-mail may say simply “Hey” or lack a heading altogether. Spam filters are not vigilant about such subject lines and allow many of them through. Since spam filters are concerned with blocking e-mails with certain words, some spammers intentionally misspell words to bypass these restrictions.

Spam is, unfortunately, all too easy, but more e-mail users who do not want spam are setting up whitelists that allow only certain people to e-mail them. It is impossible for spamsters to penetrate these walls, but the added protection may spell a lack of spontaneity for the consumer.

Read more on How Spam Works…

Not everyone will like changing his email address to get rid of spam because many people share their email addresses with their friends, colleagues, subscribers, and customers. They also may have business cards and other material with the email addresses printed on them. Moreover, getting a new email address won’t free you from spam forever. It will work the first time while your email is new. But as far as you will be using it to communicate with your contacts, the spam flow coming to that email address will be growing. So, how to combat spam? Where is the right solution? One of the effective ways to combat spam is using an anti-spam filter. Fortunately, there are a lot of anti-spam tools available on the Internet.

I am using the anti-spam filter is called SpamCombat. For me, it’s a “must-have” tool. I’ve been using it for about 2 years and my statistics show that 80% of emails I receive are deleted by SpamCombat.

The particularity of SpamCombat is that it works at the source i.e. it connects directly to your inbox on the server and manages the emails there. It’s not the same when you are using the filters in your email software, for example Outlook or Thunderbird. The major difference is that SpamCombat deletes spam and junk emails on the email server so that you never have to download them. Using an anti-spam filter in Outlook, for instance, would mean that you have to pull down the messages onto your computer first and then analyze and manage them accordingly. This may pose a threat if some emails contain viruses.

SpamCombat is easy to use. It’ll take just a few minutes to set it up. The downloadable version of SpamCombat will never expire so you have plenty of time to decide if it is working for you. SpamCombat is provided with 6 filters, which detect spam emails with great accuracy and precision. You can customize the filters for your needs. On the company’s user forum there is a topic dedicated to SpamCombat filters: http://www.justlan.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=937

The program users gratefully share their filters with others and I found many useful anti-spam filters there. I added some of them to my SpamCombat installation and the amount of spam that was identified increased to 80%. This means that on average, 3 of every 10 emails I receive are legitimate and are allowed through by SpamCombat. The rest are deleted at the server and I don’t have to spend time downloading them. This is a big deal if you are using dialup access to the Internet.

There is a concept of a blacklist and a whitelist. You can “whitelist” and “blacklist” the emails by any field from the message header (not only by the From field where the message sender’s email address is) and by any word or phrase from the message content. SpamCombat will allow all emails through that are on the whitelist, and it will mark for deletion or automatically delete all those that are on the blacklist. Adding or removing someone from the whitelist or blacklist is a very simple point and click exercise.

SpamCombat also allows using wildcards and regular expressions to set legitimate filters up. For example, if you specify all emails coming from your company domain name as being legitimate, then all messages from your colleagues will be allowed through without you having to specify each person. You can achieve this by using a wildcard setting such as “*@youworkdomain.com”. This can also be used to blacklist an entire domain such that all messages are immediately marked for deletion or automatically deleted depending on your settings.

There is also the Bayesian filter, self-learning system based on legitimate and spam emails you receive. I trained the Bayesian filter well and now it identifies my legitimate and spam emails in the proper way.

SpamCombat also has more advanced filters. One of them is known as “DNSBL filter”. There are servers on the internet which list known spam addresses. When you receive a message from one of these addresses, SpamCombat automatically marks it as spam without your filters even being invoked. This is a remarkable filter. It identifies about 10% of spam emails that I get.

Another advanced filter is called Complex Filter. This filter is based on the VBScript. If you are familiar with the VBScript, you can write a script and add it to the Complex Filter. A nice filter is described there: http://www.glocksoft.net/sc/discover-amazingly-powerful-anti-spam-filter/

The software configuration is very flexible. You can choose a deletion mode for spam emails by yourself: you can specify the emails to be deleted automatically without your participation, or you can have the program mark them for deletion but let you preview them just in case. This is important at the beginning until you tailor the program for your mail.

You can also set SpamCombat to move spam emails to the internal program trash or delete them permanently. The emails will be stored in the trash for a number of days depending on your settings. There is also a way to recover an email from the trash and receive it with your regular email client.

SpamCombat is independent software and does not interfere with your email client. It sits in the system tray and does its work thoroughly. On my computer, it checks my inbox every 20 minutes and notifies me that new emails arrived. I then review them and do a cleanout. I have my email client setup to only receive messages when I instruct it to so that SpamCombat has the most opportunity to do its work.

SpamCombat is an indispensable tool in my email arsenal. If spam is a vital problem for you, it could do likewise for you. Download your free copy today and use it for as long as you want to fight spam on your main email account.

Read more on Download Spam Blocker Now And Stop Spam Immediately…

Bayesian spam filters work by analyzing the contents of the email, and then calculating the probability of the message being spam. They analyze the characteristics of both, the legitimate mails as well as the spam mails. For the Bayesian spam filtering process, both, the characteristics of the legitimate mails as well as the spam mails are equally important. As it analyzes the mails, it keeps on building up a list of genuine as well as spam characteristics.

Read more on What are the Chances of Spammers Getting Past Bayesian Spam Filters?…